Publications
Greetings, Court Fans! It’s been ages since we last invaded your inboxes, but this time it’s not because of a lack of activity at the Court. On the contrary, The Nine have handed down five new opinions since our last missive (on top of the four we previewed there), but we’ve been unable to tell […]
Greetings, Court Fans! We’re back with Part I of our catch-up series, including summaries of the Court’s decisions in Digital Realty Trust v. Somers (No. 16-276), Rubin v. Islamic Republic of Iran (No. 16-534), and Murphy v. Smith (No. 16-1067), three cases concerning statutory construction, tied together (in a sense) by three separate opinions from […]
Greetings, Court Fans! We’re back with Part II of our February-sitting catch-up, with summaries of Jennings v. Rodriguez, Patchak v. Zinke, and Class v. United States. Without further ado… The high-profile immigration detention case Jennings v. Rodriguez (No. 15-1204) was originally argued in November 2016, when the Court had only eight members. Presumably to avoid […]
Greetings, Court Fans! We’re back with the last of our catch-up series on the decisions announced during the Court’s February sitting. Lucky for us, if you’re reading this in the Northeast, it won’t take much for you to suspend disbelief and imagine yourself reading our summaries of Merit Management Group v. FTI Consulting, U.S. Bank […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Court kicked off its March sitting with three new decisions. We’ll have summaries toute de suite, but here are the squibs in the meantime: In Cyan, Inc. v. Beaver County Employees Retirement Fund (No. 15-1439), a unanimous Court held that the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act of 1998 (SLUSA)—a statute that […]
Greetings, Court Fans! When the Court indicated yesterday (as opposed to Friday, like usual) that there would be a “possibility of opinions” today (as opposed to Monday, like usual), there was some speculation that something interesting could be afoot. Perhaps, one theory went, The Nine wanted to rush out a decision in Gill v. Whitford […]
Greetings, Court Fans! Even though the Court is in the midst of a historically slow term (as measured by opinion output), we’ve managed to fall behind. We’ll take advantage of this off-week to get you caught up to speed with summaries of three outstanding (as in, overdue, if not necessarily superlative) decisions. First up, in […]
Greetings, Court Fans! Been a bit, but better belated than benever. (Seriously, Henry Benever was a uniquely undistinguished Member of Parliament.) As we tread water nervously in anticipation of a deluge of decisions next week (and each remaining week of the term), it’s high tide time we worked our way through the current logjam. (We’re […]
Greetings, Court Fans! As we forecast last week, the downpour has commenced. The Court released five new decisions yesterday morning, including one of the most anticipated of the term, Murphy v. NCAA (No. 16-476), the New Jersey sports-betting case, in which it held (basically 6-3) that the federal Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, which […]
Greetings, Court Fans! Last time we hit your inboxes, Barack Obama was President. To call the ensuing month eventful is something of an understatement. We’ve seen a primetime Supreme Court nomination, a flood of litigation challenging hastily conceived Executive Orders, and most recently the rescinding of a Department of Education policy on transgender rights that’s […]
Greetings, Court Fans! We’re back with the lone decision from this week, Bethune-Hill v. Va. State Board of Elections (No. 15-680), one of two racial gerrymandering cases argued on the same day back in December. (Interestingly, the other case, McCrory v. Harris (15-1262), remains undecided, despite raising similar issues.) Following the 2010 census, the Virginia […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Court kicked off the week with a flurry of activity in criminal cases, issuing a landmark Sixth Amendment ruling, another decision closing the door on vagueness challenges to the Sentencing Guidelines, a per curiam decision on the standard for disqualification of judges in criminal trials, and several statements regarding cert denials […]
Greetings, Court Fans! This week, while a potential ninth justice lectured the Senate Judiciary Committee on everything from fly fishing to “mutton busting” (but not on the age-old question of whether one horse-sized duck or 100 duck-sized horses would win in a fight), The Eight churned out six opinions lecturing readers on everything from adult […]
