Friday round-up
on Oct 18, 2013 at 7:43 am
In his new book, Judge Richard Posner of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit writes that his 2007 opinion upholding an Indiana voter ID law was wrong. Justice John Paul Stevens, the author of the Court’s opinion affirming that decision, recently said that, although “he was concerned by the proliferation of state laws tightening voter-identification requirements[, he] . . . believes he ruled correctly in 2008 that an Indiana voter-ID law could stand.” Jess Bravin has the story for The Wall Street Journal. At ACSblog, Paul Smith – who argued the voter ID case at the Court – discusses Posner’s comments and challenges his assertion that the parties to the case had not provided the court with enough information.
At a forum sponsored by Fortune Magazine, Justice Elena Kagan commented on her interpersonal skills (telling the audience that she “had to develop” them) and the government shutdown (which, she indicated, would have soon required the Court to furlough some of its staff). Josh Gerstein covers the forum (with video) at Politico.
At Bloomberg View, Cass Sunstein discusses Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, the challenge to Michigan’s ban on the use of affirmative action by public universities. He characterizes the case as “major but misunderstood,” explaining that “[t]he central issue isn’t whether affirmative action is constitutional. It involves the permissible uses of state ballot initiatives.”
At BuzzFeed, Chris Geidner reports that “[t]here is a fight over marriage equality brewing in Virginia — not between supporters and opponents, although that’s there, too, but among groups backing” challenges to Virginia’s ban on same-sex marriage; both groups, he notes, want to “[b]ring[] — and win[] the Supreme Court case that allows same-sex couples to marry across the nation.”
[Disclosure: Kevin Russell of Goldstein & Russell, P.C., whose attorneys contribute to this blog in various capacities, is among the counsel on an amicus brief in support of the respondents in Schuette, but I am not affiliated with the firm or involved in the case.]
