Monday round-up

By Kiera Flynn
on Aug 22, 2011 at 10:08 am

At the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference on Friday, Justice Ginsburg presided over a re-enactment of Bradwell v. Illinois, an 1872 case involving a female lawyer who was twice denied admission to the Illinois bar.  Although the Court – in a decision that has been equated with the women’s rights version of Dred Scott – ruled against Bradwell, the judges at the conference “overruled history,” deciding the re-enactment in Bradwell’s favor.  Sign On San Diego has coverage.

More mock trials are on the horizon for other Justices as well.  In November, Justice Scalia will preside over of the re-enactment of Texas v. White, an 1869 case in which the Court rejected the claim that Texas could secede from the Union.  Jess Bravin provides coverage for the Washington Wire of the Wall Street Journal.

Following last week’s visit to South Dakota by Justice Alito, the circuit justice for the Eighth Circuit, Andrew Cohen of the Atlantic lists three questions that he would have asked the Justice.  Cohen’s questions touch on such topics as the nomination of a Native American lawyer for a federal judgeship, the Court’s recent decision (written by Justice Alito) in United States v. Jicarilla Apache Nation, holding that the fiduciary exception to the attorney-client privilege does not apply to the general trust relationship between the United States and the Native American tribes, and whether the Court’s cert. process favors opponents of Native American interests.

In a forthcoming article in The New Yorker, Jeffrey Toobin discusses the views and jurisprudence of Justice Thomas – whom he describes as having “emerged as an intellectual leader of the Supreme Court” – as well as Virginia Thomas’s ties to the Tea Party movement. 

The United States recently filed a petition for certioriari in United States v. Alvarez, asking the Court to review a decision by the Ninth Circuit deeming unconstitutional the Stolen Valor Act, which makes it a federal crime to falsely claim to be a decorated military veteran.  Jurist has coverage of the filing and details on Alvarez and another Stolen Valor Act case pending in the Tenth Circuit.   

On Friday, SCOTUSblog’s symposium on same-sex marriage added additional contributions from Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean of the University of California-Irvine’s School of Law, and from Northwestern Law School’s Andrew Koppelman.  The same-sex marriage symposium can be read in its entirety here.

Briefly: 

• In an editorial for the Washington Examiner, Conn Carroll urges the Court to “officially put the [Affordable Care Act] out of its misery and invalidate the entire” law. 
• Writing for the Huffington Post, law professor Simone Rose discusses the prospect that a battle surrounding the patenting of genes and gene sequences relating to breast cancer will reach the Court. 
• The Associated Press (via the Chicago Tribune) reports that a group representing an Arizona sheriff is seeking $60,000 in donations to file an amicus brief in Arizona v. United States, in which the state is seeking review of the Ninth Circuit’s decision blocking enforcement of provisions of S.B. 1070, Arizona’s immigration law.