Bond v. United States, 09-1227, June 16, 2011 The 10th Amendment reserves to the states that authority not specifically granted to the Federal Government, and prior Supreme Court cases have suggested that only states may challenge federal action on 10th Amendment grounds. The Petitioner assaulted her romantic rival with caustic chemicals, and [...]
Janus Capital Group, Inc. v. First Derivative Traders, 09-525, June 13, 2011 The Petitioner created an investment fund–a separate legal entity–and served as advisor and administrator to the fund. Securities law forbids “any person” to “make any untrue statement” related to the sale of securities. The Respondent alleged that the Petitioner drafted [...]
Yesterday, Adam Liptak at the NY Times covered a Supreme Court trend: the Justices’ use of dictionary definitions in their opinions. He writes that: In May alone, the justices cited dictionaries in eight cases to determine what legislators had meant when they used words like “prevent,” “delay” and “report.” Over the years, justices have looked [...]
Microsoft Corp. v. i4i Ltd. Partnership, 10-290, June 9, 2011 The Respondent sued Microsoft for infringing its computer document editing patent, and Microsoft countered that the patent was invalid. Microsoft appealed the district court’s holding that an invalidity defense must be proven by clear and convincing evidence. A unanimous Court (J. Sotomayor [...]
I will be writing a series of posts (entitled “Matters of Practice”) on the most frequently asked questions I receive about filing briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court. This is the first post in the series. At Cockle Printing, I am often asked what citation style the Supreme Court prefers and whether the [...]
Opinions Erica P. John Fund, Inc. v. Halliburton Co., 09-1403, June 6, 2011 In this securities fraud case, the district court denied the Petitioner’s application for class action certification, finding that it must be able to prove that the misrepresentation caused the claimed economic loss in order to be certified. The Fifth [...]
If we release prisoners to relieve overcrowding, then prisoners will rape, rob and murder our citizens. That is frightening; therefore we shouldn’t release prisoners, even though the State cannot afford to humanely incarcerate them. This argument was at the heart of Justices Scalia and Alito’s dissenting opinions last week in the California prison [...]
The Supreme Court released their case distribution schedule for the October 2011 Term. The schedule lists the Court's distribution dates for both both in forma pauperis and paid cases, as well as the corresponding conference dates. The distribution dates are important for determining the due date of cert stage reply brief. To view the 2011 Term [...]
Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 10-98, May 31, 2011 In 2003, FBI agents arrested the Respondent under a material witness warrant. The Respondent sued then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, claiming that in the aftermath of September 11th, the government undertook a program to detain terrorism suspects through pretextual material witness claims. The Court held (J. Scalia wrote the [...]
The discussion about the Supreme Court's landmark decision last week in Brown v. Plata continues unabated. There are basically two sides of the debate. Those predicting that a release of prisoners will create a crime wave in California, and therefore, the Supreme Court should not have upheld the release order. You can find these views [...]