June 27, 2008
I've got to say that I agree with Matt Yglesias that as a matter of crime control policy, punishing child rapists with execution seems to be a bad idea if you actually want to save the lives of children. Additionally,...
I'm most of the way through Nixonland, and happened upon this paragraph: (Part of a section describing Nixon's non-public actions to help secure his re-election in 1972) "Meanwhile there were the broadcast networks to flay - four of them, now...
June 26, 2008
His initial thoughts conclude with this observation: All in all, not a great day for those who believe, as I do, that "there is no good reason to allow disparities in wealth to be translated into disparities in political power....
June 25, 2008
I know little about con law issues tied to the 8th Amendment, or variations in the historical application of the death penalty. But I agree with John Cole that the level of outrage over this decision is perplexing, and with...
June 23, 2008
Following this morning's opinions Tom Goldstein noted the following: The only opinion remaining from the March sitting is Heller. The only Justice without a majority opinion from that sitting is Justice Scalia Is Morris smiling?Here's a handy reminder of what...
June 12, 2008
From the NYT story on the Supreme Court rulings that struck down most of the Bush Administration's attempts to keep Al Qaeda out of our courts, comes this wonderful quote by our fearless Chief Justice of the Supreme Court: And...
May 20, 2008
The Volokh Conspiracy's go-to guy on issues tied to same-sex marriage has weighed in on the California Supreme Court's recent marriage decision (here). I am not a lawyer, nor do I play one on tv, but I'd agree that these...
May 14, 2008
Marc Ambinder discusses the implications of the ruling California's Supreme Court is going to issue tomorrow relating to that state's anti-gay marriage initiative....
April 29, 2008
Anyone else notice that a few years back Justice Scalia became a parody of himself?...
April 28, 2008
From their opinion in today's voter ID decision: That the State accommodates some voters by permitting (not requiring) the casting of absentee or provisional ballots, is an indulgence - not a constitutional imperative that falls short of what is required....
April 25, 2008
A reminder of why we shouldn't "get over it"....
March 21, 2008
Not that I am opposed to catching criminals, but I find it awfully interesting that suddenly Morgantown is a hotbed of federal investigation into two criminal rings, one for drugs and another for prostitution....
March 19, 2008
Dahlia Lithwick reviews the oral argument in the big gun case, and note the Humpty-Dumpty world it has produced: Today we have four liberals rediscovering the beauty of local government and judicial restraint and five conservatives poised to identify a...
February 25, 2008
Noted without comment (source): Two years and 142 cases have passed since Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas last spoke up at oral arguments. It is a period of unbroken silence that contrasts with the rest of the court's unceasing inquiries....
February 13, 2008
So this issue doesn't strike me as one the Supreme Court would have much interest in diving into. And it seems all the more unlikely given how small the Court's docket is getting under Chief Justice Roberts. But wouldn't it...
February 08, 2008
In a little-reported story yesterday, the Attorney General of the United States argued that if the Justice Department declares something to be legal, it cannot (later) be investigated to see if it is (in fact) legal or not: Testifying before...
January 28, 2008
Yes the Court that the rightie hot-air-brigade regularly touts as all that is unholy, and a menace to America, has issued a ruling that you'd think the Dobsons, Hannitys, O'Reillys and maybe even Alan Keyes would love. Somehow though I...
January 25, 2008
One of the most partisan and right-wing judges in the federal judiciary is taking over the country's "second highest court". Great. Or not....
January 14, 2008
West Virginia produces lots of coal. Coal producers get lots of money from the coal they sell. Mining coal is destructive to the environment (mountaintop removal, valley fill, etc.) and people (black lung disease, etc.), so coal producers are always...
January 10, 2008
Yeah, oral argument was earlier this week, but I'd feel a bad blogger if I didn't link to something on the oral argument in Crawford. As is always the case in election law matters, Hasen's blog is a great place...
December 29, 2007
This list compiled by Dahlia Lithwick might be my favorite Top 10 of the season. That these outrageouse acts haven't provoked more outrage is deeply depressing. Hard to say which is the worst of these, though I'm partial to numbers...
December 10, 2007
Two big sentencing decisions were handed down by the Supreme Court today. The dissenters in each decision were Justices Thomas and Alito. The Supreme Court on Monday gave federal judges new authority to set sentences for crack cocaine crimes below...
December 06, 2007
Sure he's flawed, but Ed Lazarus makes the case that Justice Kennedy doesn't deserve the vitriol thrown at him on a regular basis. And that some of the other justices merit as much (if not more) criticism. He ends by...
December 02, 2007
The Bush administration is once again showing off its unique way of winning friends and influencing people:America has told Britain that it can "kidnap" British citizens if they are wanted for crimes in the United States. A senior lawyer for...
