In 1971, an Indiana woman petitioned the circuit court. She wanted her 15-year-old daughter, Linda Sparkman, sterilized. The daughter was described as 'somewhat retarded' and prone to staying out overnight. The petition alleged the girl might be sexually active. Judge Harold D. Stump granted the request the same day it was filed, without a hearing, without appointing a guardian for Linda, and without placing the case on the court's docket. Linda was told she was having an appendectomy. Her tubes were tied.
Years later, after marrying, Linda discovered the truth. She and her husband sued. The legal question was stark: Could Judge Stump be held liable? In a 5-3 decision, the Supreme Court said no. The majority held that Judge Stump had jurisdiction over petitions generally, and his actions, however erroneous, were judicial. He was therefore absolutely immune. The decision turned on a formalistic boundary: the difference between a judge acting in error and a judge acting without any legal authority whatsoever. Stump, the Court found, had the former.
Justice Potter Stewart dissented. He called the order 'a monstrous violation of the plaintiff's constitutional rights.' He argued that an act so far beyond the pale of judicial function—approving, in secret, the sterilization of a minor without due process—should not be sheltered by immunity. The case stands as a cold monument to a legal principle. It prioritizes the finality and independence of the judiciary, even when that independence facilitates a profound, personal injustice. The law, in its measured logic, drew a circle of immunity so wide it could contain a act many would call unconscionable.