Tuesday round-up
on Oct 11, 2011 at 9:34 am
The Court returns to a busy week after the holiday weekend, with five oral arguments scheduled for today and tomorrow. Orders from the October 7 Conference will also be released today. (On Friday, we posted our list of “Petitions to watch” for that Conference.)
Drawing the most coverage is Florence v. Board of Chosen Freeholders of the County of Burlington, in which the Court will consider whether the Fourth Amendment permits jails to conduct suspicionless strip searches whenever an individual is arrested. The New Jersey Courier-Post, The Root, CNN, and Joan Biskupic of USA Today preview the case, while ACSblog posts a video interview with Albert Florence, the petitioner in the case. (Disclaimer: Goldstein & Russell, P.C. – whose attorneys either work for, or contribute to, this blog – serves as counsel to Florence.)
Elsewhere, there is continuing coverage of last week’s argument in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC, in which the Court will assess the scope of the “ministerial exception” to federal employment laws. In a two-part series (here and here) at Concurring Opinions, Leslie Griffin argues that the true central question in the case is whether religious groups are entitled to disobey the law. PBS provides an overview of the issues in the case, while Warren Richey of the Christian Science Monitor (via ABC News) reports on the oral argument. Marty Lederman, in a guest post on this blog, focuses on Justice Breyer’s analysis and suggests that “the Court will resolve the case on constitutional, rather than statutory grounds.”
Finally, commentators continue to review Five Chiefs, the recently released memoir by retired Justice John Paul Stevens. Politico, the Los Angeles Times, and the Washington Post all focus on the Justice’s description of Bush v. Gore as “a frivolous stay application,” while Andrew Cohen of the Atlantic takes a broader look at the book and concludes that it is “the right book at the right time.” In remarks yesterday at Princeton, the Justice described himself as optimistic about the future of the Constitution and the Court; the Associated Press has coverage.
Briefly:
– The editorial board of the Albany Times-Union urges the Court to televise its proceedings, reasoning that “opening itself up to audio recordings doesn’t come close to meeting the 21st-century standard of openness.”
– Lawrence Golan, the lead plaintiff in this Term’s copyright case Golan v. Holder, weighs in on the case at TechDirt.
– Michael Kirkland of UPI suggests that the challenges to the Affordable Care Act will result in a “bitter fight” at the Court because, in his view, the Justices “can be just as political as the rest of the country when the stakes are high enough..” On the twentieth anniversary of the confirmation hearing of Justice Clarence Thomas, NPR’s Nina Totenberg looks back at the hearing’s “ripple effect.”