November 30, 2007
Bring us your poor, your tired, your huddled masses, afraid of being tortured in the United States: The United States is not a safe country for refugees, the Federal Court said Thursday as it ruled that Canada will no longer...
November 28, 2007
Should the Chief Judge of the US Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals have been overseeing the sexual harrassment investigation of US District Judge Samuel Kent? I'd say no, given her past behavior. Consider her comments during Susan Waltman's suit against...
November 25, 2007
It's a sign of how far the US has moved in the last decade that the current and former heads of Israel's highest court are noting that Israel is much better at protecting human rights than the United States. Of...
November 20, 2007
If you follow who gets hired to clerk for Justice Scalia you'll have noted that it's often guys (yes, guys) who seem to be clones of himself demographically. But today Above the Law brings us word of his latest (and...
November 19, 2007
Much like his recent nomination of a Virginian who wasn't backed by that state's senators, the president's nomination of Rod Rosenstein seems to do little more than ensure that the seat doesn't get filled (or at least make that a...
October 24, 2007
Earlier this month the Senate voted to confirm 41 year old Jennifer Elrod to a lifetime seat on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, considered by many to be the most conservative federal appealate court in the United States. Now...
October 18, 2007
I'm having trouble expressing my level of disdain for the Congressional Democrats in the English language. "Sniveling" might work, but doesn't have enough banal evilness in it. "Evil" gives them to much credit for actually doing something (takes effort to...
October 11, 2007
It's an interesting and complicated case. Medellin v. Texas could be a law-school exam unto itself. It touches on the separation of powers and the supremacy clause, international treaties and state criminal codes, federalism and the reach of the president's...
October 09, 2007
Tom Goldstein has this interesting post on the jurisprudence of Justice Thomas, the justice most willing to overturn Court precedents....
October 04, 2007
I don't think Justice Thomas is doing himself any favors in these interviews he's doing, even when they are with Jan Crawford Greenburg who's about the most supportive audience and reporter he could find. He thinks that race is the...
October 03, 2007
So says Mark Kleiman in a fun post that takes digs at David Bernstein, Straussians, Ayn Rand, Joe Biden ("competence and courage"), and most especially Justice Clarence Thomas....
October 01, 2007
Under affirmative action, Thomas says, whites will forever believe blacks enroll in top schools or hold good jobs only because the institutions lowered their standards to accept them - regardless of whatever qualifications an individual may actually have. The assumption...
Apparently he really thought that Roberts would value turning the Court into a land of cuddly, buy-the-world-a-coke unanimity over pursuing his own ideological agenda. The chief justice's own work was mystifying. He knew what was at stake: In an interview...
September 27, 2007
I don't tend to be a fan of Jeffrey Rosen. His raging moderate stances and Very Serious Person persona are rather tedious and rarely enlightening. But if you haven't read it yet, his profile of Justice Stevens that was in...
September 26, 2007
...that this brings to my mind is, if a person used a taser to attack another person, say, a police officer, with what crime would that attacker be charged? So, it's a "firearm" when pointed at a police officer, but...
This is just sort of sad.I cannot overemphasize how abhorrent and stupid I find the placing of the nooses on the schoolyard tree in late August 2006. If those who committed that act considered it a prank, their sense of...
September 20, 2007
His point - what was once the center is now the left, and a right-wing that barely existed in 1980 now dominates the highest court in the land. Beyond that, it's the right that's driving the court intellectually. Predictably, this...
September 10, 2007
So let me get this straight, the noncontroversial nomintion made yesterday (to the US Court of Appeals that oversees our fair state) is the one who's a former president of the South Carolina chapter of the Federalist Society, and managing...
September 07, 2007
Seriously, other than the SG/Acting AG is there anyone left at the Department of Justice? The head of the Civil Division, a conservative favorite (and DC Circuit Court of Appeals nominee) has added his resignation to a long, long, long...
September 05, 2007
Looks like it'll likely be Souter or Stevens, because Justice Ginsburg's already hired a clerk for the October '09 term....
August 18, 2007
Publius explains why the Washington Post's endorsement of the Judge Leslie Southwick's nomination to the 5th Circuit is at best incomplete (and really, banal). Of course appeals court judges need to be qualified, but that's not the only matter by...
August 14, 2007
Well, isn't that special: The Justice Department is putting the final touches on regulations that could give Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales important new sway over death penalty cases in California and other states, including the power to shorten the...
August 07, 2007
Today Jonathan Adler is highlighting the DC Circuit's en banc decision in Abigail Alliance. He's put up a number of posts on the topic at the Volokh Conspiracy. It's an interesting case, with an interesting dissent. If you want to...
August 01, 2007
July 24, 2007
A federal court will soon consider that issue....
