In two weeks, the Supreme Court will consider President Trump’s decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy, better known as DACA. Many expect a sharply divided decision in the spring, just as the presidential campaign picks up steam. But a different path would better serve both the court and the country.

By resolving the case on narrow grounds, the justices could steer clear of the political fray and their own jurisprudential divisions. Such a ruling would leave DACA in place for now, but leave the policy’s ultimate fate to the political process — reaffirming the vital distinction between law and politics.

Adopted in 2012, the DACA policy applies to certain immigrants who were brought to the United States as children. The policy does not provide a pathway to citizenship, but shields them from deportation (that’s the “deferred action”). Meanwhile, other federal regulations have long extended work authorization and related benefits to certain noncitizens, including people who are granted deferred action. The idea behind those regulations is that if the government is going to acquiesce to someone’s presence here, that person should also be allowed to work on the books.

That policy choice was at the heart of a 2015 ruling by an appeals court that held another Obama-era initiative unlawful. The case concerned an executive action issued in 2014, Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents. The court ruled that the executive branch could not confer work authorization and other privileges on millions of undocumented parents of citizens, because that came too close to granting full-blown legal status by executive fiat. After Justice Antonin Scalia’s death in 2016, the Supreme Court divided evenly on that question, leaving the lower court’s ruling in place.