| 20A72 |
Moore v. Circosta |
Whether the Supreme Court should stay, pending appeal, an order by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit leaving in place an extension of the deadline to receive absentee ballots for the 2020 election in North Carolina. |
| 20A71 |
Wise v. Circosta |
Whether the Supreme Court should stay, pending appeal, an order by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit sustaining changes to North Carolina's 2020 election procedures for absentee ballots, including the deadline to receive them, requirements for postmarking them, and a ban on third-party collection of them. |
| 20A63 |
Trump v. Vance |
Whether the Supreme Court should stay, pending appeal, a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit upholding the dismissal of President Donald Trump's claims that a grand-jury subpoena for his financial records – which the justices declined to invalidate in July – is overbroad and was issued in bad faith. |
| 20-542 |
Republican Party of Pennsylvania v. Boockvar |
(1) Whether the Pennsylvania Supreme Court usurped the Pennsylvania General Assembly’s plenary authority to “direct [the] Manner” for appointing electors for president and vice president under Article II of the Constitution, as well as the assembly’s broad power to prescribe “[t]he Times, Places, and Manner” for congressional elections under Article I, when the court issued a ruling requiring the state to count absentee ballots that arrive up to three days after Election Day as long as they are not clearly postmarked after Election Day; and (2) whether that decision is preempted by federal statutes that establish a uniform nationwide federal Election Day. |
| 20-520 |
American Athletic Conference v. Alston |
Whether the Sherman Act authorizes a court to
subject the product-defining rules of a joint venture to
full Rule of Reason review, and to hold those rules unlawful if, in the court’s view, they are not the least restrictive means that could have been used to accomplish their procompetitive goal. |
| 20-512 |
National Collegiate Athletic Association v. Alston |
Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit erroneously held, in
conflict with decisions of other circuits and general antitrust principles, that the National Collegiate Athletic
Association eligibility rules regarding compensation of
student-athletes violate federal antitrust law. |
| 20-499 |
Hull v. Rockwell |
Whether a debtor may keep a state-law homestead
exemption inside bankruptcy, notwithstanding that the
proceeds would be subject to attachment and execution
outside bankruptcy because the debtor sold the home
and the exemption expired under applicable state law. |
| 20-495 |
Stanley v. ExpressJet Airlines Inc. |
(1) Whether, and under what circumstances, claims
arising under federal statute are subject to the Railway Labor Act’s
mandatory arbitration requirement; and (2) whether the “undue hardship” inquiry in a Title VII
case is an affirmative defense to liability. |
| 20-490 |
Freeman v. Wainwright |
Whether the statute of limitations for filing a habeas petition begins when the new judgment entered
following resentencing becomes final. |
| 20-489 |
Bess v. U.S. |
(1) Whether 10 U.S.C. § 825, which allows a military commander to hand select members to sit on a general court-martial panel, as applied in Pedro Bess’
case — in which an all-white panel convicted a Black defendant of sexual misconduct against a white woman — violates the Fifth Amendment; and (2) whether the lower court erred in declining to
remand Bess' case for additional factfinding. |
| 20-486 |
Ogle v. Ohio Civil Service Employees Association |
Whether there is a “good faith defense” to 42 U.S.C. § 1983
that shields a defendant from damages liability for depriving citizens of their constitutional rights if the defendant acted under color of a law before it was held
unconstitutional. |
| 20-481 |
GE Capital Retail Bank v. Belton |
Whether provisions of the Bankruptcy Code
providing for a statutorily enforceable discharge of a
debtor’s debts impliedly repeal the Federal Arbitration
Act. |
| 20-478 |
CBX Resources, L.L.C. v. ACE American Insurance Co. |
Whether the Supreme Court should abolish the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit’s
judicially created “finality trap” and resolve the conflict among the U.S. Courts
of Appeals regarding the finality or non-finality under 28 U.S.C. § 1291
of a judgment when a party has dismissed — without prejudice —
remaining unadjudicated claims. |
| 20-472 |
HollyFrontier Cheyenne Refining, LLC v. Renewable Fuels Association |
Whether, in order to qualify for a hardship exemption under
Section 7545(o)(9)(B)(i) of the Renewable Fuel Standards, a small refinery needs to receive uninterrupted,
continuous hardship exemptions for every year since
2011. |
| 20-464 |
Rosemond v. U.S. |
Whether an attorney
violates a criminal defendant’s Sixth Amendment right
to autonomy by admitting, over the defendant’s
objection, that the defendant ordered a shooting of the
victim, thereby conceding the actus reus of the crime. |
| 20-457 |
MarketGraphics Research Group Inc. v. Berge |
(1) Whether the Bankruptcy Code’s “willful and malicious injury” exception — which exempts from discharge “any
debts ... for willful and malicious injury by the
debtor to another entity or to the property of another
entity” — applies only when a debtor has a subjective
intent to injure (as five circuits hold), or whether it
may also be satisfied by conduct that objectively has
a substantial certainty of causing injury (as three
circuits hold); and (2) whether the “willful and malicious injury” exception establishes a unitary standard requiring only
“actual intent to cause injury” (as five circuits hold),
or whether it establishes a two-pronged test requiring both “actual intent to cause injury” and conduct
“in conscious disregard of one’s duties or without just
cause or excuse” (as six circuits hold). |
| 20-454 |
Azar v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore |
(1) Whether the Department of Health and
Human Services' rule, which prohibits Title X projects
from providing referrals for abortion as a method of
