Publications

Greetings, Court fans! We have a few decisions to catch you up on since our last Update, bringing us to a “whopping” 23 opinions for the Term. This sluggish start is consistent with last year’s 22 opinions by this date, but is significantly off the Court’s 2005 pace of 38. So, once again, we’re in […]

Greetings, Court fans!   Solidarity on the Court is always nice to see, and this week brought two unanimous decisions. In the first, EC Term of Years Trust v. United States (05-1541), the Court (Souter, J.) held that a third party claiming that its property was wrongfully seized to pay the taxes of another, cannot […]

Greetings, Court Fans!   It’s another short Update, as the Court will hear no arguments this week and does not seem particularly motivated about issuing opinions. Today’s order list did have one new grant, however, as the Court endeavors to fill up its docket for the Term. The new case, Richlin Security Service Co. v. […]

Greetings, Court fans!   We’re back to bring you Part II. But given the Court’s release of 5 full decisions and a per curiam opinion Monday, as well as an Order List, we will again break things up – so there will be a Part III. After this minor blitzkrieg, the Court will be on […]

Greetings, Court Fans! It was not a very busy day at the Court – the Court issued no opinions, heard no arguments, and issued a one-page order list dealing with only three cases. It was, however, quite an eventful day, as the order list indicates that the Court has added three new cases to its […]

Greetings, Court Fans! The Court had a busy and congenial Monday, as it issued five largely unanimous opinions in a smorgasbord of cases. In the first case, Watson v. Philip Morris Cos. (05-1284), the Court held that private companies cannot claim the benefit of the federal officer removal statute (28 U.S.C. § 1442), which applies […]

Greetings, Court fans! The Court issued five opinions this week – the minimum necessary to maintain the “decision-a-day” pace needed to get through all outstanding cases by the end of June. And, to be honest, a couple of the decisions barely count as such . . . but we’ll save those for later in the […]

Greetings, Court fans!   The Court released all of its remaining opinions today, leaving us with some real blockbusters. We’ll address the Ten Commandment cases and Grokster (the file-sharing case) now and follow-up shortly with the final three cases and the new cert grants. Also, apart from the rulings, the biggest news might have been […]

Greetings, Court fans! Notwithstanding a plethora of decisions in recent years on both the application of the mandatory minimum sentence under the Armed Career Criminals Act (“ACCA”) and the one year limitation period to file habeas petitions under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (“AEDPA”), open questions apparently persist – resulting in two more […]

Greetings, Court fans!   The Term so far has been anything but dull . . . . We have a new Chief Justice, a withdrawn nomination, and today, a new nominee to succeed Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. Current Third Circuit Judge Samuel A. Alito, Jr. has been on the appellate bench 15 years, and he […]

Greetings Court fans!   The Court issued four opinions and an order list yesterday. That leaves 12 cases to go, including most of the big cases for this Term. Let’s get right to the opinions.   First, in Intel Corp. v. Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (02-572), the Court issued its interpretation of 28 USC 1782(a). […]

Greetings, Court Fans!   We still owe you two opinions from last week, but in the meantime the Court issued three more opinions today, including the first opinion by Justice Alito and another opinion in favor of everyone’s favorite widow, Anna Nicole Smith. Here’s the first of a two-part wrap-up of the outstanding opinions.   […]

Greetings, Court fans!   We’re back to finish up the October 2007 Term . . . and as always, the Court saved some of the best, and most controversial, opinions for last. Please bear with us – with five opinions and some orders to summarize, this Update is not short. (Not that an e-mail should […]

Greetings, Court Fans!   Yesterday, the Court made it a little easier for the law to drive us all to drink. Coming off another two-week recess, the Court issued its opinion in Granholm v. Heald (03-1116), striking down Michigan and New York restrictions on out-of-state wine producers as violating the Commerce Clause’s prohibition on state […]

Greetings, Court Fans!   We’re still catching up – here are yesterday’s opinions and orders plus one from last week, along with the news from yesterday’s order list. Once again, we owe many thanks to Tahlia Townsend for helping us out on the summaries.   First up from yesterday, in Florida Department of Revenue v. […]

