December 07, 2010
Or at least the liars: 3.32pm: "This case is not about WikiLeaks," district judge Howard Riddle told the court, according to my colleague Sam Jones, who was there. No. Of course not. Sexual assault in Sweden is of the utmost...
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April 16, 2010
So some people on the left have decried the possibility of a Kagan nomination to the Supreme Court because she has argued in favor of expansive powers for the president in her role as Solicitor General. Walter Dellinger jumps to...
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April 10, 2010
I know nothing about what's going on in the White House, but why not make some guesses, right? Play along if you wish.The favorites - Diane Wood and Elena Kagan. Definite possibilities - Jennifer Granholm and Elizabeth Warren. Intriguing long-shots...
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April 09, 2010
For those of you who are now going to enter betting pools on who the nominee to replace him will be, keep in mind that according to this New York Times story, this was the short-list of candidates who were...
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April 07, 2010
An interesting list. It makes me wonder what the senatorial succession laws are in Rhode Island, and happily it's a little broader than the same three names that are in every article on this subject. Sure, the pick is possibly...
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April 04, 2010
I'd say these stories make it clear he will be making that announcement shortly. You don't generally hold so many interviews about a possible retirement unless you are going to retire (well, presuming you aren't a professional athlete or a...
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March 27, 2010
Glenn Greenwald unloads against the notion that The Left likes Cass Sunstein (as was suggested by Peter Baker in a piece reviewing possible replacements for Justice Stevens). While Sunstein's close to the president, I really can't see him being nominated...
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March 11, 2010
As much as she might admire them and be friendly with their chums I don't think she's doing them any favors with this observation. But at some point - and I'd say that point is now - the Obama Administration...
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February 24, 2010
Those are the predictions from Tom Goldstein in this lengthy analysis. His track record on these things is strong. He correctly foresaw the Sotomayor, Roberts, and Alito appointments....
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February 15, 2010
What the Helen Lovejoys have done to the Bill of Rights is a disgrace. Ugh....
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February 04, 2010
The highest court in Illinois just declared the state's med-mal caps unconstitutional - and the decision has led to some justice-on-justice snark and posturing (though not quite as delicious as the recent tidal wave of derision unleashed on PA's newest...
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January 24, 2010
Following up on armand... ...if the Supreme Court just said, essentially, that corporations/unions have as much free speech as individuals (and thus they can spend money to buy political adds) then either: 1. Like individuals, they are limited to spending...
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January 21, 2010
To me, there'd seem to be some tension there....
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January 12, 2010
So the argument of over half the states as to why Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts needs to be overturned less than a year after it coming down is ... doing what's constitutional is too expensive? Well sure they have other arguments,...
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November 19, 2009
In terms of events that do not bode well, Judge David Hamilton, who is controversional for reasons I find hard to fathom (or who should seem downright dull to anyway to the left of Sen. Jim DeMint) was finally confirmed...
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November 06, 2009
As this is the US Circuit Court that covers West Virginia I've always got an interest in it. President Obama has nominated two men to join the court, both from North Carolina. One would be the first Latino to serve...
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November 05, 2009
The Supremes were considering prosecutorial immunity yesterday - you know, for prosecutors who spend their time framing people. It's a complicated topic. For you constitutional-law scholars out there with casebooks to update, you may soon have an addition to the...
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October 13, 2009
If you haven't seen the story about Texas (likely) executing an innocent man, you should really read it. What is becoming almost as interesting are the brazen attempts by Gov. Perry to bury the story. I think I'm OK with...
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October 07, 2009
Chris Lund has two posts on what could be an important establishment clause case that the Supreme Court is hearing today....
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September 15, 2009
President Obama has nominated a second person to fill one of the five vacancies on the US Court of Appeals that has jurisdiction over West Virginia (and the Carolinas, Virginia, and Maryland). It continues the administration's practice, unlike that seen...
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September 08, 2009
Lyle Denniston discusses Citizens United here. The re-arguing will be held at One First Street tomorrow. The case has huge implications for campaign finance regulations, and will be the first heard since Justice Sotomayor joined the court....
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September 03, 2009
Several of these picks are predictable, but I like how he breaks down different categories of greatness. He also picks out a set of least impressive justices. Some of those stories, well, they remind one of just how out of...
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August 17, 2009
A second recent surprise shift in the leadership of one of the nation's top courts (after the sudden change on the Fourth Circuit) has occurred. This appears timed solely to ensure that a "conservative" jurist remains at the top of...
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August 06, 2009
She was confirmed this afternoon by a vote of 68-31, with 9 Republicans joining 59 Democrats in favor (as expected Sen. Kennedy was not present to vote). Out of the current justices, only Justices Thomas and Alito had more votes...
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July 23, 2009
Of course this piece is working off a small N. Obama's only begun nominating judges to the national's top federal courts. But so far his nominees are notably older than the appointees of previous presidents....
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July 11, 2009
David Bernstein highlights a "scathing" review by Richard Epstein of Robert Bork's latest book, and in the resulting thread Bork finds notably few defenders - with many criticizing him as a terrible example of originalism, and some saying his haphazard...
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July 09, 2009
Until a couple years ago people regularly described the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals - which covers Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and the Carolinas - as the nation's most conservative appeallate court. But then some of its jurists began retiring...
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July 08, 2009
Well, it's finally happened. The AG of Massachusetts is suing the United States, arguing that DOMA's definition of marriage is discriminatory, and that the law steps into matters traditionally left to the states. Is this the right time to start...
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June 29, 2009
Ricci will get all the press, but this seems a more startling move. And it could have far-reaching effects. If Republicans were wondering how their 2012 presidential candidate is going to compete against President Obama's $600 million fundraising juggernaut, the...
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June 24, 2009
Linda Greenhouse reviews some of the latest handiwork of the Roberts Court. So much for judicial minimalism and justices merely serving as umpires. They look much more like baseball owners to me - writing the game's rules and deciding who...
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June 23, 2009
TAPPED has a couple of good posts up. In one Bruce Cain and Daniel Tokaji "argue that states with low participation rates should be required to issue 'electoral impact statements,' which would discourage practices that suppress turnout among poor and...
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June 18, 2009
"The Obama administration chose poorly." I'd say Professor Dorf's evaluation of the brief may be too complimentary....
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June 10, 2009
There are of course a variety of ways to measure the ideology of Supreme Court Justices, but if these scores are correct, in the 40-something years since Justice Thurgood Marshall joined the Supreme Court exactly 2 new members of the...
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June 03, 2009
Two federal judges in PA issue notably different rulings, and 2 different 3-judge panels of the 3rd Circuit have different responses to the cases. What's at stake? Well, perhaps students' ability to criticize, insult or lampoon school administrators in the...
