Monday round-up

This weekend’s coverage highlights the Term’s most anticipated decisions, including last Thursday’s opinion inAssociation for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc., as well as the Court’s cases on same-sex marriage, affirmative action, and the Voting Rights Act.

On Thursday, the Justices issued a unanimous opinion inMyriad, holding thatisolated human genes are not patentable because they are a product of nature, but that synthetic complementary DNA (“cDNA”) may be patented because it is not. Additional coverage of this decision comes from theWall Street Journal’s Jess Bravin and Brent Kendall.

With the Court having not yet issued its opinions inHollingsworth v. Perry,United States v. Windsor,Shelby County v. Holder, andFisher v. University of Texas at Austin, commentators continue to speculate about and debate the possible outcomes of these cases.Buzzfeed‘s Chris Geidner examines the paths that bothPerryandWindsor, the challenges to Californias ban on same-sex marriage and the federal Defense of Marriage Act, respectively, took to the Court, as well as what the decisions in these cases might look like. At ACSblog, Jeremy Leaming reports on remarks by Rep. John Lewis at this year’s American Constitution Society convention, in which he urged supporters of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act to be ready to mobilize if the Court invalidates that provision in Shelby County.And in anticipation of the Courts decision inFisher (in which the Court is considering the constitutionality of the schools use of race in its undergraduate admissions process) and in response to thisop-edin The New York Times The Washington Post features this op-ed byRichard Kahlenberg, who argues for class-based affirmative action over similar programs based on race.

Finally, the weekend’s coverage included coverage by theNational Law Journal’s Tony Mauro andJURIST‘sKimberly Bennett of the new regulation that prohibits demonstrations on the grounds of the Court. As Lyle reported last week, a federaldistrict judge struck down the federal law that banning such demonstrations. In response,court marshal Pamela Talkin, with the approval of the Chief Justice, promulgated a new regulation invoking a different law.

Briefly:

• This blog’s Miriam Seifter analyzes Thursday’s opinion inAmerican Trucking Associations, Inc. v. City of Los Angeles, in which the Court held that theFederal Aviation Administration Authorization Act expressly preempts two provisions in the concession agreements between the port of Los Angeles and short-haul trucking companies.
• AtFed Regs Advisor, Leland Beck discusses a recent decision by the Fourth Circuit holdingthat the National Labor Relations Boardhad no statutory authority to promulgate itsposting rule, as well as the likelihood that the Court will grant cert. to review that decision.

Disclosures:Goldstein & Russell, P.C., whose attorneys work for or contribute to this blog in various capacities, represented the American Association of Law Schools as anamicusinFisher.The firm was alsoamong the counsel to Representative F. James Sensenbrenner et al., who filed anamicusbrief in support of the respondent inShelby County.In addition, the firm’sTejinder Singh was among the counsel on anamicusbrief filed by international human rights advocates in support of the respondents inPerry, while the firm’sKevin Russell was among the counsel on anamicusbrief filed by former senators in support of Edith Windsor inWindsor.