The Castle Rock Debate Continues
Richard Smith, the lead counsel for one of the principal amici supporting the respondent in the Castle Rock case, has this post entering the debate on the Discussion Board.
June 2005 Archive
Showing 1–50 of 157 items published in June 2005, most recent first.
Religious Symbols and Funding — the Feldman/Balkin/Berg/Garnett “Debate”
In the wake of the Ten Commandments cases, the New York Times Magazine this Sunday is publishing excerpts from Noah Feldman’s forthcoming book on the “Church-State problem.” One of Feldman’s provocative theses is that the Court should be more permissive in the “religious symbolism” cases (a broad
Final Versions of Term Summary Documents
Here are the final versions of our term wrap-up documents. Thanks to Brian Fletcher, Anisha Dasgupta, and Katie TafollaYoung for their work on them. Here is the memo highlighting notable statistics. Here are the voting relationships. Here are the remaining statistics. Here is the circuit scorecard.
A Visual Guide for the Term’s Leading Cases
Booker/Fanfan Part I Part II Cutter Grokster Heald/Swedenburg Kelo Livestock Marketing Medellin Raich Roper Van Orden/McCreary County Van Orden McCreary County
The 5-4 Cases And Thoughts On Any New Nominee
Earlier today, we posted the annual statistics on the Term. I thought I would take a closer look at the 5-4 cases. (Note: in this post, I’m using the term “conservative” as shorthand for “more conservative” and to refer to the Chief, and Justices O’Connor, Scalia, Kennedy, and Thomas.
Term Summaries
If you know of Term summaries (or even press releases) that have been published by various organizations, please email them to me. Here is the summary prepared by Steve Shapiro of the ACLU. Here is an analysis published by People for the American Way (Hat Tip: How Appealing).
Supreme Court Wrap Up Events
After the jump are all the events wrapping up the Supreme Court Term that I know about, presented in chronological order. Please excuse any and all formatting glitches. I’m doing a lot of cutting and pasting here.
“Imagined Resignations”
From an article in the Fulton County Daily Report: Thomas’ five-minute address included a suggestion that no member of his court was planning to retire.
The White House’s Nomination Process
On the Nomination Blog, I have a short post about Jan Crawford Greenburg’s most recent story.
Blog Round-up – Wednesday, June 29th
PrawfsBlog has this post on the end of the term and whether or not it is unlawful to threaten to seize Justice Souter’s home. The Picker MobBlog has numerous entries on Grokster. Here is the latest one.
Commentary: A Bold Response to Kelo
Sen. John Cornyn, a Texas Republican, moved swiftly on Monday to narrow the effects of the Supreme Court’s decision last Thursday that upheld broad government power to seize private property to turn over for profit-making economic development.
Blog Update
For blog entries related to yesterday’s decisions, see Monday’s Links–Final Version, posted below. In other news: Here are end-of-term reflections from Sentencing Law & Policy. Eugene Volokh has this post about Senator Cornyn’s proposal to limit the scope of eminent domain.
More on the Ten Commandments and Grokster Discussion Boards
We expect the really terrific discussions of the Ten Commandments cases and Grokster to continue today on their respective boards, which are here and here.
Court to hear RICO abortion case
Closing out its Term, the Supreme Court agreed on Tuesday to review — for the third time — a celebrated case over the use of the RICO law to try to stop blockades of abortion clinics. The Seventh Circuit had ordered another round of litigation in the District Court.
Next Term
With today’s orders, the Court nearly filled out the first week of its January sitting. In total, the Court has filled thirty-seven argument slots. This document lists all of the cases granted for next term, sorted by the sitting in which they will presumably be heard.
Term Statistics Analysis
Here is our annual memo analyzing the Term’s statistics, including with comparisons to previous terms. Thanks to Anisha Dasgupta, who’s working with us this summer, for analyzing the current Term’s numbers.
New Cert. Petition
Today we are filing this cert. petition, which presents a question on which the courts of appeals are divided six to three: under 28 U.S.C. 1961, does interest on an award of attorney’s fees begin to accrue (1) from the entry of the judgment that establishes the right to attorney’s fees; or (2) from the entry of a later order fixing the amount of fees.
Today’s News – Tuesday, June 28, 2005
Here is an extensive – although by no means exhaustive – compilation of news relating to yesterday’s rulings and retirement speculation.
Syllabus Glitch
Multichannel News notices (no link available) that, “In describing the central legal issue in Brand X, the syllabus got it completely wrong, saying that information service providers like AOL and Earthlink were heavily regulated common carriers and phone companies were free from such mandates.
A Thank You Note re Yesterday
I just wanted to thank the people who worked very hard to get accurate, timely posts up on the blog yesterday; the bloggers (esp., but not exclusively, Eugene Volokh, Glenn Reynolds, Andrew Sullivan, Howard Bashman, and the folks at ABC’s The Note) that prominently linked to the blog; and the
A Debate Over Castle Rock
Over on the Discussion Board, we’re hosting a debate over the Court’s decision in Castle Rock. The City’s lead attorney, John Eastman, has started the debate.
Ten Commandments: Dont Mention Jesus
The Supreme Court has not ordered the immediate removal of all Ten Commandments displays from government buildings, or from the lawns outside those buildings. In fact, its ruling Monday in two cases could serve as an implied endorsement of such displays in the right context.
No Rehnquist announcement; Commandments split
The Supreme Court recessed for the summer Monday morning, with no announcement from Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist of his plans to retire or to remain on the Court. The day’s session ended after the announcement of six final rulings.