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May 27, 2009
The well-known right-leaning (and Catholic) legal scholar attracted a great deal of criticism from some on the Right and some active in the Church for his endorsement of President Obama. It's interesting to see him come out strongly in support...
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May 26, 2009
Tom Goldstein lays out the paths of attack we will see against her....
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May 19, 2009
I'll be surprised if the nominee to replace Souter isn't a woman, but Gov. Patrick (D-MA) would seem to be well-qualified for the position. And he's certainly got the diverse life experience that some people would like to see in...
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May 14, 2009
According to a Gallup poll a big majority of Americans don't think it matters if Obama appoints a woman to replace David Souter on the Supreme Court. I haven't looked into the poli sci research on this question in at...
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According to a Gallup poll a big majority of Americans don't think it matters if Obama appoints a woman to replace David Souter on the Supreme Court. I haven't looked into the poli sci research on this question in at...
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May 11, 2009
How else to explain his dismissive comments about Jennifer Granholm and Janet Napolitano? People across DC read him, so his thoughts may matter in terms of the initial reaction to the nominee. And if he's well-informed, it looks like I...
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First, Mark Kernes at Adult Video News reports that Judge Sotomayor isn't likely to be a friend of students' free speech rights. At least that's what he draws from her involvement in a 3 judge panel's ruling in the Doninger...
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May 08, 2009
According to Jan Crawford Greenburg the list is down to 6 people. She lists 3 of them, all of whom have been listed on various lists of likely nominees....
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May 04, 2009
That's really all there is to these early attacks on the 2nd Ciruit judge. We get blind quotes about potential this and possible that, and extraordinarily vague comments that rebut each other ... but mostly it comes off like they...
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April 30, 2009
It was expected, and yes, it is happening....
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April 21, 2009
I am so glad I'm not a student in the 21st century. Stephen Breyer and company who brought America's teens required drug tests (without any sort of cause) back in the 1990s appear to be just fine with strip-searching them...
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Well, at least compared to Roberts and Alito....
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April 20, 2009
The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals declined to let such an exception stand. But the Supreme Court today announced that they would hear the case (U.S. v. Stevens).By the way, SCOTUSBlog's latest stat pack is out, looking at the cases...
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April 13, 2009
Vikram Amar has written this piece on two recent Supreme Court decisions dealing with the exclusionary rule, and the important role of Justice Kennedy, who was the only justice in the majority of each of these decisions. It appears that...
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The silent justice speaks. He thinks we focus to much on rights. But he loves loading the dishwasher.And apparently he wants a more martial, Christian country, one where the citizenry is more focused on its obligations than its rights, one...
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March 18, 2009
He's nominated to the Seventh....
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March 05, 2009
A report. Supposedly it may turn on Justice Kennard....
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February 10, 2009
That seems to be what the Denver Post is hoping.One of my pet gripes about our legal system is that the lock-'em-away set is costing the states and the country a fortune through the costs of operating the prisons and...
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February 07, 2009
An interesting 3-2 decision. A sharply divided Supreme Judicial Court said yesterday that a 14-year-old boy accused of statutory rape may have been a victim of gender discrimination because authorities charged him and not the three underage girls with whom...
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February 05, 2009
Surgery for early-stage pancreatic cancer. Not good at all.And for you keeping track of the comings and goings of the Justices - as far as the gossip mavens know, Justice Souter hasn't hired any clerks for this fall's term....
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January 24, 2009
And the ODAG too....
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January 15, 2009
Hilzoy thinks Obama has to do it: It seems to me that these facts imply that if Barack Obama, or his administration, believe that there are reasonable grounds to believe that members of the Bush administration have committed torture, then...
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October 10, 2008
The state's Supreme Court has ruled 4-3 that same-sex couple have the right to marry, citing the equal protection clause in the state's constitution....
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Scott Horton raises a few topics related to the the decision to charge Mr. Kernell with a felony, and Sarah Palin's behavior. As governor of Alaska, she was obligated to maintain as public records her communications with respect to her...
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October 04, 2008
It sounds like the DOJ's Inspector General doubts that....
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October 01, 2008
It appears the White House did it - with of course the assistance of various people in DoJ. I strongly support further investigations into this....
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September 15, 2008
From the files of enormous wastes of public resources that breed a contempt for the law ... That's just a staggering number. And the graph is interesting. The giant spikes in arrests during the Nixon and Clinton administrations, and the...
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From Shakesville: So, Alaska has a pretty serious sexual assault and domestic violence program.How serious? "Alaska leads the nation in reported forcible rapes per capita, according to the FBI, with a rate two and a half times the national average—a...
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August 30, 2008
Oh my. I'll be the first to admit I don't know as much as others about how to appropriately apply Chevron. But hey, I did watch the Boston Legal episode that referenced this issue, and not only do I feel...
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August 22, 2008
I strongly agree with this. Sham indeed....
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August 12, 2008
Look at the length of the sentence Robert Chambers just got. Then look at the length of the sentence he got for killing Jennifer Levin. Anyone else think something seems out of whack? It's not surprising, but that sort of...
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July 26, 2008
So I realize that once one becomes a pundit it's virtually impossible to lose the status no matter how many inane things you say or write, but this is damn weak stuff. Quite apart from the fact that his ideological...
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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,...
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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...
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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....
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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....
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April 29, 2008
Anyone else notice that a few years back Justice Scalia became a parody of himself?...
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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....
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April 25, 2008
A reminder of why we shouldn't "get over it"....
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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....
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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...
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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....
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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....
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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October 09, 2007
Tom Goldstein has this interesting post on the jurisprudence of Justice Thomas, the justice most willing to overturn Court precedents....
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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...
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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....
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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....
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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...
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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...
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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...
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August 01, 2007
July 24, 2007
A federal court will soon consider that issue....
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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....
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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,...
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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...
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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...
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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....
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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....
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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....
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June 07, 2007
Well, you know, when he's the one who's filing suit....
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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?...
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March 02, 2007
Given the comments thread going on at the end of another post, I thought I'd link to this Q&A on Confirm Them in which Jan Crawford Greenburg is asked about Justice Stevens asserting that he is a conservative. The specific...
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February 26, 2007
While we here at BloodlessCoup have covered the issue of the White House firing eight US Attorneys before, today's NYT Editorial brought it back to me again. In addition to looking clearly wrong (what good reason can there be for...
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February 25, 2007
My recent reading (and blogging) of Jan Crawford Greenburg's Supreme Conflict predictably led to me thumbing through Yalof's Pursuit of Justices. While doing so I came across a fascinating tidbit that says volumes about how the place of Roman Catholics...
