Everything published in August 2005, most recent first.
Sorry that we haven’t had anything up on the blog lately. We have three merits briefs due at the Court within a week (two tomorrow). Next week, I’ll be doing the color commentary (for lack of a better term) for the NPR coverage of the hearings and will be live blogging them on the Nomination Blog.
PrawfsBlawg has this response to Dahlia Lithwick’s recent article on the “living” Constitution and this post on a speech Justice Stevens recently gave, profiled by the New York Times here. The Right Coast also comments on Justice Stevens’ speech here.
The Volokh Conspiracy has this post discussing this Wall Street Journal article on Justice Stephen Breyer’s new 161-page book to be released in a few weeks: “Active Liberty: Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution.” The Legal Affairs Debate Club asks, “Is Assisted Suicide Legal?” This October, in
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In honor of Justice Stevens’s thirtieth year on the Court, Fordham University School of Law has organized a two-day conference, The Jurisprudence of Justice Stevens.
The Supreme Court on Monday refused — as it was expected to do — to reconsider its controversial ruling expanding the power of local governments to seize private property for economic development.
(This is one of a series of posts on the impact that Supreme Court decisions have on later lower court rulings.) If a display of the Ten Commandments is put up on city property, it stands there alone, and the government had no historical or other non-religious reason for putting it there, is it unconstitutional as an official embrace of religion?
Foreign nationals being held as terrorism suspects at the U.S. Navy’s prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have urged the D.C. Circuit to keep their case alive, arguing that a recent Circuit Court ruling does not undercut their demand that the Bush Administration justify in court their continued detention.
The Volokh Conspiracy has this post on using Chief Justice Rehnquist’s periodic absences from the bench this year as an opportunity to test the influence of the Chief Justice by comparing results in cases over which Rehnquist presided versus those over which Stevens presided as acting Chief to see whether there is any systematic differences in the outcomes depending on the presiding Chief.
Last week, Justice Stevens gave this address to the American Bar Association at the Thurgood Marshall Awards Dinner honoring Abner Mikva.
PrawfsBlawg has this entry on two new papers on the Solomon Amendment litigation (the litigation is known as the FAIR case, for Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights). The Solomon Amendment litigation is due to reach the Supreme Court this Term.
The deepening controversy over denial of voting rights to those convicted of serious crimes — an issue that has split the Circuit Courts in recent years — is back at the Supreme Court, in an appeal challenging a Florida law.
Balkinization has this post up titled, “Dred Scott and Kelo.” Professor Balkin argues that the closest analogy to the substantive due process argument in Dred Scott v. Sandford isn’t Roe v. Wade — its the dissenters’ position in Kelo v New London.
Tony Mauro has this article in Legal Times discussion the jurisprudence coming out of Tennessee v. Lane and what a Justice Roberts would mean to the outcome of a case to be decided next term, Goodman v. Georgia.
Yesterday we filed this petition, which involves application of the so-called Parratt-Hudson doctrine to a tenure employee’s due process right to a hearing before being terminated from public employment.
This is another in a continuing series of reports on the impact Supreme Court decisions have on later rulings by lower courts — here, the impact of several statements by members of the Court over the years in the course of deciding Establishment Clause cases.
Speaking at the American Bar Association’s annual Thurgood Marshall Award Dinner on Saturday night, Justice Stevens issued a stinging criticism of America’s use of the death penalty. ACSBlog reports on the speech here. Sentencing Law & Policy has this commentary on the remarks.
The federal government’s brief in the Ayotte parental notification case is available here.
The Bush Administration has mounted a wide-ranging challenge in the Supreme Court to the power of federal judges to stop new anti-abortion laws before they go into effect.
Neal Katyal is filing today this petition for certiorari (with appendix) in the Hamdan case challenging the Gitmo military commission scheme.
Attorneys for a Guantanamo detainee facing war crimes charges on Monday bypassed possible review in the en banc D.C. Circuit, and appealed his case directly to the Supreme Court. The text of the petition for review is linked just below. (It is Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, docket 05-184.)
Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist returned to a hospital in Arlington, Va., on Thursday afternoon for treatment of a fever, the Associated Press reported, quoting a Court spokesman. The AP and other wire services later noted that he had been released after being evaluated.
Professor Bainbridge has this post discussing John Roberts’ apparently devout Catholic faith. He argues that it is legitimate to question a nominee on his faith, and that that the Senate’s advise and consent function goes beyond a nominee’s bare qualifications to include evaluation of the nominee’s judicial philosophy.
Legal Times has this article arguing that the nomination of Judge Roberts to the Supreme Court is the product of two decades of planning by legal conservatives. On TPM Cafe, Jack Balkin declares that executive power is the hidden issue in the current fight over the Supreme Court.
The federal government’s appeal in the massive anti-racketeering case against the tobacco industry now is not expected to be considered by the Supreme Court at its opening Conference of the new Term, on Sept. 26.
The federal government, as expected, moved this week to expand its victory in court on the creation of military war-crimes tribunals to its handling of terrorism suspects now being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Here the Legal Affairs Debate Club debates the question, “How Important is Habeas?” Participating is Ted Frank, Resident Fellow and Director of the American Enterprise Institute Liability Project and David Bruck, Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Virginia Capital Case Clearinghouse at Washington and Lee University.