Reporters lose in leaks case
The Supreme Court on Monday turned aside pleas by two reporters and a magazine urging the Justices to create, for the first time, a right not to be forced to reveal to the government their confidential news sources.
Grokster, StreamCast Lose
The Supreme Court ruled unanimously that developers of software violate federal copyright law when they provide computer users with the means to share music and movie files downloaded from the Internet, at least when the software companies take “affirmative steps to foster infringement.” In a
Granted Cases
The Court this morning granted certiorari for next Term in five cases: 1. Bank of China v. NBM, No. 03-1559 — whether plaintiffs in civil RICO case alleging mail and wire fraud as predicat acts must establish reasonable reliance. (Grant limited to this question). 2.
A Visual Guide to Today’s Rulings
No. 04-277, National Cable & Telecommunications Assn. v. Brand X Internet Services No. 04-480, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd. No. 03-1693, McCreary County v. American Civil Liberties Union of Ky.
Case List Document
Here is the Semi-Final OT2004 Case List (complete except for double checking to make sure there aren’t errors).
New challenge to file-sharing designers
The Supreme Court’s unanimous (but in some ways divided) ruling on the use of copyright laws to try to stop the massive sharing over the Internet of music and movie files posts a significant legal warning to software designers, but does not turn them into complete copyright outlaws.
Statistics
We’re continuing to update the statistics. These are final, except for the need to double check them. Here are the voting relationships. Here are the remaining numbers. UPDATE: Here is the corrected Circuit Scorecard.
Tomorrow
The Court will issue its final Orders List (and any summary reversal) tomorrow at 10am.
Leading Cases of the Term
Consolidated from the earlier lists I published, here is my overall list of the ten biggest cases of the Term: Booker/Fanfan – 5-4 (per JPS and SGB) – the Apprendi rule applies to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which are rendered advisory Cutter – 9-0 (per RBG) – Congress does not violate the
First Draft of End-of-Term Statistics
Each year, we produce a variety of statistics on the Court’s Term. This post includes the current version, which obviously will be updated to reflect the final six cases. In addition, we need to double check the numbers. Here are the voting relationships and the other statistics.
Finishing Off The Term
Monday morning at 10am, the Court will issue its final set of opinions for the Term, and its penultimate orders list. The date for the final set of orders is not certain, but if tradition holds will be Tuesday.
Blog Round-Up – Saturday, June 25
Here is Students for the Judiciary with a post on Attorney General Gonzales and the “Growing Imbalance between Freedom and Security.” Mirror of Justice has series of posts on Kelo.
Blog Round-Up – Friday, June 24th
Ex Post has a series of entries on Kelo. Pith in the Wind has this post in support of the decision. More complete blogging on Kelo can be found here on the Kelo Meta Blog. Legal Theory Blog has this commentary on originalism, discussing this post by Jack Balkin.
Yesterday’s Opinion in Mayle v. Felix
What happens when you mix Section 2244(d)1) of AEDPA (which establishes a one-year statute of limitations for state habeas applications), Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(c)(2)(which, in relevant part, provides that amendments made after the statute of limitations has expired relate back to the
Blog Round-Up – Thursday, June 23rd
Here is Election Law Blog on a Justice Rehnquist retirement. Here is De Novo on why Attorney General Alberto Gonzales would be a bad choice for the Court.
Court upholds property seizure in New London
Splitting 5-4, the Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that a local government may seize private property for purposes of profit-making private re-development, declaring that this constitutes a “public use” under the Constitution. (Kelo v. New London, 04-108).
Kelo Opinions
can be found here.
Our Second Podcast
Here it is in Windows Media format and .mp3 format. Note that although I say in the podcast the Term won’t end on Monday, Lyle has an update saying that it actually will.
Court will issue remaining decisions Monday
UPDATE: All remaining decisions of the Supreme Court’s current Term will be announced on Monday, the Court’s public information office said on Thursday. Six cases remain to be decided, unless, by chance, some are put over for reargument in the Term starting Oct. 3.
An Eagle Eyed SCOTUSblog reader
Notes in a comment to the blog that Justice Thomas’s Kelo dissent inadvertently refers to the Court’s forthcoming ruling in the Castle Rock case, as follows: There is no justification, however, for affording almost insurmountable deference to legislative conclusions that a use serves a “public
The Meta Blog Has Started
Over at the discussion board site. If you know of other web-based discussion of Kelo that’s ongoing please let us know.
The Remaining Decisions
From the February sitting, only the Ten Commandments cases remain. Justices Scalia and Souter have not written opinions, so they presumably have those two cases.
A Visual Guide to Today’s Opinions
Kelo v. New London, 04-108 Halbert v. Michigan, No. 03-10198 Mayle v. Felix, No. 04-563 Orff v. United States, No. 03-1566 Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Allapattah Services, Inc., Nos. 04-70 and 04-79 Gonzalez v. Crosby, No. 04-6432
Kennedy: A limit on Kelo’s reach
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, in a separate opinion in the property rights case (Kelo v. New London, 04-108), appears to have put city governments on notice that they can go too far in using the added power that the Court seems to have given them to seize land for economic development.
Opinion in Gonzalez v. Crosby
The Supreme Court held today (in an opinion by Justice Scalia) that all Rule 60(b) motions for relief from the judgment of a district court denying a habeas petition are not automatically prohibited “second or successive” habeas petitions for purposes of Section 2244(b) of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act.
Opinion in Orff v. United States
In today’s unanimous opinion in Orff v. United States, the Court held that farmers in California could not sue the federal government in a water dispute because Congress had not waived the government’s sovereign immunity to such suits.
OT2004 Merits Docket
Here is the updated version of our merits docket document, in pdf and Word.