KENNEDY IS KING OF THE WORLD | How 50 Professors Want To Fix The Court | Sotomayor Delivers A Message Of Hope
September 29, 2017
ALL EYES ON ME IN THE CENTER OF THE RING
|If it hasn’t been made clear to you already, OT17 is going to be a blockbuster year at the Supreme Court. After a quiet term of passive judgements and split votes, the full bench is back and ready to come down on some “big big” cases. David Savage with the Los Angeles Times reports that justices will rule on everything from gay rights laws to partisan gerrymandering, and as usual, the answers will likely all come from JUSTICE ANTHONY KENNEDY. “All eyes will be on Kennedy even more than normal as this year’s term could be his last. The justice has turned away questions about his plans, but Republicans on Capitol Hill predict Kennedy will retire soon, although, of course, they predicted the same thing last year…For now, however, lawyers in the biggest cases will focus on how to win over Kennedy. That explains why the gay rights laws in the blue states and the partisan election maps in the red states are both being challenged as threats to the 1st Amendment’s guarantee of freedom of speech.”
KING OF THE WORLD
|“It’s not speculative to suggest that JUSTICE ANTHONY KENNEDY represents the deciding vote. He claimed that role 13 years ago.” That’s Richard Wolf with USA Today reiterating the power of Justice Kennedy (SO Sacramento peeps), specifically when it comes to the upcoming gerrymandering case that comes before the court Tuesday. The building blocks of the American political system will go on trial, and it’s Kennedy who holds the key to determining how politics in America will be conducted from here on out. Try and tell me the Supreme Court is the least powerful branch. Do it — I dare you.
FIX THE COURT
|ver 50 constitutional law professors and scholars from across the country — including several former Supreme Court clerks and federal court shortlisters — wrote to GABE ROTH of Fix the Court to say which SCOTUS institutional shortcomings they would most like to see changed. The most popular answers all had to do with judicial tenure, with several respondents calling for a mandatory retirement age for the justices. Read the responses and see what these professors are hoping will change at the high court.
IT'S NOT WHAT YOU SAID, IT'S WHERE YOU SAID IT
|The SCOTUS newbie, JUSTICE NEIL GORSUCH, waded into some controversy this week. He didn’t do anything wrong per se, but the optics of what he did caused ethics experts to speak out. Gorsuch spoke at the Trump International Hotel in D.C. before an audience of young conservative leaders while protesters waited outside. The speech has been described as “understated” and even “folksy,” as its subject matter was mainly focused on the Founding Fathers and the importance of civility. And while Gorsuch called for greater tolerance and civility, outside the hotel several dozen people were protesting his appearance. One women held up a sign, “Judge Gorsuch: Bought and Paid For.”
ED BOARD OVERTURE
|The Editorial Board of The Wall Street Journal came running in defense of JUSTICE NEIL GORSUCH “because the political left is already attacking him for…making speeches outside the court.” Ellipsis theirs, not mine. The Ed Board writes, “All of this is best understood as a warning to Justice Gorsuch of the kind of treatment he’ll receive if he rules against progressive causes. We assume he can take the hazing.”
WORST NIGHTMARE
|“Like a bad recurring nightmare, a case that could significantly damage the labor movement’s most vibrant segment, public-sector unions, will be heard again at the Supreme Court this autumn.” Ed Kilgore for New York Magazine covers the Supreme Court’s decision to hear Janus v. AFSCME, conservative groups’ latest effort to overturn a 1977 SCOTUS decision extending to unions the right to collect “fair share” fees from nonmembers who benefit from a union’s collective-bargaining activities.
TIME TO MAKE SOME WAVES
|Matt Ford with The Atlantic reviews the justices’ decision to take up the yuge labor union case and notes that it will offer JUSTICE NEIL GORSUCH his first opportunity to make some waves on big labor.
THE FIGHT FOR $7.25
|“The effort to ensure a living wage for workers may be headed for a serious setback in the U.S. Supreme Court. Depending on how they rule in a case set for argument next week, the justices could make it much more difficult for millions of workers to secure even the meager wages guaranteed by existing federal law.” Daniel Hemel with Slate reports SCOTUS is poised to “deal a devastating blow” to minimum wage workers this term.
TEXAS'S TWEETER LAUREATE
|Yesterday, the White House named Texas Supreme Court Justice DON WILLETT as one of its four nominees for the 5th U.S. Court of Appeals. He’s been on the state’s high court since 2005 and he’s also well known for being a Twitter superstar with nearly 100,000 followers. Kyle Swenson with The Washington Post reports.
GONNA HAVE TO GO INTO THE MAP
|Like Joey Tribbiani navigating his way through London, it’s time to step into the map and take a look at all the places our justices traveled to this summer. Victoria Kwan with SCOTUSblog just posted the Summer 2017 SCOTUS Map which captures the worldwide destinations for justices’ speaking engagements.
A MESSAGE OF HOPE
|For New York Magazine, Cristian Farias covers our Puerto Rican justice’s response to her home country dealing with the devastation of Hurricane Maria. JUSTICE SONIA SOTOMAYOR told an audience last week that she still hadn’t heard from half of her family and asked for prayers for the island. Tuesday, the justice took to the airwaves of a local radio station and delivered a message to the people of Puerto Rico in Spanish. In her message, Sotomayor said, “Puerto Rico will not only survive this. It will bloom once again.”
OTHER NEWS
Appeals Court Order Blocks Enforcement of D.C.'s Strict Concealed Carry Law
The Washington Post“The District’s top lawyer had asked the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to rehear a challenge to the gun-control law after a panel of three judges ruled against the city in July. But on Thursday, the appeals court declined, without explanation, to revisit the case.”
Can a Lawyer Concede Guilt Over a Client's Objection? Supreme Court to Consider Constitutional Issue
ABA Journal“The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to consider the case of a Louisiana death row inmate who was unable to stop his lawyer from conceding guilt in the inmate’s trial for triple murder.”