The Supreme Court will hear oral argument on Wednesday, Nov. 12, in two back-to-back cases posing basic questions about the breadth of the compassionate-release statute, 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A)(i), that governs a type of sentence reduction for federal prisoners. The compassionate-release statute dates back to the enactment of the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 and allows a court to grant a sentence reduction when a defendant presents “extraordinary and compelling reasons” for doing so and satisfies criteria specified by the U.S. Sentencing Commission.

Immigration Matters is a recurring series by César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández that analyzes the court’s immigration docket, highlighting emerging legal questions about new policy and enforcement practices.

Please note that the views of outside contributors do not reflect the official opinions of SCOTUSblog or its staff.

Earlier this year, the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to revive President Donald Trump’s attempt to narrow access to birthright citizenship. As the justices consider the administration’s request, three important briefs submitted to the court hint at an even more significant departure from the broad access to citizenship that has defined U.S. law since the late 19th century. The Justice Department’s petition requesting review, backed up by an amicus brief submitted by Republican members of the House of Representatives and another by Republican Senators, suggest that the Trump administration may be preparing to deny U.S. citizenship to children whose parents are U.S. citizens if the parents, or the children, are also citizens of another country.

On Monday, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the case of Damon Landor. Landor is a Louisiana man who grew long dreadlocks for religious reasons. In 2020, prison officials forcibly shaved his head even after he showed them a copy of a federal appeals court ruling affirming his right to keep the dreadlocks. The justices will now decide whether Landor can try to recover money damages from those officials.

The federal law at the center of the case is known as the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act. Enacted 25 years ago, it applies to state prisons that receive federal funding (among other places), and bars the government from imposing a substantial burden on religious exercise unless the imposition is the least restrictive means of furthering a compelling government interest. It also allows individuals to bring suits against the government and government officials for violations of the law, for “appropriate relief.”

Brothers in Law is a recurring series by brothers Akhil and Vikram Amar, with special emphasis on measuring what the Supreme Court says against what the Constitution itself says. For more content from Akhil and Vikram, please see Akhil’s free weekly podcast, “Amarica’s Constitution,” Vikram’s regular columns on Justia, and Akhil’s new book, Born Equal: Remaking America’s Constitution, 1840-1920.

Please note that the views of outside contributors do not reflect the official opinions of SCOTUSblog or its staff.

We’re back!

Our recurring “Brothers in Law” column, launched in July, was on pause for several weeks while Akhil was on a national book tour to promote his recently released tome, Born Equal, and Vik was busy working on some briefs and law review articles. We shall soon return to our initial posts on United States v. Skrmetti to explore how this landmark case, decided in June, should have been analyzed had the justices properly understood the Constitution’s grand idea of birth equality – the theme of Akhil’s new book. But before adding the final chapter to our discussion of this seminal ruling from last term, we aim today to offer a few quick but important thoughts about the biggest cases being considered thus far in the current term, Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump and Trump v. V.O.S. Selections, which were argued on Wednesday.

Clear Statements is a recurring series by Abbe R. Gluck on civil litigation and the modern regulatory and statutory state.

Verbs, verbs, verbs.

Court-watchers hoping for fireworks over the reach of presidential authority in the tariff cases argued at the Supreme Court on Wednesday might have been left a little disappointed. Going in, much real estate was devoted to questions of presidential power. For instance, the case teed up the as-yet unanswered question of whether the major questions doctrine – the assumption that Congress doesn’t delegate significant power to the executive without crystal-clear statutory language – applies to the president at all in the foreign affairs context. But that doctrine was more of an afterthought on Wednesday than a star. And while there was some discussion of the constitutional principle of nondelegation – the validity of an apparently limitless delegation of authority to the president – that topic did not really take center stage either.