family planning, falls within the agency’s statutory authority; and (2) whether the rule is the product of reasoned decisionmaking. |
| 20-450 |
Wolf v. Cook County, Illinois |
(1) Whether entities that are not subject to the
public-charge ground of inadmissibility contained in
Immigration and Nationality Act, and which seek to expand benefits usage by aliens who are potentially subject to that
provision, are proper parties to challenge the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's final rule interpreting the statutory term “public charge” and establishing
a framework by which DHS personnel are to assess
whether an alien is likely to become a public charge; and (2) whether the final rule is likely contrary to law or
arbitrary and capricious. |
| 20-449 |
Department of Homeland Security v. New York |
(1) Whether entities that are not subject to the
public-charge ground of inadmissibility contained in
Immigration and Nationality Act, and which seek to expand benefits usage by aliens who are potentially subject to that
provision, are proper parties to challenge the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's final rule interpreting the statutory term “public charge” and establishing
a framework by which DHS personnel are to assess
whether an alien is likely to become a public charge; and (2) whether the final rule is likely contrary to law or
arbitrary and capricious. |
| 20-444 |
U.S. v. Gary |
Whether a defendant who pleaded guilty to possessing a firearm as a felon, in violation of 18 U.S.C.
922(g)(1) and 924(a), is automatically entitled to plain-error relief if the district court did not advise him that
one element of that offense is knowledge of his status as
a felon, regardless of whether he can show that the district court’s error affected the outcome of the proceedings. |
| 20-443 |
U.S. v. Tsarnaev |
(1) Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit erred in concluding
that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s capital sentences must be vacated on
the ground that the district court, during its 21-day voir
dire, did not ask each prospective juror for a specific
accounting of the pretrial media coverage that he or she
had read, heard or seen about Tsarnaev’s case; and (2) whether the district court committed reversible
error at the penalty phase of Tsarnaev’s trial by excluding evidence that Tsarnaev’s older brother was
allegedly involved in different crimes two years before
the offenses for which Tsarnaev was convicted. |
| 20-437 |
U.S. v. Palomar-Santiago |
Whether a defendant, charged with
unlawful reentry into the United States following removal, automatically satisfies the prerequisites to asserting the invalidity of the original removal
order as an affirmative defense solely
by showing that he was removed for a crime that would
not be considered a removable offense under current
circuit law, even if he cannot independently demonstrate administrative exhaustion or deprivation of the
opportunity for judicial review. |
| 20-429 |
American Medical Association v. Azar |
(1) Whether the Department of Health and Human Services' rule for the Title X family planning program — which prohibits and compels certain pregnancy-related speech between a Title
X provider and her patient, proscribing abortion-related information but requiring information about
non-abortion options — is arbitrary and capricious; (2) whether the rule violates the Title X appropriations act, which requires that “all pregnancy counseling” under Title X “shall be nondirective”; and (3) whether the rule violates Section 1554 of the
Affordable Care Act, which requires
that HHS “shall not promulgate any regulation” that
harms patient care in any one of six ways, including by
“interfer[ing] with communications” between a patient
and her provider. |
| 20-426 |
Huntress v. U.S. |
(1) Whether the discretionary-function exception to the Federal Tort Claims Act’s waiver of sovereign immunity for United States employees’ negligent or wrongful conduct nullifies the law-enforcement proviso that clarifies the act’s provisions
“shall apply to any claim” for “abuse of process[ ] or
malicious prosecution” (as four circuits
have now held), limits that proviso (as one circuit has
held) or yields to it (as one circuit has held); and (2) whether the discretionary-function exemption
applies when government officials act outside their
jurisdiction. |
| 20-422 |
Lee v. Ohio Education Association |
(1) Whether 42 U.S.C. § 1983 provides a “good-faith defense” to private entities who violate another’s
constitutional rights before the courts have clearly established the illegality of their conduct; and (2) whether the defenses of qualified immunity or “good
faith” allow a defendant who takes another
person’s money or property in violation of the
Constitution — but in reliance on a statute or
court ruling that purported to authorize its
conduct and is only later declared unconstitutional — to keep that money or property when
the owner sues for its return. |
| 20-405 |
City of Miami Gardens, Florida v. Wells Fargo & Co. |
Whether, by raising standing sua sponte at oral
argument in an appeal concerning a partial summary-judgment decision focused solely on the statute of
limitations and when discovery was limited to that
purpose, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit’s decision dismissing
this case conflicts with the Supreme Court’s binding precedent
in Alabama Legislative Black Caucus v. Alabama and violates
due process in conflict with decisions of the Supreme Court and
sister circuits. |
| 20-402 |
Richardson v. Omaha School District |
Whether, for attorneys’
fees actions under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, courts should borrow years-long state statutes of limitations because fees actions are analogous to independent lawsuits separate from the underlying merits of
the IDEA administrative proceedings, or, in contrast, courts should borrow far
shorter periods designed for judicial review of IDEA
administrative merits decisions because fees actions are merely ancillary to the underlying educational dispute. |
| 20-400 |
Avery v. U.S. |
Whether a state burglary statute that disjunctively
