Following up on yesterday’s post about “ex parte blogging,” i.e. the possibility that the Supreme Court might see a newspaper editorial, article or blog post about a pending case, let’s consider the supposed worst-case scenario, in which a Justice sees an editorial, article or blog post which has an effect on their interpretation of the
constitutional rights
Ex Parte Blogging Ethics: A New Way To Make The Supreme Court More Inaccessible and Unaccountable
Dan Markel is "singularly unimpressed" with the arguments in favor of prohibiting newspapers from editorializing about pending cases before the Supreme Court:
Over on Balkinization, Eugene Fidell has a post expressing sympathy with the idea that newspapers and others should forbear from trying to influence the Supreme Court on the same day
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Great Cases Don’t Always Make Bad Law
As Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote,
Great cases, like hard cases, make bad law. For great cases are called great, not by reason of their importance in shaping the law of the future, but because of some accident of immediate overwhelming interest which appeals to the feelings and distorts the judgment.
Northern Securities Co.
Partial Judicial Immunity Granted To Corrupt Luzerne County Judges
Following up on my post of two weeks ago on judicial immunity in the "kids for cash" Luzerne County scandal, Judge Caputo of the Middle District of Pennsylvania issued his ruling yesterday, which holds in pertinent part:
For judicial immunity to apply, only two requirements need to be met: jurisdiction over the dispute, and a judicial act.
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Are You Being Properly Joined And Served? Plaintiffs Are Winning The 28 U.S.C. § 1441(b) Removal Debate
"Removal" is the process by which a defendant in a state court case "removes" the case to federal court. 28 U.S.C. § 1441(b) makes it sound so simple:
Any civil action of which the district courts have original jurisdiction founded on a claim or right arising under the Constitution, treaties or laws of the United
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The Simple Solution To Judicial Immunity In The Luzerne County Corruption Case
Ashby Jones at the Wall Street Journal reports on absolute judicial immunity:
In January, federal prosecutors filed fraud charges against Mark A. Ciavarella and Michael T. Conahan, judges on the Luzerne County, Pa., Court of Common Pleas. Prosecutors alleged that the judges sent numerous juveniles to detention centers over several years in exchange for
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“The Limits of Executive Power” By Professor Robert Reinstein
Prof. Robert Reinstein, my mentor at Temple University Beasley School of Law, has just posted on SSRN a draft of The Limits of Executive Power:
Justice Jackson’s concurring opinion in The Steel Seizure Case has taken on iconic status among legal scholars and had been adopted by the Supreme Court as the governing
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The Lawlessness of “Law And Economics”
I admire Judge Posner, one of the flag bearers for the law and economics movement. He is thoughtful, prolific, and has not succumbed to the extraordinary pressure judges feel to guard their actual thoughts and feelings. He is in every sense of the word an open book, and we should be grateful for that.
It…
Supreme Court To Decide If Second Amendment Bars State Handgun Laws
The must-read SCOTUSBlog alerts us to the following petition for certorari being granted by the United States Supreme Court:
Docket: 08-1521
Title: McDonald, et al. v. City of Chicago
Issue: Whether the Second Amendment is incorporated into the Due Process Clause or the Privileges or Immunities Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment so as to
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“The Case of the Plummeting Supreme Court Docket” Isn’t Necessarily A Bad Thing
Adam Liptak at the New York Times writes:
In the early 1980s, the Supreme Court decided more than 150 cases a year. These days, it decides about half that many.
A couple of weeks ago, the Supreme Court advocacy clinic at Yale Law School held a conference to explore the mystery of the court’s
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