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February 23, 2007
Sandra Day O'Connor? National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame in Fort Worth, Texas, where she was inducted in 2002 In her secret heart she rides!...
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February 12, 2007
I found this on Ezra Klein's blog. Why this isn't a bigger deal in our society I'll never understand. That people regularly make jokes about it is nauseating. When I first came to prison, I had no idea what to...
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I've been eagerly awaiting reading this book. Greenburg might not be Dahlia Lithwick (the Court reporter Armand worships), but she's one of the top Court reporters in the country, and she had an astonishing level of access to executive branch...
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February 02, 2007
Lemieux's title really says it all. This is pretty incredible, and yet also not that surprising. I don't know how that's possible. But given that we're talking about Scalia and Bush v. Gore ... well, somehow, that's how things have...
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January 18, 2007
I know this presidential administration loves to give power to those who aren't fit for their jobs, but ... this is ridiculous, public and just plain weird. How do you reconcile this: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales says federal judges are...
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January 12, 2007
Sure she's competent, but apparently she's not subservient enough. Lam has had high-profile successes during her tenure, such as the Randy "Duke" Cunningham bribery case - but she alienated herself from bosses at the Justice Department because she is outspoken...
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January 10, 2007
You know it's ( sometimes lone) dissents like this that always made me clearly prefer Justice Scalia to the late Chief Justice. Sure, there's a good level of playground "I'm so right and you're so wrong" about his tone. But...
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In the wake of withdrawing (the oddly poorly rated) nomination of Michael Wallace to the very conservative 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, the president has chosen not to resubmit the nominations of 3 of his most controversial nominees to the...
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January 09, 2007
I have no idea what the merits are in this dispute, but good golly miss molly, can you imagine being a justice on this Court and having to work with both Chief Justice Taylor and Justice Weaver (the "petulant 'only...
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January 06, 2007
True, Linda Greenhouse isn't dead, but Jan Crawford Greenburg has recently snagged several extremely high-profile gets, and if she's being compared to Eve Harrington ... She talks about her recent success in this interview . In it she also talks...
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They are going back to the old system. U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, said this week that both senators from a state, regardless of party affiliation, will have to concur with a nomination before...
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December 19, 2006
...about commie professors: A psychology professor at Florida International University, Alvarez faces up to five years in prison for conspiracy to become an unregistered foreign agent. Elsa Alvarez, who also worked at the university, faces up to three years in...
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December 18, 2006
I realize that people will from time to time write incendiary articles to try and sell newspapers. But there's sensationalizing and then there's just plainly being a little bit dishonest, and I'm afraid this story in the Washington Post on...
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December 16, 2006
Right now, where are the legal immigrants that were rounded up in Homeland Security operations this week? Where are they? What's next? Maybe we should start a letter writing campaign, since trying to engage habeus corpus isn't necessarily going to...
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December 15, 2006
This is just silly, right? All things being equal, sure it's easier to get a senator through the confirmation process, so it makes some sense to consider senators in a 51-49 Senate. But several of these names would fly directly...
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December 04, 2006
Looks like those school desegregation plans that were before the Supreme Court today are going to get knocked down - and hard - in a 5-4 vote.After relaying the blow-by-blow of this particular debate, Dahlia Lithwick launches into an analysis...
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This is hilarious. And some of the comments are pretty funny too. And scarily enough, some of these thoughts get at these justice's styles a little too well....
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December 01, 2006
Via Iraq Updates, a Reuters story: Iraq's parliament will bar the media from future sessions and began yesterday by refusing access to reporters and then cutting off television coverage as a debate on mounting sectarian violence became heated. Spokesmen for...
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November 30, 2006
Ms. Lithwick reviews yesterday's arguments at the Supreme Court, and the Bush administration's unusual "we're all going to die anyhow" position....
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November 09, 2006
Given that there are always John Paul Stevens retirement rumors, who knows if these should be taken seriously. Still, given the gravity of a Stevens retirement, I figured they merited a link....
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October 20, 2006
Moron - mean-spirited, presumptuous and nasty too, but the key problem of course is that he seems to lack the slightest (accurate) understanding of one of the most important Supreme Court rulings in years....
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September 28, 2006
And so, it becomes official: The United States Senate voted the "compromise" detainee bill out this evening. The House of Representatives voted it out previously. It will become law within a matter of days. The bill establishes a legal foundation...
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The answer to question 56 is 1453, as my trivia buddies know. As to the rest - wow. I think I'd do better on this test than a lot of people, but I really wonder how many of the correct...
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No? So then why is the left fringe, but not right, mentioned specifically in the NIE? The recently declassified NIE report on terrorism contains an interesting paragraph:"Anti-U.S. and anti-globalization sentiment is on the rise and fueling other radical ideologies. This...
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September 13, 2006
...Congress is busy working to protect our rights. While refusing to give the president a blank check to prosecute the war on terrorism, Republicans in the Senate Judiciary Committee kept to the White House's condition that a bill giving legal...
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September 01, 2006
Well I imagine a lot of people will be traveling over the weekend and not reading the blog. But I'm guessing that among our regular readers at least of couple of you who have (or are working on) law degrees...
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Marci Hamilton argues that it is: In April of 2005, the Fourth Circuit held, in Simpson v. Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors, that local government can intentionally and publicly discriminate against minority religious denominations. But this month, the Fourth Circuit...
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August 28, 2006
Since I find Kyllo one of the more troubling things to come down from the country's highest court in the last decade, I tend to take an interest when discussions of it come up. And Orin Kerr notes an interesting...
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Since I find Kyllo one of the more troubling things to come down from the country's highest court in the last decade, I tend to take an interest when discussions of it come up. And Orin Kerr notes an interesting...
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August 23, 2006
Is this an accurate representation of what happened with the the recent decision? That is, is it accurate to suggest that because the US government didn't offer a rebuttal of certain points that they conceded them? And while we can't...
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August 03, 2006
Well what do you know? I'm not the only IR guy who'd sometimes rather spend his time following what the country's appeals courts are up to. It seems he doesn't think much of the reasoning in the recent Washington state...
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July 21, 2006
Look, maybe this guy will be a spectacular judge - but if you need evidence that Democrats aren't stalling the vast majority of President Bush's (oftn very conservative) appointees to the federal bench, I give you the case of Neil...
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July 17, 2006
If you don't know, Epstein is one of the most highly respected law professors of the last few decades. As his approach tends to run toward (I mean race toward at the speed of light) an economic libertarianism that would...
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July 12, 2006
There are a lot of reasons Democrats should fear Sen. Lindsey Graham, even if the rabid right in South Carolina is unhappy with him. But I think Graham will be doing a considerable service to the nation if he permanently...