lists places that may be burgled under the statute is
divisible for purposes of a sentence enhancement under
the Armed Career Criminal Act,
even though the statutory list is not exclusive and does
not require the jury to agree that the defendant burgled any particular listed place. |
| 20-382 |
Guam v. U.S. |
(1) Whether a settlement that is not under the Comprehensive
Environmental Response, Compensation, and
Liability Act can
trigger a contribution claim under CERCLA Section
113(f)(3)(B); and (2) whether a settlement that expressly disclaims
any liability determination and leaves the settling
party exposed to future liability can trigger a
contribution claim under CERCLA Section
113(f)(3)(B). |
| 20-381 |
Hamilton County Job and Family Services v. Siefert |
(1) Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit erred when it failed to conduct
an individualized analysis of the actions of the Hamilton County Job and Family Services and other petitioners before blanketly rejecting their asserted defense of
qualified immunity; (2) whether the 6th Circuit erred when it determined that,
through a footnote, it was clearly established that a
children’s services caseworker has an affirmative
duty to protect parental due process rights when a
child is hospitalized and no child custody
proceedings have been initiated; and (3) whether the Supreme Court should resolve the circuit
conflict on the important federal question of
whether a private, non-profit hospital and private
healthcare providers are state actors subject to
claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 when they simply
provide medical care and cooperate with a county
Job and Family Services Department for the
appropriate treatment of a suicidal minor. |
| 20-380 |
Idenix Pharmaceuticals LLC v. Gilead Sciences Inc. |
(1) Whether, as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has held, a
genus claim is not enabled “as a matter of law” if
it encompasses a large number of compounds — or
whether, as the Supreme Court has recognized,
enablement is a context-specific jury question; and (2) whether, as the Federal Circuit has held,
35 U.S.C. § 112(a) contains a separate “possession”
requirement — or whether, as the statute
provides, Section 112(a) sets forth a single substantive
requirement of “a written description of the
invention” sufficient “to enable any person
skilled in the art … to make and use the same.” |
| 20-365 |
Jack Daniel’s Properties Inc. v. VIP Products LLC |
(1) Whether a commercial product using humor is subject to the same likelihood-of-confusion analysis applicable to other products under the Lanham Act, or must receive heightened First Amendment protection from
trademark-infringement claims, where the brand owner
must prove that the defendant’s use of the mark either is
“not artistically relevant” or “explicitly misleads consumers”; and (2) whether a commercial product’s use of humor renders the product “noncommercial” under 15 U.S.C.
§ 1125(c)(3)(C), thus barring as a matter of law a claim of
dilution by tarnishment under the Lanham Act. |
| 20-363 |
Whatley v. Warden |
Whether a state court unreasonably applies federal law when, in determining
whether a person suffered prejudice as a result of ineffective assistance of counsel, it disregards the Supreme
Court’s case law recognizing that shackling is inherently prejudicial. |
| 20-355 |
Arctic Cat Inc. v. Bombardier Recreational Products Inc. |
Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit erred in holding that
“notified of the infringement” and “such notice” under
35 U.S.C. § 287(a) refer only to communications from the patent
owner. |
| 20-351 |
Carey v. Throwe |
(1) Whether a qualified retired law enforcement officer who meets the statutory
requirements to carry a weapon under the Law Enforcement Officer’s Safety Act has an enforceable right under
42 U.S.C. § 1983; and (2) whether social media posts “outing” a police officer’s misogynistic behavior
and his making light of gun violence and gun control, raises an issue of public concern
as a matter of law. |
| 20-331 |
Trump v. District of Columbia |
(1) Whether a writ of mandamus is appropriate because, contrary to the holding of the U.S. Court of Appeals of the 4th Circuit,
the district court’s denial of the president’s motion to
dismiss was clear and indisputable legal error; and (2) whether a writ of mandamus is appropriate, contrary to the holding of the 4th Circuit, when the
district court’s refusal to grant the president’s motion
to certify an interlocutory appeal was a clear abuse of
discretion under 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b). |
| 20-330 |
Trump v. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington |
Whether plaintiffs who claim to compete with businesses in which the president of the United States has
a financial interest can seek redress in an Article III
court to enforce the foreign and domestic emoluments
clauses of the U.S. Constitution against the president. |
| 20-326 |
Stein v. U.S. |
Whether the due process clause excuses the government’s knowing use of false testimony in a criminal prosecution so long as the government divulged
evidence during discovery indicating that the testimony was false. |
| 20-322 |
Barr v. Aleman Gonzalez |
Whether an alien who is detained under 8 U.S.C. § 1231 is entitled by statute, after six months of detention,
to a bond hearing at which the government must prove
to an immigration judge that the alien is a flight risk or
a danger to the community. |
| 20-319 |
Comcast Corp. v. Viamedia Inc. |
(1) Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit erred in holding
that a refusal-to-deal claim under Section 2 of the Sherman
Act may proceed despite the presence of valid business
justifications for the refusal, in direct conflict with
Verizon Communications Inc. v. Law Offices
of Curtis V. Trinko and decisions of the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 2nd, 9th, 10th and
11th Circuits; and
(2) whether the 7th Circuit erred in allowing
a plaintiff to avoid the limitations on a Section 2 refusal-to-deal claim by reframing it as some other form of anticompetitive conduct, such as tying, in direct conflict
with Pacific Bell Telephone Co.
