2026-09-01T08:00:29.315Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/01/politics/john-roberts-ballroom-dissent-supreme-court
“白宫绝非普通建筑。”
美国首席大法官约翰·罗伯茨如是说。这位时常尊重唐纳德·特朗普行政权威的大法官，周一却与总统及最高法院保守派同僚分道扬镳，就这项规模庞大的舞厅项目提出异议。
对这位曾撰写多篇支持特朗普的重要判决意见的首席大法官而言，这是一次罕见的异议，也是一次引人注目的决裂——其中包括2024年特朗普免于刑事起诉的裁定，以及去年6月赋予特朗普解雇独立机构负责人权力的判决。
不过，此番言论仍是典型的罗伯茨风格。
他长达六页的异议声明中，处处体现出对首都历史与建筑的重视。他援引西奥多·罗斯福和温斯顿·丘吉尔的言论，颂扬标志性建筑的价值。
“‘我们塑造建筑，而后建筑塑造我们’，”罗伯茨写道，这句话出自丘吉尔1943年的一场战时演讲。
这位首席大法官补充道：“这更说明，在决定拆除和重建这座‘人民之家’时，相关责任人必须遵守规则。”
罗伯茨时常向听众提及，他原本打算攻读历史学博士学位，而非在哈佛大学攻读法律学位。他此番言论也凸显了华盛顿历史建筑的象征意义。
他指出，1902年罗斯福感谢国会拨款增建东西两翼时，曾提及原始建筑“庄重简约”，并强调保护“作为历史丰碑、维系我们与国家过去联系的此类建筑”的重要性。
这位常为最高法院柱廊建筑感到自豪的首席大法官，在其意见书中始终展现出对白宫建筑美学的重视。（最高法院大楼直到1935年才建成，比白宫和国会大厦的建造晚了一个多世纪。）
不过，罗伯茨的立场并未起到任何作用，至少对特朗普而言没有任何代价。罗伯茨的五名保守派同僚占据多数席位，允许总统继续推进这项已开展近一年、即将完工的舞厅建设工程。
尽管如此，罗伯茨周一的声明，为这位首席大法官应对特朗普大胆的第二任期议程的记录增添了新的维度。特朗普相关案件占据了最高法院的办案日程，也将影响罗伯茨本人的司法遗产。
尽管罗伯茨批准了特朗普的多项政策，但在上一届庭审中，他投票反对两项最极端的举措：未经国会批准对外国商品征收全面关税，以及试图限制出生公民权——这项已有数百年历史的惯例赋予所有在美国出生的儿童美国公民身份。
周一这起援引美国历史的案件，也让人想起罗伯茨作为史密森学会会长的身份。这一职位主要是荣誉性的，由首席大法官的身份自然获得，但他确实主持过史密森学会的董事会会议，并见证了特朗普政府持续重塑美国主要公立博物馆的努力。
特朗普试图将华盛顿改造成符合自己形象的城市，其中包括推动在约翰·F·肯尼迪表演艺术中心镌刻自己的名字，以及建造一座250英尺高的凯旋拱门。这座拱门计划修建在阿灵顿国家公墓入口与林肯纪念堂之间的环岛处。
此案由国家历史保护信托基金会提起。该基金会辩称，拆除东翼并建造9万平方英尺的舞厅和安保设施需要国会批准。
联邦下级法院初步支持该信托基金会的主张，准许案件继续审理。法官们认定该信托基金会具备起诉资格，因为它证明了自身遭受了重大损害。该基金会指出，其长期领导者、建筑历史学家艾莉森·霍格兰德称，她对白宫的欣赏受到了损害。
最高法院多数大法官认定她的理由不成立，写道：“仅仅是冒犯、不同意或厌恶，并不构成起诉所需的具体且特定的损害。”多数方以“法庭全体一致”（per curiam，拉丁语，意为“由法院作出”）的形式发布了该意见，这类紧急上诉案件通常采用这种形式。克拉伦斯·托马斯、塞缪尔·阿利托、尼尔·戈萨奇、布雷特·卡瓦诺和艾米·科尼·巴雷特这五名大法官均未附上单独意见。
在罗伯茨看来，霍格兰德的主张绝非微不足道。（自由派大法官索尼娅·索托马约尔、埃琳娜·卡根和凯坦吉·布朗·杰克逊加入了他的意见。）
这位首席大法官强调了霍格兰德的专业资质，指出：“白宫绝非普通建筑，而就历史保护而言，霍格兰德也绝非普通人士。”
他指出，以往的法院判例曾认定“审美利益”主张可构成损害。他援引了1992年的一项先例，正如罗伯茨所描述的，该案中的表述称，“哪怕仅仅出于审美目的，观察某一特定鳄鱼物种的愿望，无疑也是一种值得承认的、具备起诉资格的利益”。
就本案而言，罗伯茨宣称：“像霍格兰德这样的历史保护主义者，会因经常参观的历史建筑被改造而遭受具体且特定的审美损害，正如环保主义者会因定期参观的特定动物灭绝、特定森林或河流被改造而遭受具体且特定的审美损害一样。”
周一的案件仅围绕起诉资格问题展开——多数方称其并未对舞厅项目本身的合法性作出裁决——但罗伯茨明确表达了他对整个项目的看法。
他在开篇指出，国会明确禁止在“未获得国会明确授权”的情况下，在此类联邦土地上进行建设。
他说：“这项建设很可能是违法的”，并宣称通常用于白宫维护的拨款“很可能并未授权总统动用数亿美元的私人捐款，拆除东翼并在原址建造舞厅”。
John Roberts often defers to Trump but not for the White House ballroom project
2026-09-01T08:00:29.315Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/01/politics/john-roberts-ballroom-dissent-supreme-court
“The White House is not just any building.”
