Showing 1–50 of 70 items published in August 2013, most recent first.
Briefly: Relying on United States v. Windsor, in which the Court struck down a provision of the federal Defense of Marriage Act that defined marriage – for purposes of over a thousand federal laws and programs – as a union between a man and a woman, a federal district court in California yesterday
This morning the Court issued a new (and routine) order list. It did not grant any new cases. Among other things, it denied petitions for rehearing and (as it often does) granted the Solicitor General’s motion for divided argument in several cases scheduled for oral argument in October.
Briefly: In the ABA Journal, Mark Walsh looks back at the “seemingly unprecedented rate” at which amicus briefs were filed last Term, as well as the role played by amicus briefs in some of the major cases.
Justice Ginsburg’s recent interviews (which I covered in Monday’s round-up) continue to generate coverage and commentary.
Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth beside his statue in front of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (Wayne Taylor / Creative Commons) This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the Birmingham civil rights protests, which led to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and gave rise to two little-known Supreme Court cases.
Justice Ginsburg’s remarks in her most recent interviews (which I covered in yesterday’s round-up) have prompted a new round of coverage and commentary. At Slate, Dahlia Lithwick compares those remarks with Justice Scalia’s comments last week in Montana (which I covered in Tuesday’s round-up).
Both Greg Stohr of Bloomberg News and Adam Liptak of The New York Times interviewed Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who – among other things — rebuffed calls for her to resign to allow President Obama to appoint her successor, described the current Court as “one of the most activist . . . in history,”
Reflecting on a long career of arguing before the Supreme Court: John Marshall Harlan II, at the end of his career; Thurgood Marshall, William O. Douglas and the constitutionality of the Vietnam War; losing Byron R. White, and so the case, at oral argument; blessing Stephen G. Breyer’s desire to
The Court has dismissed one of the cases on its merits docket for the upcoming Term.
Analysis With the Supreme Court already committed to rule on a major new test of the constitutional roles of religion and government, the prospect of additional cases reaching the Court now suggests that the next Term will be a significant one for the First Amendment’s two religion clauses.
As Lyle reported yesterday for this blog, the federal government has asked a federal district court in Texas to hold that the state must obtain approval before it makes any changes to its voting laws or procedures.
New pressure in court to compel the state of Texas to get advance approval before it can enforce any voting laws, including its two-year-old voter ID law, will now be applied in an existing lawsuit in federal court in Corpus Christi.
The role of the Chief Justice and political labels in understanding the Court as an institution in whichthe Justices wrestle with many complex considerations through individual cases.
In her column for The New York Times, Linda Greenhouse canvasses the Court’s case law to imagine how the Court might rule on the constitutionality of New York City’s “stop and frisk” policy, which a federal district judge recently struck down as violating the constitutional rights of minorities in that city.
If one goes to the “Frequently Asked Questions” page of the Supreme Court website, there is this question: “Where can I find the papers of the Justices?” Indeed.
FURTHER UPDATE 4:35 p.m. The text of the motion to intervene in the San Antonio redistricting case is here. The legal complaint of the United States as intervenor is here. ————– UPDATE 4:05 p.m. The text of the new lawsuit against the Texas voter ID law is here.
The Court’s job isn’t to be consistent; it is to decide cases and consider when to throw its institutional weight around. “What could be more political?” In this six-part series, Burt Neuborne describes the Supreme Court as a necessarily political institution, explains how the Constitution and the
Bond v. United States is back before the U.S. Supreme Court, and this time it raises a question that has long interested academics: What are the limits on Congress’s power to implement treaties?
Responding to a recent blog post by Jeffrey Toobin suggesting that “there is no proof of any systemic, deliberate violations of law” by the National Security Agency with its surveillance programs, Jim Harper points at Cato at Liberty to the amicus brief that he filed with Randy Barnett in In re Electronic Privacy Information Center, the challenge to the constitutionality of those programs.
The Court is an unavoidably political institution – and that’s good. In this six-part series, Burt Neuborne describes the Supreme Court as a necessarily political institution, explains how the Constitution and the Court’s position in our democracy affects our understanding of what the Court and its Justices can and should do, and tells stories of arguing before the Court and individual Justices.
Analysis In nearly twelve years of the “war on terror,” Congress has seldom been willing to let the other branches of the government decide on their own what U.S. policy would be on detention of individuals suspected of terrorism.
The Court’s recent decision in Shelby County v. Holder, striking down the provision of the Voting Rights Act which identifies the jurisdictions that must obtain preapproval (under Section 5 of the Act) for any changes to their voting laws and procedures, continues to provide fodder for commentary and analysis.
The “genius” of the Court is that it is “two courts”; the originalist as the “straw man.” In this six-part series, Burt Neuborne describes the Supreme Court as a necessarily political institution, explains how the Constitution and the Court’s position in our democracy affects our understanding of what the Court and its Justices can and should do, and tells stories of arguing before the Court and individual Justices.
At the end of the October Term 1936, the Justices dispersed as usual in June. They needed a break. The Court was under attack by President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Court-packing bill, which threatened to add a new Justice for each one over the age of seventy who refused to retire, under the trumped-up premise that the “Nine Old Men” (average age: seventy) were unable to keep up with their workload.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday released the calendar of oral arguments for the two-week sitting that begins November 4, showing a hearing date for November 6 for the major new test case on church-government relations, Town of Greece v. Galloway.