v. Linkline Communications Inc. and decisions of the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 4th, 9th and
10th Circuits. |
| 20-317 |
Chavis v. Delaware |
Whether the confrontation clause permits DNA
evidence obtained as the result of a multi-analyst testing process to be introduced against the defendant at
trial through one of the testing analysts who has no
personal knowledge of the basis for the out-of-court
testimonial statements made by the other nontestifying analysts who participated in the testing. |
| 20-315 |
Sanchez v. Wolf |
Whether, under 8 U.S.C. § 1254a(f)(4), a grant of temporary protected status authorizes eligible noncitizens to obtain lawful-permanent-resident status under 8
U.S.C. § 1255. |
| 20-310 |
Keach v. New Brunswick Southern Railway Co. |
Whether the “six months rule” — which grants a special priority to certain unsecured
claims of creditors that provided goods or services necessary to a railroad’s operation, in reliance on payment out of the railroad’s current income, in the six
months before the receivership — entitles unsecured
claims for necessary operating expenses incurred by a
railroad in the six months before bankruptcy to priority
of payment if the railroad has not diverted any income
away from the payment of such claims to pay secured
creditors. |
| 20-304 |
World Programming Ltd. v. SAS Institute Inc. |
(1) Whether the All Writs Act or Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 69 permits
federal courts to fashion novel remedies to enforce federal money judgments, such as an injunction that forbids
the judgment debtor from licensing its software for use
in the U.S. until the judgment is paid, to “incentivize”
payment; and (2) whether and under what circumstances federal
courts may invoke the All Writs Act to enjoin enforcement of a foreign money judgment, even within the
nation that issued the judgment. |
| 20-303 |
U.S. v. Vaello-Madero |
Whether Congress violated the equal-protection
component of the due process clause of the Fifth
Amendment by establishing Supplemental Security
Income — a program that provides benefits to needy
aged, blind and disabled individuals — in the 50 states
and the District of Columbia, and in the Northern Mariana Islands pursuant to a negotiated covenant, but not
extending it to Puerto Rico. |
| 20-301 |
Hennis v. U.S. |
(1) Whether the offenses for which the petitioner, Timothy Hennis, was
tried and acquitted in state court constituted
offenses “for which [he] cannot be tried in the courts
of . . . any State”; (2) whether 10 U.S.C. § 803(a) is unconstitutional
insofar as it allowed the government to court-martial Hennis only because the double jeopardy
clause would have barred his retrial in a state court; and (3) whether the Constitution bars the military
from subjecting servicemembers to capital trials for
non-military offenses. |
| 20-298 |
El Paso County, Texas v. Trump |
(1) Whether the executive branch’s expenditure of
$2.5 billion on border-wall construction violates the
Consolidated Appropriations Act and thus the Constitution's appropriations clause; and (2) whether the Department of Defense’s transfer
of $2.5 billion between agency appropriations accounts violates Section 8005 of the DOD Appropriations Act and
thus the Constitution's appropriations clause. |
| 20-293 |
Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. New Mexico, ex rel. Balderas |
(1) Whether the federal government or a state
government, as the real party in interest in a qui tam
action brought in its name and litigated to judgment with
its full knowledge, is bound by a final judgment on the
merits when that government has declined to intervene; and (2) whether a state court may establish a novel
“public policy” exception to the res judicata effect of a
concededly final federal judgment when that exception
runs to the exclusive benefit of a single party, the
government. |
| 20-289 |
Retirement Plans Committee of IBM v. Jander |
(1) Whether Fifth Third
Bancorp v. Dudenhoeffer’s “more harm than
good” standard can be satisfied by generalized
allegations that the harm of an inevitable disclosure
of an alleged fraud generally increases over time and
thus plan fiduciaries should have made earlier
disclosures through regular securities-law filings; and (2) whether the Employee Retirement Income Security Act imposes a duty on a plan
fiduciary who is also a corporate officer to use inside
information for the benefit of plan participants. |
| 20-283 |
Bass v. Greve |
(1) Whether Officer Austin Bass had probable cause to
arrest under the Fourth Amendment when
the suspect admitted to trying to enter a
closed and locked building, breaking a door
handle in the process, but offered a questionable claim of an innocent mental state when
explaining his behavior to Bass; and (2) whether, even if there was no probable cause
to arrest Patrick Greve for any offense, Bass
was entitled to qualified immunity because
the law was not clearly established in this regard. |
| 20-276 |
Gibson v. Securities and Exchange Commission |
Whether Congress has implicitly stripped federal
district courts of jurisdiction to adjudicate separation-of-powers challenges to the authority of the Security and Exchange Commission's administrative law judges to
preside over enforcement proceedings. |
| 20-272 |
Maryland v. Rogers |
Whether the Court of Appeals of Maryland departed from
the Supreme Court’s decisions in Smith v. Doe and Apprendi v.
