Showing 1–50 of 75 items published in February 2017, most recent first.
This morning, the Supreme Court heard arguments in Esquivel-Quintana v. Sessions, a case that arose from the U.S. government’s effort to remove a lawful permanent resident for a “sex crime.” Judging from today’s argument, the justices appeared closely divided on the question of statutory interpretation before the court.
Today the court hears oral argument in Dean v. United States, in which the justices will consider whether mandatory statutory gun-sentencing provisions may limit a district court’s discretion under the advisory sentencing guidelines. Douglas Berman previewed the case for this blog.
The transcript in Dean v. United States is here.
Today the court hears oral argument in two cases. The first is Packingham v. North Carolina, which asks whether a ban on social media use by sex offenders violates the First Amendment. Amy Howe previewed the case for this blog.
At today’s oral argument in Packingham v. North Carolina, a challenge to a state law that imposes criminal penalties on registered sex offenders who visit social networking sites, Justice Elena Kagan suggested that social media sites like Facebook and Twitter were “incredibly important parts” of the country’s political and religious culture.
The transcript in Packingham v. North Carolina is here; the transcript in Esquivel-Quintana v. Sessions is here.
This morning the Supreme Court issued orders from last week’s private conference. The justices added three new cases to their merits docket for the next term, but – like last week – the most interesting development may have come in a death penalty case in which the court denied review.
The court issued orders from its February 24 conference on Monday. It granted certiorari in three cases. On Wednesday, the court released its opinion in Bethune-Hill v. Virginia State Board of Elections. The court also heard oral arguments on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.
This evening the Supreme Court asked both sides in Gloucester County School Board v. G.G., a challenge to a Virginia school board’s bathroom policy, to submit letters to the court discussing “how the case should proceed in light of” yesterday’s revocation of the Obama administration’s prior guidance.
Yesterday evening, the court asked both sides in Gloucester County School Board v. G.G., a challenge to a Virginia school board’s bathroom policy, to submit letters discussing “how the case should proceed in light of” the Trump administration’s revocation of prior guidance from the federal
Katerina Linos is a professor at UC Berkeley Law School. Kimberly Twist is an assistant professor of political science at San Diego State University. Does the Supreme Court, the most trusted branch of the federal government, influence ordinary Americans’ opinions?
In April 2010, Lester Packingham’s traffic ticket was dismissed, prompting him to take to Facebook to celebrate. He posted that “God is Good! How about I got so much favor they dismissed the ticket before court even started? No fine, no court costs, no nothing spent . . . Praise be to GOD, WOW!
The case in front of Neil Gorsuch presented “an interesting constitutional question,” as he put it. “Does [due process] require a ‘nexus’ between the United States and a non-resident alien to apply to him extraterritorially a federal criminal statute?” wrote Gorsuch, who is President Donald Trump’s
Oyez has posted audio and transcripts from this week’s oral arguments at the Supreme Court. The court heard argument this week in: Hernández v. Mesa McLane Company v. EEOC Kindred Nursing Centers v. Clark
In its conference of February 24, 2017, the court will consider petitions involving issues such as whether Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(a)(5)(C) can deprive a court of appeals of jurisdiction over an appeal that is statutorily timely, or whether it is instead a nonjurisdictional
Some Supreme Court cases have intricate facts, complex legal arguments, numerous nuances and important implications for future cases. Life Technologies v. Promega isn’t like that.
Yesterday’s argument in Kindred Nursing Centers Limited Partnership v. Clark had the justices retracing some pretty familiar terrain, as they considered whether the Federal Arbitration Act pre-empts a decision of a state supreme court holding an arbitration agreement unenforceable based on the lower court’s thinly disguised hostility to pre-dispute arbitration agreements.
One day before lawyers for a transgender teen who identifies as a boy and wants to use the boys’ bathroom at his Virginia high school are due to file their brief in the Supreme Court, the Trump administration today withdrew guidance, issued by the U.S. Department of Education in 2015 and 2016, on the use of school bathrooms and locker rooms by transgender students.
Yesterday the court heard oral argument in Kindred Nursing Centers Limited Partnership v. Clark, which asks whether the Federal Arbitration Act pre-empts a Kentucky rule that requires a power of attorney to refer expressly to arbitration agreements before an attorney-in-fact can bind her principal to such an agreement.
John Elwood reviews Tuesday’s relists Welcome back from the longest break from Supreme Court news that you’ll get all term! From this point on, there will be a fairly steady stream of conferences until June arrives and the Justices begin their rigorous schedule of summer teaching duties.
Starting with her first publication, an editorial for her elementary school newspaper in 1946, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has not hesitated to express her views to the world.
At first glance, Coventry Health Care v. Nevils reads like a tedious commercial-law dispute, assessing the enforceability of “subrogation” clauses in insurance contracts. What a snore-fest, you might think.
Tuesday’s argument in McLane v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission gave the justices an opportunity to consider in detail the role of federal district courts in policing EEOC subpoenas.