Recently I linked to his short list for a Democratic president who might be elected in 2008. Here's his list of potential nominees a Republican winner in 2008 might choose from. Orin Kerr responds here....
July 13, 2007
SCOTUSBlog has a review - and the analysis may have Justices Brennan and Marshall spinning in their graves. Perhaps what is most notable about the civil rights subset of this term’s docket is that Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia,...
Michael Dorf argues that those who disrupted a Hindu's attempt to offer the daily prayer in the Senate likely have more than one Supreme Court justice on their side: So fear not, you monotheists who worry that Hinduism may become...
July 12, 2007
I love little more than discussions about who'll next be appointed to the Supreme Court, so if someone as thoughtful as Tom Goldstein chooses to address the topic, I'm definitely going to link to his thoughts. After all, he picked...
July 11, 2007
Original meaning or original application ... or whichever one takes him to the result he wants? Jack Balkin has this post on how Justice Thomas's originalism, and how his readings of history shape his decisions....
July 03, 2007
Has anyone noticed that Britain's response to the round/wave of bombings is to use the law, arrest people according to the law (technically, they can "hold" them for 28 days before arresting them or letting them go, but the law...
June 29, 2007
I see that the Supreme Court has decided to see if Congress can pass a law that forbids people (granted, non-citizens) from having access to our judicial system. I'll agree that, in theory, this is a question the Court should...
June 26, 2007
Dahlia Lithwick and Walter Dellinger have some reasonable points about Justice Alito's executive branch-friendly opinion in Hein (Alito executive-branch friendly? who'd have thought that?!?):Lithwick: Justice Souter need barely put an oar in the water after Scalia's efforts. He merely notes...
June 25, 2007
The next person who says a kind word about Robert C. Byrd, who voted for Justice Alito, risks geting slapped in the face. Morse, Hein ... you can follow the Court's actions today at SCOTUSBlog - if you have the...
June 18, 2007
What happens when a state can't - or won't - rely on a standing army to accomplish its security objectives? Privatization. In the case of the war in Iraq, it looks like the private sector has found new and improved...
June 17, 2007
I think it's fairly predictable that a cover story on Justice Kennedy is going to be negative. Why that's the case is an interesting question. But there's negative ... and then there's what Jeffrey Rosen has written for The New...
June 11, 2007
I suppose some new revelation about how low this administration has sunk shouldn't surprise anyone at this point. And, to be honest, I'm not really surprised by this. Still, what's one more scandal at the Justice Department at this point....
June 08, 2007
Vikram Amar wrote this excellent column arguing that the much-discussed law that constrains who Wyoming's governor can name to the seat of the late senator Craig Thomas is quite possibly unconsitutional....
June 07, 2007
Well, you know, when he's the one who's filing suit....
June 02, 2007
Jan Crawford Greenburg lets us know that the White House is readying itself in case a member of the Supreme Court decides to step down when their current term ends this month. Justice Souter wouldn't really do that to the...
May 19, 2007
Tom Goldstein discusses how post-2008 retirements, and who has the power to choose the replacements for retiring justices, will affect the Supreme Court here. He expects the next president to replace Justice Stevens and Justice Souter, and possibly (if the...
April 26, 2007
Unlike former University of Chicago Law School Dean Geoff Stone, I am not particularly troubled by the fact that last week's abortion decision was written by five Roman Catholics. But at the same time I think that the manner in...
April 22, 2007
Do you ever run across a comment in a thread that you can't wait to see how people respond to? I think I just saw one that could be a classic in that regard. Why do even the most conservative...
March 23, 2007
Reasons to love lawyers: Remember my previous post about an editorial in a student newspaper in Indiana that talked about how people should accept their gay friends when they came out of the closet? Believe it or not, the teacher...
March 19, 2007
And seems to get it jaw-droppingly wrong. I'll admit to not having read the opinions in this case, but great googly-moogly this sounds pretty open and shut if this analysis by Ann Friedman is accurate. The female employees and Planned...
March 15, 2007
Via TPM, the National Journal is reporting that Gonzalez asked Bush to end an internal Justice Department probe that was focusing on his own actions: Shortly before Attorney General Alberto Gonzales advised President Bush last year on whether to shut...
March 09, 2007
Via the Associated Press: WASHINGTON (AP) -- The FBI underreported how often it used the USA Patriot Act to force businesses to turn over customer information in suspected terrorism cases, according to a Justice Department audit. (snip) Justice Department Inspector...
March 07, 2007
I can't be talking about one among the justices as there aren't two women on the Court any more, so I must be referring to a clash between two titans of reporting on the Court - Linda Greenhouse and...
March 04, 2007
Vikram David Amar discusses Supreme Court decision making, and specifically Justice Breyer's approach to Philip Morris, here. What is it with swing justices?...