REMEMBERING JUSTICE SCALIA | All You Bad Folks, You Must Go | Let’s Get In Formation
February 13, 2017
A MAN REMEMBERED
|On this day in 2016 — just a year ago — JUSTICE ANTONIN SCALIA passed away at the age of 79. His seat on the Supreme Court bench has remained vacant ever since.
WHEN WE WERE YOUNG
|“When Supreme Court JUSTICE ANTONIN SCALIA delivered the Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. Lecture at Harvard Law School on Valentine’s Day in 1989, he made quite an impression on a first-year law student from Colorado named NEIL GORSUCH.” USA Today’s Richard Wolf reflects on the life of Antonin Scalia on the anniversary of his death, considering whether the man and his legal philosophy might live on in Judge Gorsuch at the Supreme Court.
J'AI UNE QUESTION
|On Saturday, JUDGE GORSUCH submitted his 68-page questionnaire to the Senate Judiciary Committee, checking one very important box in preparation for the confirmation process.
NOW LET'S GET IN FORMATION
|“Democrats and their progressive allies are marching in lock step to oppose JUDGE GORSUCH, whose record they find deeply troubling, and gay pundits are painting him as a homophobe. But interviews with his friends — both gay and straight — and legal experts across the political spectrum suggest that on gay issues, at least, he is not so easy to pigeonhole.” Sheryl Gay Stolberg with The New York Times reports that friends of the new Supreme Court nominee think that Gorsuch’s jurisprudence may be more akin to JUSTICE KENNEDY’S than that of JUSTICE SCALIA.
WE DON'T BELIEVE YOU 'CAUSE WE THE PEOPLE
|When PRESIDENT TRUMP announced JUDGE NEIL GORSUCH as his nominee for the Supreme Court, he boasted that the judge had been confirmed to his current appeals court position be a unanimous vote at the Senate. Carl Hulse with The New York Times explains why the statement is not exactly true, and how it primes the battle ahead. “It is just one example of how the warring parties can be a little elastic with the truth when it comes to framing the coming Supreme Court fight to their best advantage. Neither side has clean hands.”
KNOW WHEN TO STOP
|Sunday, a White House official launched yet another attack on the judiciary saying the court ruling blocking the president’s immigration EO was a “judicial usurpation of power.” It was Stephen Miller, White House senior policy adviser, who also said the administration is reviewing all possible options in its consideration of what to do next.
ALL YOU BAD FOLKS, YOU MUST GO
|Bloomberg’s Greg Stohr and David Voreacos report that if the Trump administration chooses to go back to the drawing board with the travel ban, a rewrite would be no easy task. It would “almost certainly trigger a new round of legal challenges on a topic that has riveted the nation and sparked turmoil around the globe over the past two weeks.”
SAY IT AIN'T SO
|Are we in a constitutional crisis? Vox’s Dylan Matthews asked eight leading experts — six constitutional law professors and two political scientists — for their thoughts.
OUT ON THE TOWN
|CityCenterDC’s Centrolina was the place to be on Friday night, where several SCOTUS wonks decided to get their din. JUSTICE ELENA KAGAN and NINA TOTENBERG were among the Supreme Court experts in attendance. Helena Andrews-Dyer with The Washington Post reports on the sightings.
IF WE ARE GOING TO HEAL, LET IT BE GLORIOUS
|ICYMI, The Grammys were last night and packed something of a political punch. Most of the internet is talking about the performances of Beyoncé and A Tribe Called Quest, but there was also a glittering moment for the Supreme Court when LAVERNE COX stood on stage and made a request of the audience. “Everyone, please Google ‘Gavin Grimm.’ He’s going to the Supreme Court in March.” Grimm is, of course, the young transgender student who sued the Gloucester County School Board over its policy that bars him from the boys’ bathroom. His case is scheduled for oral arguments in late march and is known as Gloucester County School Board v. G.G.
SCOTUS REVIEWS
Should the judiciary defer to the executive on national security issues?
Los Angeles Times“As the litigation over Trump’s travel ban bounces around the judicial system, everyone involved should keep in mind the chief lesson from U.S. vs. Reynolds: Don’t trust the government.”
I'm a moderate for Gorsuch: Former law clerk
USA Today“Although I worked closely with Gorsuch for a year as one of his law clerks, and spent social hours with the judge, his family and other clerks, I also struggled to come up with an answer. And then I smiled because I realized the judge lives by the principle that ‘justice is blind.’ He did not bring preconceived positions on social issues into the courtroom. Rather, he pushed us to thoroughly research all sides of each case that came through his chambers.”
OTHER NEWS
Washington's Top Lawyer Uses Strategic Streak to Fight Trump
The Associated Press“The legal challenge that would launch Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson into the vanguard of resistance against President Donald Trump’s travel ban was already in the works as Ferguson flew home from Florida the morning after Trump issued his executive order.”
5 Ways Scalia's Death Changed the Supreme Court
The National Law Journal“A year later, no other justice has claimed Scalia’s chambers. His office belongings are still being packed up, and no destination has been decided on for his papers. His death — and the politics of replacing him — still slows the scheduling of cases, as the court awaits a ninth justice to break ties and carry the workload. Here’s a look at other ways the court has changed in the year since he died.”
No Track Record on Patents, But Gorsuch Clear on 'Chevron' Doctrine
The National Law Journal“Gorsuch has virtually no track record on patents, but his feelings about delegating judicial decision-making to executive agencies are clear.”