Wednesday round-up
on Jan 25, 2012 at 10:07 am
Monday’s decision in United States v. Jones continued to dominate most of yesterday’s Court coverage. NPR’s Nina Totenberg, David Savage of the Los Angeles Times, and CNN (video) all report on the decision. At Slate, Dahlia Lithwick laments that the Court “issu[ed] the narrowest possible decision about the most consequential technological dilemma” – a sentiment echoed by the Los Angeles Times editorial board, which describes the decision “needlessly narrow.” The blog Concurring Opinions provided extended commentary on the case, which included posts from Margot Kaminski, Gerard Magliocca, Derek Bambauer, and Priscilla Smith, Nabiha Syed, and Albert Wong. Additional commentary comes from Jim Harper at Cato@Liberty, Garrett Epps at the Atlantic, Jeffrey Rosen at the New Republic (thanks to Howard Bashman for the link), and Micah W.J. Smith and Babak Siavoshy at ACSblog.
In other news, Carol J. Williams of the Los Angeles Times reports on Monday’s opinion in Ryburn v. Huff, in which the Court summarily reversed a Ninth Circuit decision denying immunity to two police officers who invaded a student’s home without a warrant because of concerns of an imminent violent confrontation. And at the paper’s “Opinion L.A.” page, Patt Morrison responds to Monday’s decision in National Meat Association v. Harris, in which the Court held that the Federal Meat Inspection Act expressly preempts a California law regulating euthanization at slaughterhouses, urging Congress to step in and address this “animal welfare issue.”
Looking ahead to upcoming decisions this Term, Mark Walsh at the ABA Journal breaks down the issues presented in the upcoming health care cases, in which the Court will “grappl[e] with profound questions about the limits of congressional power.” And at PrawfsBlawg, Lyrissa Lidsky reads “the oral argument tea leaves” in FCC v. Fox.
Briefly:
- At NPR, Tovia Smith discusses the possibility and implications of a Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage.
- At the Huffington Post, Lila Shapiro reports that despite the Court’s ruling in Wal-Mart v. Dukes“the plaintiffs’ lawyers haven’t given up, and neither have [their clients].”
- Tony Mauro at the Blog of the Legal Times notes that the Supreme Court largely stayed out of the spotlight in the President’s State of the Union speech last night.
- Also at the BLT, Zoe Tillman reports on a lawsuit brought against (among others) Pamela Talkin, the Supreme Court Marshal; the plaintiff alleges that the rules barring protesters from displaying signs at the Court are unconstitutional.
- At the ABA Journal, Richard Brust discusses the debate over the use of legal scholarship by judges and practitioners.
- The Los Angeles Times blog L.A. Now reports on a petition for certiorari asking the Court to overturn a Ninth Circuit decision requiring aCalifornia math teacher to remove religious banners from his classroom.
- Discussing Perry v. Perez, ACSblog’s Daniel Tokaji writes that though the decision avoids “the looming issue of Section 5’s constitutionality . . . we may not have to wait long before it appears again.”