New Jersey in holding, contrary to the decisions of
numerous federal courts of appeals and state supreme
courts, that sex offender registration constitutes
“punishment” within the meaning of the Sixth and
14th Amendments to the United States
Constitution, and that, as a result, any fact necessary
for placement on the sex offender registry, such as the
victim’s age, must be determined beyond a reasonable
doubt during the criminal proceeding, even if that fact
is not an element of the criminal offense that is the
basis for registration. |
| 20-257 |
Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. v. Scott |
Whether a district court may consider factors other
than the presence of a single material question of law or
fact common to a group of employees when assessing
whether the employees are “similarly situated” for purposes of the collective-action provision of the Fair Labor
Standards Act. |
| 20-256 |
Jordan v. U.S. |
Whether each separate
conviction under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1) — under which “any person who, during and in relation to any crime of violence or drug
trafficking crime . . . uses or carries a firearm, or
who, in furtherance of any such crime, possesses a
firearm” commits an offense — requires only a
separate predicate crime of violence or drug trafficking offense, as the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 3rd, 4th and 8th Circuits have held, or also requires a separate act of
using, carrying or possessing a firearm, as the
U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 2nd, 5th, 6th, 7th, 10th and District of Columbia Circuits have held. |
| 20-255 |
Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L. |
Whether Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, which holds
that public school officials may regulate speech that would
materially and substantially disrupt the work and discipline of the school, applies to student speech that occurs
off campus. |
| 20-251 |
Gipson v. Louisiana |
Whether the Supreme Court’s decision in Ramos v.
Louisiana applies to cases on
state collateral review, when the state follows the
retroactivity framework established in Teague v.
Lane. |
| 20-250 |
Poole v. Florida |
(1) Whether the Florida Supreme Court erred in
reinstating a capital sentence issued under Florida’s
pre-2016 scheme, in contravention of the Supreme Court’s
holding in Hurst v. Florida that
such sentences violate the Sixth Amendment because
the jury did not make the requisite death-eligibility
findings, including that aggravating circumstances
outweigh mitigating circumstances; and (2) whether the Florida Supreme Court violated
the Eighth Amendment in reinstating a capital
sentence lacking a unanimous jury recommendation of
death and based on a guilt-phase jury finding rendered
without awareness of the consequences for capital
sentencing. |
| 20-249 |
Ommen v. Milliman Inc. |
(1) Whether the Federal Arbitration Act preempts the generally
applicable disavowal defense codified in Iowa’s
Liquidation Act; and (2) whether, if so, whether the McCarran-Ferguson Act exempts the
disavowal defense from preemption. |
| 20-240 |
Kentucky v. White |
Whether a capital defendant can waive a claim of
intellectual disability under Atkins v. Virginia and its progeny. |
| 20-237 |
Old Republic Home Protection Co. v. Sparks |
Whether, in a case involving interstate commerce
and a written contract with an arbitration provision
that expressly requires application of the Federal Arbitration Act, a state
arbitration statute that by its terms “shall not apply
to . . . contracts which reference insurance”
(a) qualifies as a “law enacted by [a] State for the
purpose of regulating the business of insurance”
under the McCarran–Ferguson Act, and (b) can
support reverse preemption of the FAA based on an
asserted impairment of such a state law. |
| 20-234 |
Immigration and Customs Enforcement v. Padilla |
(1) Whether 8 U.S.C. § 1225(b)(l)(B)(ii) — which authorizes the government to detain aliens who are placed
in expedited removal proceedings, but who then establish a credible fear of persecution based on a protected
ground — violates the due process clause of the Fifth
Amendment because it contains no provision authorizing bond hearings; and (2) whether 8 U.S.C. § 1252(f)(1) prohibits lower
courts from granting classwide injunctions against the
operation of 8 U.S.C. §§ 1221–1232. |
| 20-222 |
Goldman Sachs Group Inc. v. Arkansas Teacher Retirement System |
(1) Whether a defendant in a securities class action
may rebut the presumption of classwide reliance recognized in Basic Inc. v. Levinson by
pointing to the generic nature of the alleged misstatements in showing that the statements had no impact on
the price of the security, even though that evidence is also
relevant to the substantive element of materiality; and (2) whether a defendant seeking to rebut the Basic
presumption has only a burden of production or also the
ultimate burden of persuasion. |
| 20-216 |
Bose v. Bea |
Whether a school that expels a student based on
charges and evidence motivated by sex bias denies that
student educational opportunities “on the basis of sex.” |
| 20-202 |
Massie v. Mena |
(1) Whether, under the particular facts and circumstances
of this case, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit erred in finding that Robert Massie’s actions constituted an excessive use
of force in violation of the Fourth Amendment; and (2) whether, regardless of the answer to the first issue, the district court and 9th Circuit nonetheless
erred in denying qualified immunity to Massie when
