The Supreme Court on Tuesday struggled to define precisely when public officials who block their critics on their personal social-media accounts are acting on behalf of the government and therefore can be held liable for violating the First Amendment. As Justice Neil Gorsuch put it, the justices had a “profusion of possible tests” before them,… Read More
Justices consider liability for officials who block critics on social media
On Tuesday the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a pair of cases involving liability for public officials who block critics on their personal social-media accounts. The two cases, O’Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier and Lindke v. Freed, are the first in a series of disputes this term arising out of the relationship between government and… Read More
No grants from Friday’s conference
The Supreme Court on Monday morning issued orders from the justices’ private conference last week. The justices did not add any new cases to their merits docket for the 2023-24 term, and they did not act on several of the high-profile petitions for review that they considered on Friday. The justices denied review in one… Read More
Justices grant four new cases, including Chevron companion case
The Supreme Court has added a second case asking it to overrule its landmark 1984 decision in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council to its docket for the 2023-24 term. The announcement came on a list of orders released on Friday afternoon from the justices’ private conference earlier in the day. The court will hear… Read More
Purdue Pharma, tax cases headline December argument session
The Supreme Court will hear oral argument on Dec. 4 in the challenge to the legality of the bankruptcy plan for Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of the highly addictive opioid painkiller OxyContin. The argument in the Purdue Pharma case is one of eight cases scheduled for seven hours of oral argument in the court’s December… Read More
Justices question finding that S.C. district was unconstitutional racial gerrymander
The Supreme Court on Wednesday was skeptical of a lower court’s decision that a congressional district on the South Carolina coast was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. After over two hours of oral argument, a majority of the court seemed inclined to rule for the state in a dispute that centers on the often close correlation… Read More
Court to hear argument in racial gerrymandering challenge to S.C. congressional district
The Supreme Court will hear oral argument on Wednesday in a dispute over the congressional map that South Carolina’s Republican-controlled legislature enacted in the wake of the 2020 census. A federal court threw out the map earlier this year, holding that one district on the South Carolina coast was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander – that… Read More
Court won’t hear case seeking to overrule NYT v. Sullivan
The Supreme Court did not add any new cases to its docket on Tuesday morning. In a list of orders from the justices’ private conference last week, the justices denied review in approximately 180 cases – including one asking the court to overrule one of its landmark decisions on freedom of the press. In Blankenship… Read More
Alabama returns to the Supreme Court over allegedly discriminatory voting map
It was déjà vu all over again at the Supreme Court on Monday, as Alabama asked the justices to intervene in a dispute over the state’s congressional map. The last time it made such a request, in January 2022, Alabama won the battle but lost the war: A divided Supreme Court temporarily blocked a lower… Read More
Biden administration recommends grant in challenges to social-media laws
The Biden administration on Monday urged the Supreme Court to take up a pair of challenges to the constitutionality of controversial social-media laws in Florida and Texas. In a brief filed at the justices’ request, U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar told the court that the laws, which were enacted in response to beliefs that social-media… Read More