A GOOD HARD LOOK AT SCOTUS LAW CLERKS | A PR Move To End Partisan Gerrymandering | Is There Such A Thing As Too Many Laws?
December 12, 2017
TODAY IN HISTORY
|On this day in 2000, the United States Supreme Court made GEORGE W. BUSH president by reversing a state court decision calling for recounts in Florida’s contested election.
THE STORY BEHIND THE STORY
|Tony Mauro and Vanessa Blum with The National Law Journal took a good hard look at the Supreme Court law clerks who are hired to help the justices screen incoming petitions and write their opinions. In their report, you’ll learn who these clerks are, how they get to the Supreme Court, and what they do when they leave.
TOP-ED
|“Is the Supreme Court about to cause great political upheaval by getting into the business of policing the worst partisan gerrymanders? Signs from last week suggest that it well might.” That’s Richard L. Hasen suggesting in the Los Angeles Times that the second partisan gerrymandering case that was just added to this term’s docket may actually be a sign that the high court is already ready to do away with the practice. By taking on both cases, and ruling on them together, the high court could announce a new gerrymandering rule that shows no preference to one political party over another. It’s the kind of good PR that has CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS written all over it.
A CASE FOR PRIVACY
|In The Sacramento Bee, Erwin Chemerinsky reflects on a case known as Carpenter v. United States which was argued before SCOTUS a few weeks ago. He argues this case “provides a crucial vehicle to bring the law of privacy into the 21st century.” Chemerinsky: “The court in Carpenter should hold that the government should be able to obtain this information only by getting a warrant from a judge based on probable cause. This will not preclude police from obtaining the information where they have a valid basis, but it will provide all of us with the essential protection of privacy that the Fourth Amendment demands.”
CAN'T HAVE YOUR CAKE AND EAT IT TOO
|For the Chicago Tribune, Dahleen Glanton reports the Masterpiece Cakeshop case argued last week is about so much more than cake. “It is a complicated case that mixes the highly volatile issues of religious freedom, creative expression, free speech and discrimination. But regardless of how well the mixture is blended, the end result is bigotry.”
THE NEW NEW AMERICA
|The quiet rightwing takeover of America’s judiciary could have some big league consequences for the future of our country. Paul Butler for The Guardian points out the lack of diversity among DONALD TRUMP’S judicial picks and his success in already accomplishing a transformation of the courts so early in his term. Butler notes, “The claim that Trump has not accomplished much in his first year in office is dead wrong.”
TOO MUCH OF A GOOD THING
|In The Washington Post, Ilya Somin reports that during last week’s oral argument in Christie v. NCAA, JUSTICE SONIA SOTOMAYOR called out a “dangerous feature of our legal system.” While speaking on how governors enforce state laws, Sotomayor unintentionally highlighted the danger of having too many laws. Somin writes, “Justice Sotomayor is absolutely right. At both the state and federal levels, we have so many laws that law enforcement officials can only target a small fraction of offenders; so many that the vast majority of adult Americans have violated state or federal law at one time or another. The executive therefore exercises enormous discretion about which lawbreakers to go after and which ones to leave alone.”
HOLD OUT FOR THE HOT BENCH
|Dear friends, stay tuned for a very special edition of The Hot Bench this week. Without giving too much away, let’s just say we’re very excited to share with you a conversation about the more artful elements of Supreme Court coverage. Until then!