it was not clearly established at the time of the incident (or now) that his actions constituted an excessive use of force in violation of the Fourth
Amendment. |
| 20-193 |
McMillan v. Alabama |
Whether the execution of a person sentenced
to death by judicial override violates the
Eighth Amendment. |
| 20-183 |
Stair v. Jackson |
(1) Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit departed from the Supreme Court’s decisions in Graham v. Connor and Plumhoff v. Rickard in denying qualified immunity
to the petitioner, Billy Stair, based upon the absence of a constitutional violation by assessing the reasonableness of each of three Taser activations
over a 19-second period, instead of assessing the reasonableness of Stair’s
conduct in light of the totality of the circumstances; and (2) whether the 8th Circuit departed from the Supreme Court’s decision in Kisela v. Hughes and
numerous other cases by denying qualified immunity even though two judges concluded
the use of force was reasonable, and notwithstanding the absence of clearly established
law imposing liability under circumstances
closely analogous to those confronting Stair. |
| 20-157 |
Caniglia v. Strom |
Whether the “community caretaking” exception
to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement
extends to the home. |
| 20-136 |
Dozier v. U.S. |
Whether an offense is
“punishable by imprisonment for more than one year”
when the maximum term permitted by the applicable
statutory sentencing scheme at the time of conviction is
one year or less. |
| 20-132 |
The Moodsters Company v. The Walt Disney Company |
(1) Whether
originality is the proper standard to determine
character copyrightability; and (2) whether
copyrightability — for a character or any work — is a question of fact, or involves questions of fact, ill-suited for resolution on a Rule 12 motion. |
| 20-128 |
Big Port Service DMCC v. China Shipping Container Lines Co. |
Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit erred in recognizing a
cause of action for a party seeking to avoid arbitration
and in concluding that courts have remedial
power — untethered to any federal statute and
unconstrained by the Supreme Court’s precedents governing the
grant of injunctive relief — to issue injunctions against
arbitration. |
| 20-126 |
Andalusian Global Designated Activity Company v. Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico |
Whether the Employees Retirement System of the Government of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico's entitlement to future payments from statutorily mandated employer contributions to
ERS’ pension system, though not fixed and
calculable at the time of bankruptcy, is “property,”
and the subsequent payments “proceeds,” within the
meaning of Section 552(b)(1) of the Bankruptcy Code. |
| 20-120 |
Juarez v. Colorado |
Whether, when there
is no dispute that a guilty plea will trigger mandatory
deportation pursuant to federal law, defense
counsel must advise a noncitizen-defendant that the plea
will result in deportation as a matter of law, or whether it is sufficient for defense counsel to caution that the plea
could make the noncitizen-defendant “deportable” or
that it will “probably” result in deportation. |
| 20-109 |
Schwab v. Fish |
(1) Whether the Constitution prohibits Kansas from requiring applicants to provide proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote; and (2) whether Section 5 of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 prohibits Kansas from requiring motor-voter applicants to provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote. |
| 20-107 |
Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid |
Whether the
uncompensated appropriation of an easement that is
limited in time effects a per se physical taking under
the Fifth Amendment. |
| 20-101 |
Harris v. Maryland |
Whether, when preindictment delay has caused actual prejudice to the accused’s ability to defend himself, the due process clause requires that the defendant prove that the delay was driven by an improper prosecutorial motive, or that courts balance the particular prejudice to the defendant against the particular
reasons (or lack thereof) for the delay. |
| 20-97 |
Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association v. Ross |
(1) Whether, in conflict with the holdings of the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 5th
and 11th Circuits and the National Marine
Sanctuaries Act, the Antiquities Act applies to ocean
areas beyond United States’ sovereignty where the
federal government has only limited regulatory
authority; and (2) whether the president can evade the Antiquities
Act’s “smallest area” requirement, including
designating ocean monuments larger than most
states, by vaguely referencing “resources” or an
“ecosystem” as the objects to be protected. |
| 20-96 |
U.S. v. Kane County, Utah |
Whether an advocacy organization’s environmental concerns qualify as an “interest” required by Rule 24(a)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure for the organization to intervene as of right as a party defendant in a pending civil action, where no judicial relief could be granted against that organization in the action and its environmental concerns are unrelated to any claim or defense that the organization could itself assert in the action. |
| 20-86 |
Hutchings v. Ross |
Whether Rule 10(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure permits a habeas
petitioner to rely on a state court order appended to,
but never mentioned in, his original federal habeas
petition to supply the core operative facts necessary to
satisfy the relation-back standard set forth in Mayle v.