With the Court scheduled to hear oral arguments this Term in Town of Greece v. Galloway, in which it will consider the constitutionality of legislative prayer, Kurt Lash focuses at PrawfsBlawg on the interpretation of the Establishment Clause and suggests that that the Court’s 1983 decision in
The following essay is part of our online symposium on McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission. In McConnell v. Federal Election Commission (2003), Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote: “It is in the nature of an elected representative to favor certain policies, and, by necessary corollary, to favor the voters and contributors who support those policies.” (emphasis added) That is a striking choice of words.
The creative “tension” in a career teaching at New York University Law School for forty-two years and a career as a civil rights advocate.
Arguing that a wartime prisoner has been held at Guantanamo Bay three years longer than even the government believed he should be confined, and that Congress is directly responsible for that delay, lawyers for a detainee there have moved for a prompt federal court ruling on a host of constitutional arguments over who may leave Guantanamo.
In her “Circuit Split Watch” column at Appellate Daily, Michelle Olsen summarizes the issues in Samantar v. Yousuf, in which a former Somali government official has asked the Court to consider whether he is entitled to common-law immunity for atrocities committed in that country.
The following essay is part of our online symposium on McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission. Photographs purport to show objective facts. But whether they illuminate or distort our understanding of the world depends entirely on choices — of lens, of frame — that the photographer has made.
A top Supreme Court staff officer, who protects its property and supervises its police force, is asking a federal appeals court to revive an old law that blocks protesters near the Court’s building.
The pendulum swings from “tough on crime,” even at the Court, and why you should fall in love with habeas corpus too. In this five-part series, David Porter talks about direct federal appeals, habeas corpus and “being heard,” changing ideas of crime, terrorism, and punishment; and the realities of “effective assistance of counsel” fifty years after Gideon v. Wainwright.
The Obama administration, taking the advice of two judges to rush the issue to the Supreme Court, has moved quickly to ask the Justices to rule that police are free to look through the contents of a private cellphone they take from an individual they arrest, and to do so without a judge’s approval.
As Lyle reported yesterday for this blog, the California Supreme Court has declined to revive that state’s ban on same-sex marriage – the measure at the center of last Term’s decision in Hollingsworth v. Perry, in which the U.S. Supreme Court held that the ban’s defenders lacked the legal right to defend it on appeal.
The following essay is part of our online symposium on McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission. Shaun McCutcheon is a well-to-do businessman from Alabama and a staunch believer in and supporter of the Republican Party and its candidates and causes.
What being heard means to defendants and the reality of the right to counsel on the fiftieth anniversary of Gideon v. Wainwright. In this five-part series, David Porter talks about direct federal appeals, habeas corpus and “being heard,” changing ideas of crime, terrorism, and punishment; and the realities of “effective assistance of counsel” fifty years after Gideon v. Wainwright.
This blog’s symposium on McCutcheon v. FEC, in which the Court will consider a constitutional challenge to aggregate limits on contributions to federal candidates and political committees, continues with an essay from Robert Corn-Revere, who “urge[s] all the members of the Court not to approve any
UPDATED 2:05 p.m. The Third Circuit decision will be challenged in the Supreme Court, according to Matt Bowman, senior legal counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, attorneys representing the Pennsylvania company.
The following essay is part of our online symposium on McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission. McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, in which the Supreme Court will consider the constitutionality of aggregate limits on campaign contributions to candidates and political parties, presents just the latest challenge for defenders of campaign finance law.
How changing ideas about criminality and terrorism, and the need for Supreme Court clarity, affect habeas corpus. In this five-part series, David Porter talks about direct federal appeals, habeas corpus and “being heard,” changing ideas of crime, terrorism, and punishment; and the realities of “effective assistance of counsel” fifty years after Gideon v. Wainwright.
California’s Supreme Court, without explanation, refused Wednesday afternoon to revive “Proposition 8” — the state’s ban on same-sex marriage. It rejected a plea to order county clerks across the state to obey that ballot measure. The state court acted in a brief order, with no noted dissents.
At its September 30, 2013 Conference, the Court will consider petitions seeking review of issues such as determining qualified immunity based on the law at time of the conduct at issue, res judiciata as a bar to second removal proceedings, and proof of intent to send threatening communications.
An important civil rights case that the Supreme Court is scheduled to take up as the first case in its next Term should be sent back to a lower court because of a procedural flaw, a group of twelve law professors have argued in a new brief.
The following essay is part of our online symposium on McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission. The central paradox of most campaign finance reform measures is that they are premised on the odd notion that political speech is far too important to be free.
Supposedly, the Supreme Court settled thirty-six years ago the issue of how to count the votes of the Justices to decide who won a case — and why — when the Court is widely splintered.
Briefly: At 1 p.m. today, Roberta Kaplan – who argued on behalf of Edith Windsor in United States v. Windsor, her successful challenge to the constitutionality of the federal Defense of Marriage Act – will discuss the case and answer questions at HuffPost Live.
The complexities of redressing crime, sentencing guidelines for crack and powder cocaine, and losing a Supreme Court case on California’s “three strikes” law.
Foreword: Buckley v. Valeo revisited Concentrated wealth is nothing if not creative.
Briefly: The saga of Baby Veronica, the child at the heart of the custody dispute before the Court last Term in Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl, continues to unfold.