Lyle Denniston

Aug 8 2016

U.S. will reluctantly accept some ethics sanctions

Trying energetically to avoid any punishment by a federal judge who has complained of ethical lapses by Justice Department lawyers during the big immigration case, the Obama administration on Monday reluctantly agreed that it would accept some mild forms of sanctions.

Aug 8 2016

Mixed signal on Hurst ruling’s meaning

The Supreme Court turned aside on Monday a plea to require jurors to satisfy the toughest legal test before they may vote to impose the death penalty.  Without comment, the Justices denied rehearing in a Louisiana case that they had passed up last Term, thus rejecting a new attempt by lawyers to turn it into a sequel to the Justices’ important Sixth… Read More

Aug 6 2016

Where does the government immigration case stand now?

The Obama administration’s two levels of defense of its broad new immigration policy — one, a continued attempt to put the policy into effect, the other, a move to head off a federal judge’s ethical complaints against federal lawyers in the case — are moving along even in the slow court days of summer.

Aug 5 2016

McDonnells’ legal fate may be known soon

Prosecutors and defense lawyers in the public corruption cases of the former governor of Virginia and his wife — Robert F. McDonnell and Maureen G. McDonnell — are working toward an August 29 deadline on where to go next with both prosecutions.

Aug 4 2016

Broader meaning of transgender rights ruling

Analysis The newest version of a civil rights movement – claims of equality for transgender people – has been building toward the Supreme Court at a very fast pace. On Wednesday, the Justices took their first action on the issue in a significant case, and the signals were mixed.

Aug 3 2016

Court blocks transgender rights ruling, for now

Signaling that the Supreme Court may be willing to take up the first significant test case on transgender rights, the Justices split 5-to-3 on Wednesday in blocking a lower court ruling on access of students to high school restrooms.  The Court’s order is here.

Aug 2 2016

Can only a jury impose the death penalty?

Analysis Reading a Supreme Court ruling of last January in a widely expansive way, a divided Delaware Supreme Court on Tuesday struck down that state’s death penalty law.  It ruled that the Supreme Court’s most recent ruling on death sentencing requires that the ultimate choice of life or death can only be made by a jury,… Read More

Aug 2 2016

Would Tom Brady have won in the Supreme Court?

This post also appears on Constitution Daily, the blog of the National Constitution Center. The New England Patriots professional football team opened this year’s pre-season training camp this week in Foxborough, Mass., with one lingering issue settled: their star quarterback, Tom Brady, is not going to ask the Supreme Court to give him legal permission… Read More

Jul 29 2016

Sweeping North Carolina limits on voting nullified

Declaring that the North Carolina legislature had passed “the most restrictive voting law…since the era of Jim Crow,” aimed specifically at black voters because of their race, a federal appeals court on Friday ordered the state to stop enforcing the five major parts of the measure.

Jul 27 2016

Move to block generic birth-control drugs’ sale fails

In a ruling that leaves unsettled a key legal question on inventors’ rights to a patent, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., on Wednesday cleared the way for a maker of generic drugs to sell cheaper versions of two highly profitable birth-control pills that are now sold only under brand names.

Lyle Denniston continues to write about the U.S. Supreme Court, although he “retired” at the end of 2019 following more than six decades on that news beat. He was there for three revolutions – civil rights, women’s rights, and gay rights – and the start of a fourth, on transgender rights. His career of following the law began at the Otoe County Courthouse in his hometown, Nebraska City, Nebraska, in the fall of 1948. His online, eight-week, college-level course – “The Supreme Court and American Politics” – is available from the University of Baltimore Law School, and it is free.

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