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July 11, 2006
It's all over the news, and I'm sure we're not the first blog to put it up, but the US government (specifically, the White House via a DoD memo) announced that all detainees worldwide will be treated according to the...
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July 10, 2006
Discussing the problems (or not) of splintered Supreme Court opinions, Orin Kerr gives us this description of a real doozy: The Court split 2-2-1-4, with the fifth vote a real doozy. Two Justices, Stevens and Stewart, said that the private...
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July 08, 2006
Checking out OrinKerr.com I noticed a couple of interesting posts/links. First, I think I learned more about the 4-2 anti-gay marriage decision by New York's top court in this short comments thread than I did in any of the reporting...
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July 05, 2006
In case you wanted a quick refresher on who voted how on some of the big split decisions from last term. You can quibble with a few of the categorizations, but it's kind of interesting.Btw, I know nothing of Jones...
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June 30, 2006
From Crooks and Liars (emphasis mine): Loyalty: [In the Hamdan decision,] Justice Thomas refers to Justice Stevens’ "unfamiliarity with the realities of warfare"; but Stevens served in the U.S. Navy from 1942 to 1945, during World War II. Thomas’s official...
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June 28, 2006
Along with most of the other remaining decisions from this term at the Supreme Court (the decision in Hamdan comes out tomorrow, and Stevens appears sure to be writing it!) - a quick summary of the results can be found...
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June 27, 2006
I wake this morning to discover, via the New York Times that the august US Senate (the deliberative, thoughtful half of our legislative branch) is within a single vote of amending the US constitution to ban the burning of the...
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June 26, 2006
Pro-life....
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I thought that would be the outcome - but I didn't think that their would be 6 opinions issued from the Court on that case. That should make for some interesting reading (and interpreting) - especially to see what Justice...
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June 25, 2006
Several major decisions are going to be announced in the coming week....
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June 21, 2006
Given that it's New York, that state's top court receives more than average attention. So it's probably worth noting that in the next seventeen months more than half of the membership of that court could change (either due to judges...
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June 20, 2006
Oh, and judicial power too of course.Publius has a review of Scalia's Rapanos opinion here. It's worth a look. It cuts through some of the "complete and total crap", and includes some classic Publius language like "Last I checked, lynch...
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June 16, 2006
Since Binky has shown an interest in this week's Supreme Court ruling on the knock-and-announce requirement (well, former requirement) I thought I'd mention that Orin Kerr has a few good posts on this, including one in which he asks what...
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June 15, 2006
Oh, wait, nevermind. The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that police armed with a warrant can barge into homes and seize evidence even if they don't knock, a huge government victory that was decided by President Bush's new justices. The 5-4...
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June 14, 2006
At the end of a post on crime trends (all of which are troubling - violent crime is up, the incarceration rate is weirdly high, and while this is going on, Bush's government is cutting aid to the nation's police...
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June 01, 2006
Kermit Roosevelt thinks the fretting over the Ceballos opinion is excessive. He sees a very narrow opinion that's not a catastrophe, particularly given the morass of that section of the law. I think that it takes essentially the right view...
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May 30, 2006
Yes, I regularly bashed her writing and her reasoning - but Alito?!?!? That's not really an improvement (and yes, I did say Alito was possibly the best choice the Bush administration could make - but I was saying that in...
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May 26, 2006
Bloomberg has an update on where things stand. It looks like Judge Boyle might not get his promotion, and that the Haynes nomination might fail too. But the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh was approved today. The 41 year old former...
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May 11, 2006
Via Echidne, we find a link to an AP wire blurb indicating that the Justice Deparment has given up investigating the legality of the NSA wiretapping program. Why did Justice give up? "We have been unable to make any meaningful...
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April 25, 2006
For ... inane reasons he can't possibly be serious about. I mean, c'mon: I agree that our constitutional system is best served by giving the Supreme Court the last word, but there is no doubt that congressional procedures and authority...
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April 15, 2006
Employers can set different dress codes and grooming standards for women than for men, as long as the rules aren't burdensome or based on sex stereotypes, a federal appeals court decided Friday in the case of a female casino bartender...
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April 05, 2006
Howard Bashman provided this description of the a recent 9th Circuit ruling:"With the walls of our homes breached by the Internet, our next best defense is the law." So writes Ninth Circuit Judge Stephen S. Trott, at the outset of...
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March 30, 2006
An interesting turn of events:The court that made Massachusetts the first state to legalize gay marriage ruled Thursday that same-sex couples from other states where gay marriage is prohibited, including Connecticut, cannot marry here....
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March 29, 2006
It's official. We are living in a Kafka novel. I strongly encourage you to read her whole article. But here is some of her report One of the most dramatic moments in today's oral argument in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld comes...
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March 19, 2006
Long New York Times story today about the "secret" US prison/interrogation facility in Baghdad. Suffice it to say, the abuse their was on par with (or exceeded) the abuse at Abu Ghraib. It gets harder and harder to argue that...
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It's a few days old, but the first page of this New York Times story on anti-globalization protests in New York City in 2002 is worth reading. Long story short, the police arrested a number of people (the article says...
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March 09, 2006
Howard Bashman has a set of links and comments to an interesting case before an en banc panel of the (supposedly notoriously liberal) 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Their decision held "that an individual's subscription to web site offering both...
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I realize I've had my head down recently (dissertation), but I surfaced just long enough to see this NYT story. Last I checked, the Administration was spying on Americans without even a FISA warrant. This violates both FISA and some...
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March 07, 2006
Uh, -er -er....
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March 02, 2006
All the country's major papers are running articles today on yesterday's arguments in the Supreme Court over the latest round of congressional redistricting in Texas (see this Dana Milbank article for an example). But, as you might as expect, for...
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February 15, 2006
They might be a tad more diverse than the Scalia crew, but these names would seem to suggest that the impression that Alito bats from the right - maybe the far right - is accurate....
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February 12, 2006
This is hilarious - in a you've-got-to-be-fucking-kidding-me kind of a way. Is Yoo not only one of the most dangerous attorneys in the country, but also a hypocrite of jaw-dropping proportions? You be the judge....
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February 08, 2006
I came across that little bit of political trivia this morning. Lovely. Not. The senior Democrat in the US Senate voted against the first African-American nominee to our nation's highest court, one of the country's most prominent civil rights attorneys,...
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February 06, 2006
Gosh they look an awful lot like this year's clerks. Once again, 4 men who have clerked for prominent right-leaning Circuit Court of Appeals judges. In fact, in the cases of the Wilkinson, Kozinski and Luttig clerks - they come...
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February 03, 2006
Responding to a comment by Kevin Drum, Professor Bainbridge has asserted that Judge Richard Posner of the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals is not a conservative. Now at one level I find classifying judges as "liberals" or "conservatives" to be...