Felix. |
| 20-83 |
Jones v. Kalbaugh |
(1) Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit improperly focused on the
knowledge and intentions of the suspect, rather than
the facts knowable to the officers, in reversing the district court’s grant of qualified immunity in an excessive
force case; and (2) whether the 10th Circuit analyzed clearly established
law at too high a level of generality by relying on general statements of Fourth Amendment excessive force
principles rather than identifying a case in which officers
acting under similar circumstances were held to have
violated the Fourth Amendment. |
| 20-82 |
Kane County, Utah v. U.S. |
(1) Whether Rule 24(a)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure allows intervention as
of right where the movant does not have a significant,
cognizable interest in the lawsuit; and (2) whether the United States adequately represents its title, which is the only interest at issue in a
quiet title suit. |
| 20-60 |
Silver v. U.S. |
Whether a public official can be convicted of bribery
absent proof of an agreed exchange with the alleged
bribe payor, based solely on his unexpressed,
unilateral state of mind when receiving a benefit; (2) whether a conviction for Hobbs Act extortion can be
based on a theory of simple bribery; and (3) whether, if the government elects not to argue harmless
error, a court of appeals may raise harmless error sua
sponte, without providing the defendant any
opportunity to be heard on the issue. |
| 20-47 |
Lebamoff Enterprises Inc. v. Whitmer |
Whether a state liquor law that allows in-state
retailers to ship wine directly to consumers, but
prohibits out-of-state retailers from doing so, is invalid
under the nondiscrimination principle of the
commerce clause or is a valid exercise of the state’s
21st amendment authority to regulate the sale
of alcoholic beverages within its borders. |
| 20-38 |
Arkansas v. Gresham |
Whether the approval by the secretary of
health and human services of the Arkansas
Works Amendment was lawful. |
| 20-37 |
Azar v. Gresham |
Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit erred in concluding
that the secretary of health and human services may not authorize demonstration
projects to test requirements that are designed to promote the provision of health-care coverage by means of
facilitating the transition of Medicaid beneficiaries to
commercial coverage and improving their health. |
| 20-19 |
Jackson v. Braithwaite |
Whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 applies to the uniformed military. |
| 20-14 |
Congregation Rabbinical College of Tartikov Inc. v. Village of Pomona, New York |
Whether, under the Religious Land Use and
Institutionalized Persons Act’s substantial-burdens
provision, an owner of real property seeking to use such
property for religious exercise has Article III standing
to challenge a municipality’s zoning law that prohibits
outright the owner’s proposed land use without first being
required to either apply for permits or variances that the
municipality has no power to grant or to seek a legislative
change to the zoning law from the municipality. |
| 20-11 |
Alexis v. Barr |
Whether, when a state’s definition of a drug expressly sweeps in
more substances than the federal definition, a noncitizen convicted of possessing that drug bears the burden
of showing in deportation proceedings under 8 U.S.C.
