I actually discussed this idea many years ago, but never went any further than that, and now Josh Blackman has set it up: a fantasy league based on the future dispositions of Supreme Court cases! The basic rules: For each case on which the Supreme Court grants cert, points are allocated for * The Outcome: […]
Archive | Supreme Court
CVSG in Staub v. Proctor Hospital
The Court didn’t grant cert in any cases today. It did, however, call for the views of the Solicitor General in Staub v. Proctor Hospital, 09-400, a case presenting the question of the proper standard to employ in determining whether an employer can be held liable based on the unlawful intent of officials who influenced […]
Second OT2009 Opinion–PC in Capital Case
No Supreme Court opinions in argued cases yet, but we got a second per curiam in a non-argued case. The Court summarily reversed the Sixth Circuit (Merritt, Martin, Moore) in the case of David Bobby (I guess that’s Ricky’s brother), Warden v. Robert J. Van Hook, 09-144, a capital case presenting the question of the […]
Roundtable on Free Enterprise Fund v. PCAOB
The Vanderbilt Law Review‘s “En Banc” online supplement has published a roundtable on Free Enterprise Fund v. PCAOB, an important separation of powers case the Supreme Court will hear later this term. The case concerns the constitutionality of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, an independent entity appointed by the Securities and Exchange Commission. The […]
Louis Brandeis and the Incorporation Doctrine
By David Bernstein on October 28, 2009 1:28 am in Constitutional History, Freedom of Speech, Supreme Court
I’ve read most of Mel Urofsky’s new biography of Louis Brandeis, and it’s an extremely good, and very informative, book. But I’m afraid that Mel vastly exaggerates Brandeis’s influence on the Supreme Court’s adoption of the “incorporation doctrine”, to wit: (1) p. 618: “Scholars now believe that the Fourteenth Amendment … was intended to extend […]
Corcoran v. Levenhagen
I wonder if I’m the only one who sees today’s Supreme Court opinion in a death penalty case, Corcoran v. Levenhagen, as somewhat similar to the Court’s order two months ago in In re Troy Davis. As in Davis case, today’s opinion in Corcoran is essentially an order telling a district court to take a […]
Chief Justice Roberts Dissents from Denial of Fourth Amendment Case — Again
Chief Justice Roberts published a dissent from denial of certiorari today in a Fourth Amendment case, Virginia v. Harris, that is interesting in part because it resembles his dissent from denial of certiorari last year in Pennsylvania v. Dunlap (a.k.a. the “tough as a three dollar steak” opinion). In both Harris and Dunlap, a state […]
Was Heller comparable to Roe v. Wade?
So argued the eminent Fourth Circuit Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson, III, in Of Guns, Abortions, and the Unraveling Rule of Law, recently published in the Virginia Law Review. In Unraveling Judicial Restraint: Guns, Abortion, and the Faux Conservatism of J. Harvie Wilkinson, III, Nelson Lund and I disagree, arguing that none of Judge Wilkinson’s comparisons to […]
My Findlaw Column on Alvarez v. Smith – A Key Property Rights Case Argued Before the Supreme Court Today
By Ilya Somin on October 14, 2009 3:12 pm in Due Process Clause Property Rights, Property Rights, Supreme Court
Findlaw has just posted a column I wrote on Alvarez v. Smith, an important Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause property rights case that was heard by the Supreme Court today: Today, the Supreme Court hears Alvarez v. Smith, an important case that will affect the constitutional property rights of many people around the country but […]
Is Justice Sotomayor Concerned about the Cost of Class-Actions?
Yesterday, with little fanfare, Justice Kennedy filed an statement respecting the denial of the petition for a write of certiorari in DTD Enterprises v. Wells. It reads: This case began with a contract action brought by DTD Enterprises, Inc. (hereinafter petitioner), a commercial dating-referral service, against respondent, one of peti-tioner’s customers. The suit alleged that […]
Good Luck, Mike
This morning, at the U.S. Supreme Court, my colleague Michael Benza will argue on behalf of the respondent in Smith v. Spisak. He will argue that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit correctly granted a writ of habeas corpus to death row inmate Frank Spisak due to constitutionally defective jury instructions and […]
Rethinking the Supreme Court’s Website
One of the odd things about the website for the U.S. Supreme Court is that it’s not the place to go to get briefs, new opinions, and oral argument audio of the Court’s own cases. [See update velow.] If you’re one of the many Supreme Court geeks that needs to read the opinions as soon […]
The Ten Best Supreme Court Decisions
By Ilya Somin on October 6, 2009 11:12 am in Constitutional History, Constitutional Theory, Libertarianism, Supreme Court
It’s easy to make lists of the worst Supreme Court decisions of all time, and libertarians are constantly criticizing the Court for not doing enough to protect constitutional liberties. But now, libertarian lawprof Brad Smith asks for a list of the ten best Supreme Court decisions from a libertarian point of view. As I see […]
Yesterday’s CVSG in San Francisco Health Care Case
Yesterday, the Supreme Court called for the views of the Solicitor General about a certiorari petition filed in Golden Gate Restaurant Association v. San Francisco, 08-1515, which presents the following question: Whether ERISA section 514(a), 29 U.S.C. § 1144(a), preempts local laws mandating ongoing employer contributions for employee health-benefits, or alternative payments to a local […]
Want to do it the easy way, or the hard way?
In a new podcast from iVoices.org, I explain McDonald v. Chicago to Independence Institute President Jon Caldara. This is an 11 minute audio, which presumes that the listener is entirely new to the whole idea of incorporation. If you’ve got much more time on your hands, here’s an 86 minute video of my presentation on […]