Greetings, Court fans!   We have some catching up to do – three opinions from last week, where the focus was on money laundering, and another four this week. Here’s the first batch, and we’ll be back in your in-box shortly.   Turning first to money laundering, Cuellar v. United States (06-1456) interpreted 18 U.S.C. […]

Greetings, Court Fans!   The Court issued three opinions today, plus one cert grant.   First, the headline-grabbing case of the day, Arthur Andersen LLP v. United States (04-368), in which the Court unanimously set aside Andersen’s conviction for destroying documents related to the Enron debacle. As set forth in the Chief’s opinion for the […]

Greetings, Court fans!   The Court issued only one opinion yesterday, unanimously reversing a Ninth Circuit decision that held that a trademark defendant asserting the affirmative defense of “fair use” has the burden of proving that its actions are not likely to cause consumer confusion. The case, KP Permanent Make-Up, Inc. v. Lasting Impression I, […]

Greetings, Court fans!   We’re following up on Tuesday’s Update with the two Batson cases. As a quick refresher, in Batson the Court created a three-part test for reviewing a claim that the use of peremptory strikes in jury selection was discriminatory. First, the objector must make out a prima facie case by showing that […]

Greetings Court fans!   The Court issued an order list today granting cert in two cases:   1. Pasquantino v. United States (03-725): This case is about the operation of the federal wire fraud statute (18 USC 1343) in the context of an allegedly fraudulent scheme to avoid the payment of taxes owed to a […]

Greetings, Court fans!   Lots of action today, in what was probably the last opinion day before 2005. The Court issued five opinions, on top of the four cert grants from last Friday. To avoid producing a totally unmanageable e-mail, we’ll split the rulings into two (only somewhat unmanageable) e-mails. Today, we’ll do two opinions […]

Greetings, Court Fans, and welcome back for another Term of the Supreme Court Update! Although it seems like we just left you for the summer, the first Monday in October is almost upon us. As in past Terms, when the Court issues an order or opinion, we will send an e-mail summarizing the highlights to […]

Greetings, Court Fans!   The Court came back yesterday for its final session before the holiday recess, and in the spirit of the season it gave us three opinions and a bunch of cert grants – making this the longest of our Updates so far this Term. If you’re a criminal practitioner, or just a […]

Greetings, Court Fans! In terms of written output, it was a slow week at the Court – just a single order list with two new cert grants. The cases, however, look interesting. The first, District Attorney’s Office v. Osborne (08-6), involves an inmate who, at the time of his trial for kidnapping and sexual assault, […]

Greetings, Court Fans!   We’re still working on the remaining decisions from last week and yesterday – here are a few more, including the Court’s major decision yesterday striking down Vermont’s campaign finance laws in Randall v. Sorrell (04-1528 & 04-1697) and Vermont Republican State Committee v. Sorrell (04-1530).   Randall yielded a Court arguably […]

Greetings, Court fans!   The Court issued a significant antitrust decision Monday and also cleared out a bit of the underbrush, issuing four other (relatively short) decisions and dismissing cert as improvidently granted in one case. We’re covering everything in this Update, so be prepared for a long e-mail.   Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly […]

Greetings Court fans! Two items of interest from the Court. First, the Court issued its opinion in FCC v. Nextwave Personal Communications, Inc. (01-653). After today, there is only one opinion still outstanding from the October sitting (Miller-El v. Cockrell), and since Kennedy hasn’t issued a majority opinion from October yet, it’s a good bet […]

Greetings Court fans! Not much news to report. The Court granted cert in 2 cases, thus (according to my latest count), filling their calendar for this Term. Any cases granted after today will be heard in October Term 2003. The Court will sit on Monday to hand down an order list, and maybe release opinions, […]

  Greetings, Court Fans!   Warning: This update will be a big one. Today, in a death penalty case, the Court issued its first 5-4 opinion of the Term (and of the new Chief’s tenure), on top of three opinions from yesterday dealing with heavy-duty trucks, disabled prisoners, and yet another instance of the courts’ […]

Greetings, Court fans! Yesterday, the Court released its first non-per curiam decisions of the Term, and the winners of the race to publish first are (drum roll, please) . . . Justices Stevens and Breyer. Both of the today’s cases came from the Ninth Circuit, which went 1 for 2. So far, four of the […]