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January 30, 2006
From CNN: "The Senate kills off an attempt to filibuster Samuel Alito's Supreme Court nomination with a 72-25 vote to end debate."...
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January 29, 2006
Razza frazzin frickin frackin...ooh! ooh! stupid friggin' democrats! Yeah I know Kinsley was complaining about kicking Democrats being a pastime and all, but come on! If the Conservatives are saying things like these, what kind of crack do you have...
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January 27, 2006
The Rude One has spoken: Then here's a brief list of reasons to filibuster Alito that have nothing to do with Savage Sammy:- Because President Bush authorizes spying on Americans without a warrant.- Because President Bush authorized torture by Americans...
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January 26, 2006
And we're not talking Faberge eggs. The administration does not need Congress to extend the USA Patriot Act in order to keep using the law's investigative powers against terror suspects. That's from a Boston Globe story about domestic spying, and...
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Kerry says he "will attempt a filibuster to block the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court." I just emailed Byrd and Rockefeller. Find your senator, and give 'em some feedback if you want them to join the...
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January 25, 2006
Scott Lemieux notes here why Pennsylvania Democrats should vote for Chuck Pennacchio in the upcoming Senate primary - Bob Casey Jr. has endorsed Sam Alito....
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January 18, 2006
I used to really like Publius. Now I really *LIKE* Publius. I doubt I read another post this funny (in a crying multiple types of tears kind of way) this week - hell, maybe not for the rest of January....
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Lyle Denniston on today's big (though short) Supreme Court ruling: Read most broadly, though, the opinion could be understood as laying down a new limit on lower court judges' authority to issue sweeping decisions that nullify new abortion laws, end...
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January 16, 2006
I'll make the assertion that Mohammed Yousry should not be in prison. Read the article yourself, and tell me what you think. I'll also assert that "juror 39" is a moral coward. I can't adequately express my feelings for people...
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January 13, 2006
Or reading the NYT: We learned that Judge Alito had once declared that Judge Robert Bork - whose Supreme Court nomination was defeated because of his legal extremism - "was one of the most outstanding nominees" of the 20th century....
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January 12, 2006
In the comments section of another thread Moon has raised a reasonable point- while there is a good bit of posturing and theater in this thing (I'm looking right at you Senator Coburn) there have also been moments of honest...
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January 11, 2006
Oh please, give me a break. I'm not a fan of the death penalty. But if we are going to have it, let's have it. I thought the Supreme Court decision making it unconstitutional to execute people in their mid-teens...
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January 10, 2006
I haven't watch a single minute of the hearings. I haven't read a single story about them. What's the point? The first day was all prepared speeches - if anyone said anything surprising, let me know and I'll be glad...
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December 30, 2005
I hope she gets every cent she's asking for. This story is so horrifying on so many levels - and of course a scary reminder of the fact that we might be putting people in prison on the basis of...
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Or, I suppose more accurately the post should be titled: Why Alito Should Be Very Closely Questioned About Issues Related to Executive Branch Legal and Constitutional Limits of Power During War, Non-War, and Peace; And If He Answers The Questions...
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December 21, 2005
Bunch of Conservative Federal Judges to President Bush: Bite Me: A federal appeals court delivered a stunning rebuke to the Bush administration today, refusing to allow the transfer of Jose Padilla from military custody to civilian law enforcement authorities to...
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December 19, 2005
Maybe someone who knows more about this than I might weigh in? (Moon, cough, Moon, cough cough): In a 1972 case, the Supremes held that even in the face of great harm, the President is not allowed to authorize warrantless...
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December 18, 2005
Morris, in comments to a previous post, chided me for not taking the threat of terrorism seriously: That's essentially the argument you're making, saying that we shouldn't adapt to this threat until it's stronger than we are. And that is...
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December 17, 2005
Although, I was considering titling this post "We're Fucked," since amongst the three of us who study war, revolution, authoritarianism, political leadership and the middle east, our book list is a lot more scary that some undergrad at UMass-Darmouth working...
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It looks like the unexpectedly open seat on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court is going to be filled without much controversy. Governor Rendell is going to nominate Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Cynthia Baldwin to fill that vacancy. Judge Trott's seat...
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December 16, 2005
Another day, another Constitutional atrocity by the Bush Administration. It's a good one this time: the National Security Agency has been spying on Americans, without a court-approved warrant. A few selected highlights from the long article: Months after the Sept....
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December 04, 2005
I continue to become more and more worried....
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December 02, 2005
" ... probable cause can exist so long as there is more than a five- to ten-percent chance that evidence will be present in the place to be searched."Those are Howard Bashman's words describing a recent position taken by Sixth...
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November 26, 2005
Two links on Alito, for you to read while I continue to enjoy my vacation. First, Americablog describes an Alito flip-flop, in which he first said he would recuse himself from certain cases that would be conflcts of interest, but...
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November 16, 2005
Treading on Armand's turf of law and courts, and likely inviting disaster in the form of a Moon corrective, I submit this post by Nathan Newman which I have seen referenced at a few sites. But what is most striking...
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You don't really need to mourn the loss of Underneath Their Robes, not when you have Scott Lemieux keeping you busy with the real, political science view of all you need to know about Alito: As a follow-up to my...
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November 14, 2005
This is from an interview Judge Alito had with Attorney General Ed Meese in 1985:Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr., President Bush's Supreme Court nominee, wrote that "the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion" in a 1985 document...
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In addition to being big on IR around here, we are also big on history. It seems like the last couple of years have given us ample opportunity to quote Santayana: "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to...
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November 08, 2005
For what it's worth, here is how Walter Murphy, the McCormick Professor in Jurisprudence Emeritus at Princeton University, evaluates Judge Alito, and his comments on comparing him to Justice Clarence Thomas.Murphy, who has kept in touch with Alito over the...
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November 04, 2005
This post on Pandagon features what I think has to be the best post title of the week....
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Orin Kerr reminds me why there are few words I find more infuriating and less helpful to engaging in clear discourse than "conservative" and "liberal". Kerr sees at least 7 distinct types of judicial "conservatives"....
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November 03, 2005
I'm sure a lot of eyebrows have gone up on the news that William Brennan is one of Judge Samuel Alito's four favorite Supreme Court justices of the past. I'd say that the inclusion of White should raise far more...
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Our buddy Moon has written an impressively researched piece analyzing several of the opinions that leftist bloggers have been using in their attacks against Judge Alito this week. He concludes that many of these attacks are unfair, and that 1)...
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October 31, 2005
First, it could have been worse (Luttig, Garza, Jones ...). And as you keep reading about Judge Alito in the weeks to come, keep that in mind. Sure, that's scary (hell, terrifying) and probably hard for some of my leftist...
