Thursday round-up
With coverage of the Court’s health care decisions continuing to wane, reporting largely focused on the Congressional Budget Office’s report on the effects of the Affordable Care Act, which Conor featured in yesterday’s round-up. Additional coverage comes from NPR, The Wall Street Journal (subscription required), The Christian Science Monitor, the Consumer Law & Policy Blog, and The Wall Street Journal Law Blog. In other health care news, Lyle reports on a petition for rehearing filed recently by Liberty University in its challenge to the Act.
Retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the importance of civics education. Among other things, she criticized the controversy over the Chief Justice’s opinion in the health care cases, emphasizing that such comments “demonstrate, only too well, the lack of understanding that some of our citizens have about the role of the judicial branch.” C-SPAN has video of Justice O’Connor’s testimony. Additional coverage comes from the Los Angeles Times, ABC News, the Associated Press, and the Blog of Legal Times.
Briefly:
- Yesterday New York City filed an amicus brief in support of Edith Windsor, a New York octogenarian challenging the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act. Coverage comes from The City Room Blog of The New York Times and Thomson Reuters.
- Nina Totenberg blogs at NPR about her interview with Justice Scalia on Tuesday.
- At The Opinionator Blog of The New York Times, Linda Greenhouse analyzes public perception of the Court and of the Chief Justice in particular and urges the Chief to “share the court’s story with the rest of us.”
- The editorial board of the Los Angeles Times argues that the Court should not only grant certiorari to determine whether an insanity defense is required under the Constitution, but that it should also answer the question in the affirmative. [Disclosure: Goldstein & Russell, P.C., whose attorneys work for or contribute to this blog in various capacities, represents the petitioner in the case.]
- At this blog, Sina Kian discusses his recent article in the New York University Law Review on the relationship between the Constitution and common law remedies.
- Richard Pildes, writing at Election Law Blog, calls upon the Court to clarify the “boundary between legitimate [campaign] contributions and criminal bribes.”
- The Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. FEC was the subject of scholarly testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Human Rights. Coverage comes from the National Law Journal and the Christian Science Monitor.
- Writing for the American Bar Association here, here, and here, Professor Rory Little summarizes some of the cases from OT2011, including summary reversals, Arizona v. United States, and Filarsky v. Delia .
- In the wake of the Court’s opinion in United States v. Alvarez striking down the Stolen Valor Act, the Department of Defense has created a website listing the names of those who have received certain military commendations. Coverage comes from The Hill and The Washington Times.
- Writing at ACSblog, Professor Jeffrey M. Shaman examines Justice Scalia’s use of originalism in his opinions in District of Columbia v. Heller, in which the Court struck down the District of Columbia’s ban on handguns, and Nevada Commission on Ethics v. Carrigan, in which it upheld the Nevada Ethics in Government Law.
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