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.
Jul 22 2016
U.S. seeks nationwide advice on birth control dispute
The Obama administration, in a major surprise, on Thursday launched a nationwide plea for advice — technical, practical, legal and even religious — on ways to settle the bitter controversy over the Affordable Care Act’s birth-control mandate. This appeared to be a sign that private talks with religious groups over the issue have not reached… Read More
Jul 21 2016
Texas voter photo ID law sharply narrowed
Meeting a Supreme Court deadline to act, a federal appeals court on Wednesday undercut most of Texas’ five-year-old law requiring photo IDs to vote, calling it the “strictest in the nation.” In addition, the same court raised at least the prospect that the state of Texas could lose its right to pass new election laws without… Read More
Jul 18 2016
U.S. wants Court to try again on immigration case
The Obama administration on Monday asked the Supreme Court to reopen the government’s case defending its broad new immigration policy, but to act on the request only after a ninth Justice has joined the Court.
Jul 17 2016
New attack on Amtrak’s role as tracks manager
Relying anew on a New Deal era precedent of the Supreme Court, the nation’s freight railroads have urged a federal appeals court to leave intact a ruling that strips the Amtrak rail passenger service of much of its power to make sure that its trains run on time.
Jul 13 2016
Transgender rights dispute reaches Court
This post also appears today on Constitution Daily, the blog of the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. A public school board in Virginia, arguing that no one ever thought that separate restrooms for the sexes would be illegal, asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to delay a court order that it must provide equal access… Read More