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David Bernstein and I were thinking alike this morning (talk about something that's rarer than a blue moon ...). The degree to which anti-Catholic prejudice has declined in this country in the last generation or two is quite remarkable....
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October 30, 2005
I agree with Ann Althouse - this would be a horrifyingly tacky spectacle. But we are rarely treated to something so hilariously awful. So, since we've been denied the gruesome fun of the Harriet Miers hearings, I really hope the...
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October 28, 2005
Tom Goldstein, who saw the John Roberts nomination coming long before anyone else, notes that Jan Crawford Greenburg (who appears to have had the best reporting in the days and weeks leading up to that pick) is saying that the...
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October 27, 2005
Holy moly kids! Harriet's out! Both the NYT and CNN have a breaking news banner....
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October 20, 2005
Midterms continue, so I provide you with more links to other people who are funnier than I feel like whilst grading. Today's pick of the litter? Billmon. A short excerpt (but go read it all): SENATE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY...
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October 18, 2005
...at the Wall Street Journal think something might be fishy with the (now not so) secret conference call about Harriet Miers' position on Roe v. Wade. Mr. Dobson quelled the controversy by saying that Karl Rove, the White House's deputy...
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October 17, 2005
Yay! Another blogger backing a cause I strongly agree with....
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October 16, 2005
Everything you've been hearing from the outraged radical right (say, those like Manny Miranda who I can't believe that anyone, Republican or Democrat, really takes seriously, or Robert Bork) who's up in arms over the Miers nomination sounds a lot...
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October 13, 2005
Now follow me here: The President says that Miers got the nod for the Supreme Court in part because of her religion: "People are interested to know why I picked Harriet Miers," Mr. Bush said. "They want to know Harriet...
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October 10, 2005
A3G provides more dishy gossip into the loves of Harriet Miers. I swear, I really am inching closer and closer to a personal endorsement of her nomination. Her story really is the most bizarre thing I've seen this side of...
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Put them together, these self-imposed and outside constraints on the administration's choices for the US Supreme Court, and you'll understand why Bush nominated Roberts and Miers. Or so says Michael E. Levine in this interesting post....
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October 03, 2005
We've all got our own little things that irk us about the Miers nomination (or two, or six, or ten of them), but one that's really irritating me by this point in the day is the constant harping about how...
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While some of today's criticisms of Harriet Miers may be well deserved, they are also shedding light on the kinds of justice many on the far right would prefer - a judge who actually doesn't have any respect for the...
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As just about everyone who wakes up this morning will soon realize, Bush has chosen a new nominee to the Supreme Court: Harriet Miers. I'm not a relentless court-watcher, so this name was new to me. I have no idea...
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October 02, 2005
Slate has this profile of three federal appeals court judges who are increasingly being discussed as possible replacements for Justice O'Connor - Judges Karen Williams, Alice Batchelder and Consuela Callahan. I find the idea of a Williams or Batchelder appointment...
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September 27, 2005
"It's Armageddon," said Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah....
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On Thursday Judge John Roberts of the DC Circuit Court of Appeals will be confirmed as the new Chief Justice of the United States. All that's unknown now is the final vote tally. It's looking increasingly likely that Roberts will...
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Rick Hasen has these posts on election law cases that the SCOTUS has scheduled on its calendar for the coming term. As he notes, this is one area in which the changing composition of the Court could have a major...
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September 22, 2005
The talking is almost (finally) over, and when it ends the Senate Judiciary Committee will recommend the confirmation of Judge John Roberts as the next Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court. Three Democrats (Leahy, Kohl and Feingold) will join...
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September 20, 2005
Article III Groupie has another post that's both hilarious and insightful, noting that her prediction that 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Consuelo Callahan would enter the mix of those considered to replace Justice O'Connor has been vindicated by the...
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It's reports like this that leave me dumbfounded that large numbers of people feel safe with Republicans in charge of the country. These are the people that make you feel safe? The people who want to prioritize a War on...
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September 14, 2005
Since he's avoided answering most direct questions I'm sure judge Roberts would decline to answer these questions too - but I think that the questions proposed by Eric Muller and Mark Kleiman (I have question #3 in mind) are well...
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September 13, 2005
I love this. One of Tom Goldstein's recent posts: "2:28 - Kyl is the Joe Biden of the right. His point is that the job of judges is not to advance progress and freedom. There are competing values, no absolutes."Ah,...
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From NPR I learned that, earlier in her career in government, Sen. Feinstein (D-CA) took part in sentencing women to jail for having abortions. And in college Feinstein saw a plate passed around so that one of her classmates could...
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September 12, 2005
So who's going to replace Justice O'Connor on the Supreme Court? Today Robert Novak is playing up the chances of Fifth Circuit Court Judge Priscilla Owen."According to White House sources, Bush met secretly with Owen last week. While not decisive...
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I've been troubled for some time about the degree to which our Fourth Amendment protections seem to be be falling away in the wake of recent Supreme Court opinions. A study by Professor Thomas Clancy (analyzed and discussed at Grits...
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Why are there so many Harvard Law graduates (as opposed to only one Yale Law graduate) on the SCOTUS? Here's a perspective from Yale....
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September 06, 2005
This essay notes the many roles that the Chief Justice plays - several of which give him a vast amount of power over many different different kinds of government policy. His personnel powers alone are enormous. It is extremely important...
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September 05, 2005
It seems that in light of Hurricane Katrina some people think it might make good political sense to name a woman from Louisiana to fill Sandra Day O'Connor's seat on the US Supreme Court. UPDATE: Todd Zywicki offers another reason...
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August 30, 2005
My initial reaction to this post by Publius on the importance of rhetoric was considerable puzzlement - and then I finally realized, oh, the Roman guy, not Mr. J. Lo. Thankfully, I was in a rather more focused state when...
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August 10, 2005
That's what Sen. Ron Wyden seems to think. Supreme Court nominee John Roberts declared that, in cases dealing with end-of-life care, he would "start with the supposition that one has the right to be left alone," Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.,...
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August 07, 2005
While I am deeply interested in many matters related to the US Supreme Court and its justices, after having read a raft of stories about the upcoming hearings for John Roberts I fear that a lot of the questions that...
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August 06, 2005
Via Pandagon, a story about a woman in Washington state who cannot get a divorce because she is pregnant. Her husband is in jail on domestic violence charges. Lovely....
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July 27, 2005
Where do you look for the highest law? The Constitution? The Ten Commandments? The Light of Reason puts the nomination of John Roberts and his answer to that question under a bright light: Roberts said that he might have to...
