A lot of the rules that determine who has standing when were just made up by the courts at one point or another. These seem more like guidelines, and can be contravened if the Legislature says so or if a given court feels like it. But apparently there are some kinds of standing issues that Congress has no power to change, because they are grounded in the constitutional authority of Article III. Scalia argues for the majority in Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife that Congress can't empower just anybody to sue if they won't have a legitimate "case" or "controversy."
Of course, Article III isn't very specific on this point. How did we decide what counts as an allowable "case" or "controversy?" That's right. The court made it up. Only earlier.
Professor Civil Procedure had been shooting down gunners all morning and just snapped at Unfortunate Student who brought this up in class, but near as I can tell the best reason for why some standing issues count as constitutional and some are merely procedural is: "Because that's how we've been doing it, and it's been working out okay. It doesn't have to make sense."
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