The justices will hear oral argument this morning in Kindred Nursing Centers Limited Partnership v. Clark, which asks whether the Federal Arbitration Act pre-empts a state-law contract rule that requires a power of attorney to refer expressly to arbitration agreements before an attorney-in-fact can bind her principal to such an agreement.
When Stacy and Brent Fry obtained a goldendoodle for their five-year-old daughter, E.F., in 2009, they could not possibly have imagined that they would find themselves, seven years later, at the U.S. Supreme Court.
When a Texas jury was deciding whether to sentence Duane Buck to death for the 1995 murders of his former girlfriend and another man, the key question in their deliberations was whether Buck was likely to be violent in the future.
There were some special guests in the courtroom on Wednesday. Ivanka Trump, the daughter of President Donald Trump, was in attendance in the VIP section with one of her daughters and an adult friend or care-giver.
The transcript in Kindred Nursing Centers Limited Partnership v. Clark is available here.
We live-blogged this morning as the court issued opinions. The transcript is available at this link.
Over the last few years, the Supreme Court has decided a number of criminal-removal cases.
Today the court returns from its February break to hear oral argument in two cases. First up is Hernández v. Mesa, a case that stems from the cross-border shooting of a Mexican teenager by a U.S. Border Patrol agent. Amy Howe previewed the case for this blog.
It has now been more than 12 years since the Supreme Court’s landmark opinion in United States v. Booker recast the federal sentencing guidelines as “effectively advisory.” In subsequent cases, the court has clarified and reiterated the breadth of district-judge sentencing discretion within an advisory-guideline system.
The transcript in Hernández v. Mesa is available here; the transcript in McLane Co. v. EEOC is available here.
At today’s oral argument in Hernández v. Mesa, the latest chapter in a Mexican family’s effort to hold a U.S. Border Patrol agent liable for the fatal shooting, on Mexican soil, of their 15-year-old son, some of the justices appeared “sympathetic,” as Justice Stephen Breyer put it, to the family’s plight.
Last week the court released its calendar for the April sitting, the final two-week session in which the justices are scheduled to hear oral arguments during the 2016-2017 term.
On Tuesday, the court issued orders from its February 17 conference. It granted certiorari in Class v. United States. On Wednesday, the court released its opinions in three cases. The court also heard oral arguments on Tuesday and Wednesday.
At Law.com, reporters “canvassed prominent lawyers from around the country for what questions they would like to see asked” at Gorsuch’s Senate confirmation hearing, which begins on March 20.
Yesterday the Senate Judiciary Committee announced that the confirmation hearing for Judge Neil Gorsuch will begin on March 20, creating at least the possibility that, if confirmed, Gorsuch could join the court’s current eight justices in time for the April sitting, which begins on April 17.
Last weekend, Judge Neil Gorsuch submitted his Senate Judiciary Committee questionnaire. Amy Howe reports on the submission for this blog.
The nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch has moved into a phase that is unique to the Supreme Court confirmation process: trying to predict how a justice will vote on particular issues and cases in the future. This predictive process may occur in two phases.
Kindred Nursing Centers Limited Partnership v. Clark so closely resembles several of the court’s recent cases that you’d have to be a pretty close reader if you didn’t wonder whether they’d already decided this one.
At Roll Call, Todd Ruger reports on Judge Neil Gorsuch’s Senate Judiciary Committee questionnaire, noting that “some portions” were “apparently copied and pasted from a similar questionnaire from a decade ago, when the Senate confirmed him on a voice vote to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th
Judge Neil Gorsuch, President Donald Trump’s nominee to the Supreme Court, was first contacted about a possible nomination to the court on December 2, 2016 – nearly two months before he was actually nominated.
Yesterday the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property and the Internet held a hearing on judicial transparency and ethics.
Even in a term in which the eight-member court seems to be going out of its way to avoid high-profile disputes, there is a remarkable degree of consensus among the various players involved in McLane Co. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
At Buzzfeed, Zoe Tillman reports that “Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch submitted his formal questionnaire to the Senate Judiciary Committee, answering questions about his past decisions and providing new details about the events leading up to his nomination.” In The Wall Street Journal, Beth
Sergio Hernández at his elementary school graduation (Courtesy of the family of Sergio Hernández) In any context, the case of Hernández v. Mesa would be an important one: The parents of Sergio Hernández, a Mexican teen shot by a U.S. Border Patrol agent while standing on Mexican soil, are seeking to sue the agent responsible for their son’s death in U.S. courts.
In its conference of February 17, 2017, the court will consider petitions involving issues such as whether a guilty plea inherently waives a defendant’s right to challenge the constitutionality of his statute of conviction; whether it is a violation of the 14th Amendment guarantee of equal
In The New York Times, Sheryl Gay Stolberg reports that although Judge Neil Gorsuch’s “record on gay rights is thin,” and it “suggests a deference to religious freedom and a strong skepticism toward using the courts to find a new constitutional basis for L.G.B.T. rights,” “interviews with his
On Friday, the justices met for their February 17 conference; our list of “petitions to watch” for this conference is available here. The calendar for the February sitting, which will begin on Tuesday, February 21, is available on the court’s website.