558
Syllabus
Held:
1. The Compensation Clause prevents the Government from collecting Social Security taxes, but not Medicare taxes, from federal judges who held office before Congress extended those taxes to federal employees. Pp. 565-578.
(a) The Court rejects the judges' claim that the "law of the case" doctrine now prevents consideration of the Compensation Clause because an affirmance by an equally divided Court is conclusive and binding upon the parties. United States v. Pink, 315 U. S. 203, 216, on which the judges rely, concerned an earlier case in which the Court heard oral argument and apparently considered the merits before affirming by an equally divided Court. The law of the case doctrine presumes a hearing on the merits. See, e. g., Quern v. Jordan, 440 U. S. 332, 347, n. 18. When this case previously was here, due to absence of a quorum, the Court could not consider either the merits or whether to consider those merits through a grant of certiorari. This fact, along with the obvious difficulty of finding other equivalent substitute forums, convinces the Court that Pink does not control here. Pp. 565-566.
(b) Although the Compensation Clause prohibits taxation that singles out judges for specially unfavorable treatment, it does not forbid Congress to enact a law imposing a nondiscriminatory tax (including an increase in rates or a change in conditions) upon judges and other citizens. See O'Malley v. Woodrough, 307 U. S. 277, 282. Insofar as Evans v. Gore, 253 U. S. 245, 255, holds to the contrary, that case is overruled. See O'Malley, supra, at 283. There is no good reason why a judge should not share the tax burdens borne by all citizens. See Evans, supra, at 265, 267 (Holmes, J., dissenting); O'Malley, supra, at 281-283. Although Congress cannot directly reduce judicial salaries even as part of an equitable effort to reduce all Government salaries, a tax law, unlike a law mandating a salary reduction, affects compensation indirectly, not directly. See United States v. Will, 449 U. S. 200, 226. And those prophylactic considerations that may justify an absolute rule forbidding direct salary reductions are absent here, where indirect taxation is at issue. In practice, the likelihood that a nondiscriminatory tax represents a disguised legislative effort to influence the judicial will is virtually nonexistent. Hence, the potential threats to judicial independence that underlie the Compensation Clause, see Evans, supra, at 251-252, cannot justify a special judicial exemption from a commonly shared tax, not even as a preventive measure to counter those threats. Because the Medicare tax is nondiscriminatory, the Federal Circuit erred in finding its application to federal judges unconstitutional. Pp. 566-572.
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