Three cases granted review
on Apr 18, 2005 at 10:02 am
The Supreme Court agreed on Monday to rule on the federal government’s power to ban the religious use of a herbal tea that officials claim contains a hallucinogenic substance. (Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao Do Vegetal, et al., docket 04-1084). The Court granted review of the Solicitor General’s petition even though it had refused on December 10 to stay the Tenth Circuit’s ruling at issue, barring enforcement of the federal ban on hoasca.
The question presented in the case is: “Whether the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993…requires the government to permit the importation, distribution, possession, and use of a Schedule I hallucinogenic controlled substance, where Congress has found that the substance has a high potential for abuse, it is unsafe for use even under medical supervision, and its importation and distribution would violate an international treaty?”
The Court also agreed to rule on two cases raising criminal law issues: the power of police to conduct a warrantless search of a home if one occupant consents, but another objects (Georgia v. Randolph, 04-1067), and the scope of the duty of police to honor the request of a suspect in custody to see a lawyer (Maryland v. Blake, 04-375).
In Georgia v. Randolph, this is the question: “Should this Court grant certiorari to resolve the conflict among federal and state courts on whether an occupant may give law enforcement [officers] valid consent to search the common areas of the premises shared with another, even though the other occupant is present and objects to the search?”
In Maryland v. Blake, the issue to be decided is: “When a police officer communicates with a suspect after invocation of the suspect’s right to counsel, does Edwards v. Arizona [1981]permit consideration of curative measures by the police, or other intervening circumstances, to conclude that a suspect later initiated communication with the police?”
In another order, the Court refused to reopen the 1998 decision in Almendarez-Torres v. U.S., establishing the power of judges to enhance a criminal sentence on the basis of a prior criminal conviction. The Court denied a motion to file a petition for rehearing in a case that a majority of the Court now appears to agree was wrongly decided under the Apprendi line of cases on the power of judges and juries in sentence-enhancement situations. (The case still carries the original docket number, 96-6839.)
Among the cases denied review on Monday were these:
McGuire v. Reilly (04-939), testing the constitutionality of a Massachusetts law creating a buffer-zone around abortion clinics.
Stavropoulos v. Firestone (04-1099), seeking clarification of the test for proving retaliation under Title VII or the First Amendment against a worker who speaks out on the job on a public issue.
Nissan Motor v. Nissan Computer Corp. (04-869), an attempt to establish trademark violations when an Internet domain name used a major business firm’s trademark for a commercial website.
California v. Dynegy, Inc. (04-1028), a claim of Eleventh Amendment immunity by the state of California to removal to federal court of a state lawsuit in state court against energy companies for their role in the series of blackouts that hit the state in 2000 and 2001. Nineteen states supported the California petition.
Moses v. U.S., (04-1254), a new attempt to use the sexual privacy decision in Lawrence v. Texas to nullify a military court conviction for sodomy.
Cross-appeals in a case over the government’s handling of natural resources and trust funds for two Wyoming Indian tribes. Eastern Shoshone v. U.S. (04-731) and U.S. v. Shoshone (04-929).
