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Posts Tagged scotus

Law Banning Depictions of Animal Cruelty Could Go to the Dogs

By | 10.06.09 | 12:58 pm

The law banning depictions of animal cruelty at issue in a Supreme Court argument this morning may not survive, reports Lyle Denniston at SCOTUSblog.

The federal law makes it illegal to make and sell commercially “any visual or auditory depiction” of the killing or serious abuse of a More…

Gun Case Could Broaden Legal Basis for Wide Range of Rights

By | 10.02.09 | 4:38 pm

In announcing on Wednesday that it would review a case that asks whether individuals have a fundamental right to bear arms under the U.S. Constitution, the Supreme Court did more than just step into a heated debate over gun control. Although McDonald v. City of Chicago is on its face More…

Pressure to Close GTMO Puts Some Prisoners at Risk

By | 10.01.09 | 1:11 pm

As the pressure grows on the Obama administration to close the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay by January, so too does the risk that some of the Guantanamo detainees cleared for release could be returned to countries where they’ll face persecution or torture, More…

SCOTUS to Hear Chicago Gun Ban Case

By | 09.30.09 | 2:19 pm

Maybe now we’ll finally get to find out where the high court’s newest justice, Sonia Sotomayor, really stands when it comes to whether the Second Amendment guarantees individual citizens a “right to bear arms.”

That was a contentious issue at her confirmation hearings, with Republican gun More…

SCOTUS Takes No Action on Uighurs’ Case or Abuse Photos

By | 09.30.09 | 10:58 am

Although court-watchers were predicting that the Supreme Court would decide yesterday whether to hear the appeal from a group of Chinese Muslim detainees at Guantanamo Bay claiming the right to be released into the United States, the high court apparently decided not to decide, at least for now. More…

SCOTUS to Consider Abuse Photos and Uighurs’ Release Tuesday

By | 09.28.09 | 2:57 pm

Among the cases the Supreme Court will consider reviewing in its private meeting tomorrow are two controversial cases arising out of the war on terror. Both question whether the president’s authority over detainees and information about their treatment is absolute, or reviewable by the federal courts.

The first More…

Ginsberg Heads Back to Work

By | 09.25.09 | 2:46 pm

The U.S. Supreme Court this morning had good news: “Justice Ginsburg was released from Washington Hospital Center this morning and plans to be at work at the Court this afternoon.”

Ginsburg was hospitalized yesterday after “feeling ill in her chambers earlier in the day,” the Court announced.  An hour after More…

New State Secrets Policy Amounts to ‘Trust Us’

By | 09.24.09 | 1:48 pm

Ed Brayton at ScienceBlogs (and also of our sister site, The Michigan Messenger) has a thorough analysis of the Obama administration’s new state secrets policy, which I wrote about yesterday.

Ed sums it up: “All of the changes are to the process More…

Today’s SCOTUS Argument Doesn’t Bode Well for Campaign Finance Reform

By | 09.09.09 | 12:17 pm

Here’s Scotusblog’s Lyle Denniston’s take on this morning’s argument in the campaign finance case Citizens United v. FEC:

If supporters of federal curbs on political campaign spending by corporations were hoping that Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., and Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr., would be hesitant to

More…

Federal Court Clears Way for Forced Transfer of Gitmo Prisoners

By | 09.09.09 | 8:54 am

In yet another case that questions the power of federal courts to rein in the government’s executive branch, the U.S. Circuit Court in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday issued a mandate that allows the government to send up to 150 Guantanamo detainees to other countries over More…