So said Chief Justice John Roberts, who has often deferred to Donald Trump’s executive authority, but on Monday separated himself from the president and fellow Supreme Court conservatives to protest the colossal ballroom project.
It was a rare dissent and remarkable break for the chief justice who has penned some of the most important opinions backing Trump, including the 2024 grant of immunity from criminal prosecution and last June’s decision giving him power to fire the heads of independent agencies.
Still, the rhetoric was vintage Roberts.
His six-page dissenting statement was laced with regard for history and architecture in the nation’s capital. He quoted Theodore Roosevelt and Winston Churchill as he extolled the value of iconic structures.
“‘We shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us,’” Roberts wrote, lifting a page from a 1943 Churchill war speech.
To that, the chief justice added, “All the more reason to ensure that those responsible follow the rules in deciding what to tear down and what to build up at the People’s House.”
Roberts, who regularly tells audiences that he once intended to pursue a history Ph.D. rather than law degree at Harvard, touted the symbolism of Washington’s historic architecture.
He observed that when Roosevelt in 1902 thanked Congress for the appropriations for the additions of the East and West wings, Roosevelt referred to “the stately simplicity” of the original architecture and the importance of preserving “such buildings as historic monuments which keep alive our sense of continuing with the Nation’s past.”
Throughout his opinion, the chief justice, who often shows pride in the Supreme Court’s columned building, demonstrated his own regard for the aesthetic of the White House structure. (The court did not have its own building until 1935, more than a century after the construction of the White House and US Capitol.)
Yet, Roberts’ position failed to make a difference and was costless, at least to Trump. Roberts’ five conservative colleagues had a majority to allow the president to continue the ballroom construction that has been underway for nearly a year and nearing completion.
Still, Roberts’ statement Monday adds another dimension to the chief’s record as he has confronted Trump’s audacious second-term agenda. The Trump cases have dominated the court’s docket and will contribute to Roberts’ own legacy.
While Roberts has greenlit many of Trump’s policies, he voted last session against two of the most extreme: the sweeping tariffs imposed on foreign goods without congressional approval, and the attempt to limit birthright citizenship, a centuries-old practice that entitles any child born in the US to American citizenship.
Monday’s case invoking American history also serves as a reminder of Roberts’ position as chancellor of the Smithsonian Institution. The role is largely ceremonial, by virtue of his role as chief justice, yet he has overseen Smithsonian board meetings and witnessed the Trump administration’s ongoing effort to reshape the nation’s major public museums.
Trump’s drive to transform the look of Washington in his image has included his move to inscribe his name on the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and to build a triumphal 250-foot arch. The arch is planned for the traffic circle between the Arlington National Cemetery entrance and the Lincoln Memorial.
The case was brought by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. It contended that demolition of the East Wing and the construction of 90,000 square-foot ballroom and security structure required congressional approval.
Lower federal courts preliminarily sided with the Trust and let the case proceed. Judges found that the Trust had “standing” to sue because it had demonstrated a significant injury. The Trust pointed to a long-time Trust leader and member, Alison Hoagland, an architectural historian, who claimed her enjoyment of the White House had been harmed.
The high court majority declared her grounds insufficient, writing “mere offense, disagreement, or distaste does not qualify as a concrete and particularized injury” to sue. The majority issued the opinion, per curiam, Latin for “by the court,” as happens in such appeals that come to its emergency docket. None of those justices (Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett) signed any separate opinion.
To Roberts, there was nothing meager about Hoagland’s claim. (Joining his opinion were liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.)
The chief justice emphasized her architectural credentials as he observed, “The White House is not just any building, and – when it comes to historic preservation – Hoagland is not just any person.”
He noted that past court cases have found an injury when “esthetic interests” were asserted. He referred to a 1992 precedent in which, as Roberts described it, with lines from that prior case, “a desire to … observe an animal species like a particular crocodile, even for purely esthetic purposes was undeniably a cognizable interest for purposes of standing.”
As for the case at hand, Roberts declared, “A historic preservationist such as Hoagland can be aesthetically injured in a concrete, particularized way by the transformation of a historic building that she frequently enjoys, just as an environmentalist can sustain a concrete, particularized aesthetic injury from the extinction of a particular animal or the transformation of a particular forest or river that he regularly enjoys.”
Monday’s case turned on the standing issue alone – the majority said it was not ruling on the lawfulness of the ballroom project itself – but Roberts made clear his view of the entire enterprise.
He observed at the outset that Congress had explicitly prohibited construction on such federal property “without express authority of Congress.”
“That construction is likely unlawful,” he said, declaring that the usual appropriation for White House maintenance “likely does not authorize the President to use hundreds of millions of dollars in private donations to tear down the East Wing and construct a ballroom in its stead.”
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