Greetings, Court Fans! This morning, the Court issued its decision in Moore v. Texas (15-797), an important death-penalty case holding that Texas’s outdated standard for determining whether a death-row inmate is intellectually disabled violates the Eighth Amendment. We’ll provide a more in-depth summary in our next Update, but first we bring you the remaining opinions […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Eight are Nine again. After over a year of operating short-handed, the Court is finally at full strength, as Justice Neil Gorsuch joined his colleagues on the bench this week to hear arguments for the first time. Meanwhile, we at the Update have felt a bit short-handed ourselves, but we’re back […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Nine wrapped up arguments for OT16 last week, so it’s time to start playing catch-up. This Update will get us most of the way there, with summaries of: Lewis v. Clarke (No. 15-1500), a rare case from the Connecticut Supreme Court regarding whether lawsuits brought against tribal employees in their individual […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Nine (well, eight of them, with Gorsuch still taking no part in decisions argued before his appointment) were back in action yesterday, issuing three new opinions touching on the Federal Arbitration Act (Kindred Nursing Centers v. Clark (No. 16-32)), the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (Midland Funding v. Johnson (No. 16-348)), […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Court rang in the week with three more decisions—Cooper v. Harris (No. 15-1262), an important ruling clarifying the test for racial gerrymandering claims; TC Heartland v. Kraft Foods Group Brands LLC (No. 16-1341), an important ruling clarifying the scope of the patent venue statue; and Water Splash, Inc. v. Menon (No. […]
Greetings, Court Fans! We’re back with summaries of the three decisions handed down this past week, beginning with a major ruling on racial gerrymandering. Cooper v. Harris (15-1262) is one of two significant redistricting cases that were argued on the same day in December, which together make it much easier for plaintiffs to make out […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Court packed four new opinions into this holiday-shortened week, including the first case to be decided by nine justices in sixteen months. In that case, BNSF Railway Co. v. Tyrrell (No. 16-405), The Nine held that the Federal Employers’ Liability Act does not create a special rule authorizing jurisdiction over railroads […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Court took care of some deck clearing this week, handing down five unanimous decisions in relatively uncontroversial cases, including Honeycutt v. United States (No. 16-142), on the applicability of federal forfeiture statutes to members of a conspiracy who did not personally acquire forfeitable property, and Advocate Health Care Network v. Stapleton […]
Greetings, Court Fans! Four new decisions to start the week, including the first ever authored by Justice Gorsuch: Henson v. Santander Consumer USA Inc. (No. 16-349), holding that a company seeking to collect its own debt is not a “debt collector” under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. We’ll have a summary of that decision […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The end-of-term rush is officially on. On Monday, the Court handed down six new decisions (including a per curiam summary reversal) and accepted a potential OT17 blockbuster for review. To summarize briefly: In Matal v. Tam (No. 15-1293), the Court unanimously (but with some disagreement on rationale) struck down the disparagement clause […]
Greetings, Court Fans! Three more decisions this morning, leaving us with six to go (and a hint that perhaps a couple of these may be left undecided, fizzling out as 4-4 affirmances or being set for reargument next term). We’ll be back later with summaries of today’s cases, but here’s the blackletter: In Lee v. […]
Greetings, Court Fans! The Nine were back in action this morning, handing down three decisions in cases raising important issues of criminal law and procedure. Briefly: In Maslenjak v. United States (No. 16-309) (one of several “crimmigration” cases this term) the Court held that, where a naturalized citizen is alleged to have procured citizenship illegally, […]
Greetings, Court Fans! It is finished. October Term 2016, that is. This morning, the Court handed down decisions in four of its six remaining cases for OT16 (with two cases that were argued before Gorsuch joined the Court being scheduled for reargument in the Fall, meaning it will be up to him to break an […]
Greetings, Court Fans! Though OT16 was gaveled to a close yesterday, the work of the clerk’s office continued this morning with the issuance of additional orders from yesterday’s “clean up conference,” including five new cases accepted for argument next Term. Our work continues, too, as we make our way through the long list of decisions […]
Greetings, Court Fans! Told you we’d back soon. This time, we’ve got summaries of two decisions relating to the availability of the implied damages remedy for constitutional violations by federal officials announced in the Court’s 1971 decision, Bivens v. Six Unknown Federal Narcotics Agents. Ziglar v. Abassi (15-1359) and its two companion cases arose in […]
Greetings, Court Fans! This is the way October Term 2016 ends—not with a whimper, but a bang. After eight relatively sleepy months, the last day of the term brought enough excitement to warrant a T.S. Elliot misquote. To be sure, much of the bang came through end-of-term orders and cert grants for OT17, but the […]
Greetings, Court Fans! While a potential ninth justice made plans to give a high school commencement address, The Eight continued to demonstrate that, without a full complement of justices, this may be the Term Without Blockbusters. (Although, with abortion and affirmative action still on the docket, that remains unlikely.) Two more high-profile cases were disposed […]