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July 22, 2005
Apparently Orrin Hatch, a senior member of the Judiciary Committee and someone who will no doubt be a leader in the Roberts nomination process, said the following on Fox News: "I think senators can ask any questions they want. I've...
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July 21, 2005
Marshall, Jackson, White, Harlan and (probably) Roberts - learn more about some of the greats and definitely not greats of US legal history here....
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"I am proud that a citizen of John Roberts’s ability and character has been honored by our President in a way that, in a sense, he so richly deserves. But at the same time, I harbor some deep reservations."This post...
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July 20, 2005
I'd say a life term without parole is appropriate, though I realize he won't get that. And, honestly, given the way they apparently view the world - I'd feel better if his parents, wife and public defender were behind bars...
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OK, so this is my favorite line that I've read on the nomination of John Roberts this morning:``I don't see ideological underpinnings,'' said A.E. Dick Howard, a law professor at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. ``Conservative, yes, but ideology,...
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July 19, 2005
Surely Armand will have a brilliant analysis when the announcement is made (especially if it is Judge Clement, as CNN is predicting), however, the timing of this whole thing is driving me nuts. No doubt it is supposed to. I...
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July 06, 2005
"I am amazed that our en banc court would have the audacity to turn around and reach the same result the Supreme Court just vacated," 5th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Harold DeMoss Jr. One reason that the Supreme...
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June 27, 2005
If I was going to bet on who would next be named to the US Supreme Court, I wouldn’t put money on 10th Circuit Judge Michael McConnell. While he’s extremely bright, affable, and a nominee who could split liberals and...
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Since today is the last day of the current Supreme Court term, I expect to write a number of posts tied to that today. So I will begin by noting this profile of Justice Kennedy in today's New York Times....
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June 23, 2005
SCOTUSBlog has this handy graphic showing who was and who wasn't in the majority in the six decisions handed down this morning by the US Supreme Court (the remaining seven decisions from this term will be handed down on Monday)....
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June 21, 2005
Sean Sirrine gets at part of why I often wish Alex Kozinski would be the next conservative nominee to the US Supreme Court. He's not only brilliant, he's straightforward and funny. Sadly though, those last two traits alone are probably...
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June 08, 2005
If there are any of you out there who still haven't gotten your fill of reading about Raich and its implications I recommend this piece by Michael Dorf. It lays out the various arguments and the historical context in a...
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June 07, 2005
Today's the day this justice of the Supreme Court of California will likely be elevated to fill a seat on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals. I have mixed feelings about this, and if I were a senator this vote...
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June 06, 2005
Orin Kerr has the first lengthy review I've seen of today's decision in Raich (the medical marijuana/federalism case). The vote was 6-3 to reverse the 9th Circuit and uphold the federal government's power to regulate marijuana - and in the...
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May 31, 2005
Stuart Taylor wrote this recent cover story in the National Journal. It strikes me as a fair evaluation of CJ Rehnquist's service on the Supreme Court. It also reminds us that what makes a good Chief Justice is somewhat different...
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May 30, 2005
Publius is in fine form in this critique of Justice Thomas' dissent in Deck v. Missouri. He uses this opinion to illustrate the holes in originalism, and the related notion that certain judges like him who follow this doctrine are...
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May 25, 2005
It's happened. The first of the federal appeals court judges that had been blocked by a Democratic filibuster has been confirmed. She will leave the Supreme Court in Texas and join the US Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals which is...
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May 16, 2005
And the state laws in Michigan and New York are found to be unconstitutional.In soaring rhetoric, Kennedy said that preserving cross-country access to consumers was "essential to the foundations of the Union," citing the Federalist Papers, and the work of...
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May 13, 2005
Jacob Sullum notes some of the latest appalling follies that are being perpetrated by those in power....
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Ann Althouse has some ideas as to why it is taking the Supreme Court so long to come up with an opinion in the Raich case. While I think that her piece is generally quite insightful, I find the end...
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May 02, 2005
While the case of the 13 year old Floridian's struggle against DCF efforts to block the abortion she wants has received plenty of attention, and sparked some insightful discussion around the web, this article from the Sun Sentinel shows the...
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May 01, 2005
Underneath Their Robes is running a series on the men and women who will be serving as Supreme Court clerks in the coming term. Here is the run-down on the four men who'll be clerking for Justice Scalia. You can...
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April 27, 2005
This ruling is just the kind of thing that must send the results-oriented activists on both the left and right screaming about how "their" justices could do such a thing. In Small, if you only look at the results and...
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April 21, 2005
This appears to be significant loss to the country and the government. From all accounts I've read the Deputy Attorney General is a talented leader who is serious about the law. And, in fact, that seriousness might have blocked him...
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April 17, 2005
Jeffrey Rosen's piece in The New York Times Magazine is something I hope to get around to reading in the next day or two. On Saturday it prompted two critical posts by David Bernstein dealing with a variety of issues....
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April 13, 2005
I hereby declare Orin Kerr the Volokh conspirator with the best sense of humor. I love clever - and this is both clever and really funny....
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April 08, 2005
This post at Underneath Their Robes is really pretty clever. How do you tell who are the real players who are in the running for the next opening on the US Supreme Court? How can one hope to systematicly rate...
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April 06, 2005
This piece in the New York Times doesn't begin to delve into the certain complexities of this case, but it is one more in a series of recent articles I have read that basically suggest that any teenager - perhaps...
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March 30, 2005
True, he never made such a ruling in a case that came before him. And some would argue that if you are looking for allies to make your case, well, invoking Taney's name dredges up a fair amount of historical...
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March 29, 2005
This is one of those cases in which traditional conservative/liberal or pragmatist/non-pragmatist divides on the Court would seem to be thrown out the window because there is just soooooo much going on. There are so many different topics that the...
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March 23, 2005
Margaret Talbot’s article on Justice Scalia in the March 28, 2005 issue of The New Yorker brings several points to mind. Of course some of these deal with Scalia’s actions as a member of the Supreme Court. While Justice Scalia...
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March 22, 2005
Well, no, he wasn't. But he was a foreigner after all. And apparently foreigners are not to be trusted. They are horrible people, trying to wreck all that is noble and godly in the world. And the US must be...
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March 15, 2005
Julian Sanchez notes a key point in yesterday's decision. Banning gay marriage isn't simply problematic because of the ban takes away a fundamental right without a rational basis - there's also the problem of gender discrimination. After carrying out his...
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Where can victims of Chile's 1973 coup go to seek justice? The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has affirmed that one place is the US judicial system....
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March 12, 2005
Jeffrey Rosen makes the case for viewing William H. Rehnquist as one of the Supreme Court's greatest Chiefs in this article in The Atlantic. The gist of it is that Rehnquist has done a remarkably good job at melding his...
