Last week the court released its calendar for the April sitting, the final two-week session in which the justices are scheduled to hear oral arguments during the 2016-2017 term. With a full calendar (and then some) for April, and three cases that were granted in January carried over to the fall, it was not altogether… Read More

At today’s oral argument in Hernández v. Mesa, the latest chapter in a Mexican family’s effort to hold a U.S. Border Patrol agent liable for the fatal shooting, on Mexican soil, of their 15-year-old son, some of the justices appeared “sympathetic,” as Justice Stephen Breyer put it, to the family’s plight. But at the same… Read More

Yesterday the Senate Judiciary Committee announced that the confirmation hearing for Judge Neil Gorsuch will begin on March 20, creating at least the possibility that, if confirmed, Gorsuch could join the court’s current eight justices in time for the April sitting, which begins on April 17. Today the justices released the calendar for the April… Read More

Judge Neil Gorsuch, President Donald Trump’s nominee to the Supreme Court, was first contacted about a possible nomination to the court on December 2, 2016 – nearly two months before he was actually nominated. That information came over the weekend, when Gorsuch submitted his responses to a questionnaire from the Senate Judiciary Committee. Gorsuch’s initial… Read More

In any context, the case of Hernández v. Mesa would be an important one: The parents of Sergio Hernández, a Mexican teen shot by a U.S. Border Patrol agent while standing on Mexican soil, are seeking to sue the agent responsible for their son’s death in U.S. courts. But with the United States’ relationship with… Read More

Reports indicate that President Donald Trump intends to nominate Charles Cooper, a well-liked and well-respected Washington lawyer who served in the Reagan administration, to serve as the U.S. solicitor general. Cooper is perhaps best known for his defense of California’s Proposition 8, which barred same-sex marriage in that state. By a vote of 5-4, the… Read More

The Supreme Court released its calendar for its March sitting this morning. The calendar includes some high-profile cases – most notably, Gloucester County School Board v. G.G., the case of a transgender student who identifies as a boy and wants to be able to use the boys’ bathroom at his Virginia high school, which will… Read More

The Supreme Court issued orders from its January 19 conference this morning. After granting review in two cases from that conference last week, the justices did not add any new cases to their merits docket today. But there was one notable denial on today’s order list: Abbott v. Veasey, the challenge to a Texas law… Read More

With the Supreme Court closed tomorrow for the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump, the justices met today, one day early, for their private conference. One week after adding 16 new cases to their docket, today the justices granted review in two more – potentially filling out their merits docket for the term. The first grant… Read More

In 2011, Simon Tam tried to register The Slants, the name of his rock band, as a trademark – a word, name or symbol used to identify a product and to identify its source. Tam had named his band The Slants to bring attention to discrimination against Asian-Americans, but the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office… Read More