1227(a)(2)(B)(i) that the state has actually prosecuted a
criminal defendant with respect to one of the non-federally-controlled substances. |
| 19-8695 |
Gutierrez v. Saenz |
(1) Whether, under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, the state’s decision to deprive Mr. Gutierrez of the opportunity to be accompanied during his execution by a religious adviser employed by the prison substantially burdens the exercise of his religion, requiring the state to justify the deprivation as the least restrictive means of advancing a compelling governmental interest; and (2) whether, for purposes of the free exercise clause, the state’s blanket policy of denying all prisoners the aid of a religious adviser at the time of the execution—adopted for the acknowledged purpose of avoiding the obligation to allow such a minister to a Buddhist prisoner—burdens Mr. Gutierrez’s exercise of religion without legitimate justification. |
| 19-1475 |
Duke University v. Biomarin Pharmaceutical Inc. |
(1) Whether a court of appeals can invoke forfeiture
to refuse to address an appointments-clause violation
in a pending appeal despite an intervening change in
law; and (2) whether the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
Director’s delegation of authority to institute inter
partes reviews to administrative patent judges acting as principal officers outside the director’s review
violates 35 U.S.C. § 314, which vests institution
authority solely in the director; and (3) whether establishing a nexus between a
patentee’s invention and objective evidence of
nonobviousness under Graham v. John Deere Co. requires the patentee to negate every
other conceivable reason for a product’s commercial
success and industry praise. |
| 19-1441 |
City of Austin, Texas v. Paxton |
Whether, under Ex parte Young, a state official is a
proper defendant in a federal declaratory
judgment challenge under the supremacy
clause to the validity of a self-enforcing state
statute, if the official with authority to enforce
the statute has not yet overtly threatened enforcement. |
| 19-1414 |
U.S. v. Cooley |
Whether the lower courts erred in suppressing evidence on the theory that a police officer of an Indian
tribe lacked authority to temporarily detain and search
the respondent, Joshua James Cooley, a non-Indian, on a public right-of-way within
a reservation based on a potential violation of state or
federal law. |
| 19-1411 |
Rupert v. Janvey |
Whether the standing
requirement of Article III limits receivers to bringing
claims that are coextensive with the receivership
estate and thus whether Article III precludes receivers
from bringing, settling and barring claims of third
parties against non-receivership entities. |
| 19-1402 |
Zacarias v. Janvey |
Whether a district court in a receivership action
has Article III jurisdiction to bar investor claims for
individual injuries when the receiver lacks standing
to bring those claims himself due to the lack of an
injury to the receivership estate. |
| 19-1398 |
Lieu v. Federal Election Commission |
Whether the federal statutory limit on
contributions to political committees, 52 U.S.C.
§ 30116(a)(1)(C), comports with the First Amendment
as applied to committees that make only independent
expenditures. |
| 19-1388 |
Small v. Memphis Light, Gas & Water |
Whether Trans World Airlines Inc. v. Hardison, which stated that employers
suffer an “undue hardship” in accommodating an employee’s religious exercise whenever doing so would
require them “to bear more than a de minimis cost,”
misinterprets 42 U.S.C. § 2000e(j) – which specifies that “‘religion’ includes all aspects of religious
observance and practice, as well as belief, unless an
employer demonstrates that he is unable to reasonably accommodate to an employee’s or prospective employee’s religious observance or practice without undue hardship on the conduct of the employer’s business” – and should be overruled. |
| 19-1385 |
Box v. Henderson |
Whether a state, consistent with the 14th
Amendment due process and equal protection
clauses, may adopt a biology-based birth-certificate system that includes a rebuttable presumption that a
birth mother’s husband — but not wife — is the child’s
biological parent. |
| 19-1368 |
Walmart Stores Inc. v. Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission |
Whether a state law that has the predominant
effect of protecting in-state retailers from out-of-state
competition is immune from constitutional scrutiny
just because it does not facially distinguish between
in-state and out-of-state businesses of the same form. |
| 19-1365 |
Hueso v. Barnhart |
Whether, notwithstanding
the savings clause of 28 U.S.C. § 2255(e) – which allows a prisoner whose claim for postconviction relief is
otherwise barred to petition for a writ of habeas corpus
if the Section 2255 remedy is “inadequate or ineffective” to test
the legality of his detention – an individual serving a
wrongfully enhanced sentence is barred from obtaining
relief, solely because the wrongfulness of the sentence
was established retroactively by a court of appeals
decision. |
| 19-1362 |
Laut v. U.S. |
(1) What test, if any, should be used to determine
whether a constructive amendment impacted a
defendant’s substantial rights under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 52(b); and (2) what showing is required to determine whether
a constructive amendment is “plain” error under Rule
52(b). |
| 19-1315 |
Nevada v. Walden |
Whether a state remains immune from suit after
voluntarily removing a federal claim to federal court
when the state is immune from such claims in its own
courts. |
| 19-1194 |
Kuang v. Department of Defense |
(1) Whether courts can evade their constitutional
and statutory duty to review military decisions under
the so-called “Mindes test,” from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit's decision in Mindes v. Seamen, or whether claims seeking
injunctive relief against the military are reviewable
so long as they do not present a nonjusticiable
political question or otherwise fall outside the court’s
subject-matter jurisdiction; and (2) whether a Department of Defense policy that requires all legal
permanent resident enlistees—but not their U.S.-
citizen counterparts—to suffer unjustified delays
before beginning their military careers is judicially
reviewable. |
| 19-1184 |
Bruni v. City of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania |
(1) Whether federal courts have authority to save
a state or local law from unconstitutionality by
positing a limiting construction that has no state-law
basis and contradicts governing authorities’ understanding of their own law; and (2) whether Pittsburgh’s buffer-zone ordinance
violates the free speech clause. |
| 19-793 |
Institute for Free Speech v. Becerra |
(1) Whether a state official’s demand for all significant donors to a nonprofit organization, as a precondition to engaging in constitutionally protected
speech, constitutes a First Amendment injury; and (2) whether official demands for membership or
donor information outside the electoral context should
be reviewed under strict or exacting scrutiny. |
Submit Event