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March 09, 2005
"Scalia looks at the Constitution and sees 'understandings' – I look at the Constitution and see words. " This is yet another great post by Publius. While it starts with some interesting points about last week's decision in Roper, in...
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February 25, 2005
If you haven't gotten around to reading Jane Mayer's article in the New Yorker (the February 14 & 21 issue), you should. It's been out for a little while now, but before it fades from discussions entirely, I want to...
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February 24, 2005
Jack Balkin has this to say about Justice O'Connor's position in Johnson v. California: "In saying that Thomas and Scalia aren't being consistent, I do not mean to suggest that O'Connor is. As Thomas correctly points out, her refusal to...
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February 18, 2005
This is from Jane Mayer's article in The New Yorker: "In criminal justice, you either prosecute the suspects or let them go. But if you've treated then in ways that won't allow you to prosecute them you're in this no...
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January 31, 2005
Senior Judge Joyce Hens Green has ruled that the "enemy combatants" held at Gitmo have "enforceable consitutional rights". Of course this puts her directly at odds with a judge in the same court who's heard similar cases. Who could have...
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January 25, 2005
This post by Orin Kerr is realy interesting. He discusses how recent decisions, including yesterday's in Illinois v. Caballes, are moving 4th Amendment questions from being the nature of the search or surveillance employed to the government, to the nature...
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January 24, 2005
If I was forced to pick my two favorite Supreme Court justices Ginsburg and Souter would probably top the list, so any case in which they stand together as the only dissenters will catch my eye - and that happened...
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January 20, 2005
This article on Law.com does an excellent job of explaining what's going on with the appelate judicial nominees that the Senate refused to approve in the last Congress (or the ones out of that set that the president has resubmitted...
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January 10, 2005
That's a possible nomination that makes a lot of sense to me. His is certainly a name to watch....
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January 04, 2005
This editorial in the Sacramento Bee strongly disagress with the 9th Circuit's recent ruling in Jesperson v. Harrah's. What was the case about?"Harrah's Casino in Reno fired a bartender with a stellar 20-year work record because she refused to follow...
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The latest issue of Perspectives on Politics (sorry, I don’t know how to link to it) features a symposium on the Supreme Court Forecasting Project. This project is built with the goal of creating a statistical model that can predict...
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December 30, 2004
Andrew Rosenthal discusses the marginalization of the military lawyers in the Bush administration. Normally, the civilian policy makers would have asked the military lawyers to draft the rules for a military prison in wartime. The lawyers for the service secretaries...
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December 23, 2004
Publius passionately, but succinctly, notes why conservatives should take off their partisan blinders and see the incredible damage the prisoner abuse and torture issues related to the war in Iraq are doing to the causes they believe in....
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December 22, 2004
Phil Carter brings us up to date on some of the latest reports on the Bush administration's sweeping assertions of its powers - where they came from, and the effects they've had on US foreign policy. Carter thinks that John...
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December 09, 2004
Publius has an interesting post on Clarence Thomas. Thomas has a perfectly coherent jurisprudence that would (1) unfetter the executive in wartime; (2) allow state-established religion; (3) invalidate much of the administrative state; and (4) toss out all precedent that...
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December 07, 2004
Risk Hasen has some pretty good reasons. And he doesn't even touch on the areas of law in which many Democrats would actually agree with Scalia's views....
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December 05, 2004
While the general impression of the US Supreme Court is that it's not friendly to complaints brought by people convicted of violent crimes, it's also clearly not friendly to appeals courts that appear to repeatedly violate its holdings. Adam Liptak...
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December 02, 2004
Since I know the Third Circuit's recent ruling on the Solomon Amendment interested Binky, I'm going to link to this post by Orin Kerr on how it relates to the Dale (Boy Scouts) case. The more I read about the...
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November 30, 2004
What can one say about this? Couldn't the Chief Judge of the District Court have sorted this out? I probably should just let it go before I start proposing how it's all part of a White House conspiracy to draw...
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November 26, 2004
I've been waiting for Ashcroft v. Raich for months, and to my eyes it's quite possibly the most important case of the year. But there will, of course, be other business before the Court next week and this gender-equity case...
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November 23, 2004
Last week Senior Judge Donald Lay of the 8th US Circuit Court of Appeals had an op-ed in The New York Times on the need for federal drug courts. Considering that 1) such courts have a great record of improving...
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November 16, 2004
How dare puny judges question my power! The AG has basically accused the US Court system of being in league with the terrorists. Lovely. You know, if you're watching Seinfeld and see "No soup for you!" it's kind of funny....
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November 12, 2004
I think Orin Kerr is probably right - the practice he discusses here may have a lot to do with it....
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November 06, 2004
That's the name being pitched by Mike Rappaport. Eugene Volokh thinks that's a fine idea. His nomination would make a great deal of sense, and I'm rather surprised his name isn't on more of the lists of possible nominees. UPDATE:...
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November 05, 2004
I can't wait to read Howard Bashman's article that he discusses here. My initial reaction is that I'd be stunned if the White House actually nominated Jones for Chief Justice. She'd seem relatively easy to defeat. Which isn't to say...
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October 26, 2004
If Chief Justice Rehnquist steps down while the Senate is in recess, President Bush could name an appointee to fill his seat for the duration of the NEXT Congress. Yes - even if the president is defeated on Tuesday. Lyle...
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October 22, 2004
Stuart Taylor has a run-down on possible nominees. This piece in The National Journal is better than the usual prospective nominees article. While most of the names are familiar, there are a few new ones, and Taylor offers brief but...
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September 15, 2004
A well-educated moron I'll grant you. A serious moron. A plain moron who dresses in such boring attire that it's obvious you're supposed to look at him for deep, insightful, solid thoughts. He's possibly even at some level a very...
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September 13, 2004
One of the other good things in yesterday's Times was this story by Adam Liptak that points out that the Federal Sentencing Guidelines themselves may not be as big a problem in today's legal system as our continual adoption of...
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August 25, 2004
I have to say that Mark Tushnet's description of Mr. Justice Breyer as a "statist" "resembling Byron White" has certianly done nothing to lessen my considerable level of ambivalence for Bill Clinton's second appointee to the US Supreme Court....
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August 24, 2004
If two women were simultaneously nominated to the US Supreme Court it would probably be a major news story for months. But given US disinterest in all things Canadian I figured I should alert you to a story you might...
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August 22, 2004
Jack Balkin has this interesting historical review, drawn from Justice Blackmun's notes, of how Casey did, and then did not, over-rule Roe v. Wade....
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May 31, 2004
This story in the New York Times and this one in the Washington Post show that there are some deeply troubling holes in our justice system, holes than can lead to horrifying results for those who are wrongly accused. If...
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