Wednesday round-up
on May 4, 2016 at 7:38 am
Coverage relating to the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, its effect on the Court, and the nomination of Chief Judge Merrick Garland to succeed him comes from Hanna Trudo of Politico, who reports on comments by President Barack Obama to news outlets in battleground states. The National Law Review looks at the effect of Scalia’s death on the Fifth Circuit and circuit splits more generally. And Patricia Manson of the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin reports on an appearance by retired Justice John Paul Stevens and Justice Elena Kagan in Chicago; among other things, she notes, Stevens “predicted the vacancy created by Antonin G. Scalia’s death will not be filled until after President Barack Obama leaves the White House.”
Briefly:
- In his Sidebar column for The New York Times, Adam Liptak reports on two pending petitions for certiorari that have “asked the Supreme Court to sort out whether the Washington Redskins and an Asian-American dance-rock band called the Slants have names so offensive that they should be denied the protections of federal trademark law.”
- In The National Law Journal (subscription or registration may be required), Tony Mauro looks back at some of the highlights and notable moments during oral arguments this Term.
- Also in The National Law Journal, Mauro reports on Justice Stephen Breyer’s solo dissent from the denial of review in the case of a California death row inmate, who argued that “his extended stay on death row—he was sentenced to death 32 years ago—violates the Eighth Amendment.”
- Kent Faulk of Al.com reports on Monday’s order in the case of an Alabama death row inmate; the Court “sent the case back to the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals for review in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in January that Florida’s sentencing scheme that allows judicial override in death penalty cases was unconstitutional.”
- At ThinkProgress, Alan Pyke weighs in on Monday’s order denying review in a challenge to a Seattle law setting the minimum wage in the city at fifteen dollars per hour, suggesting that “opponents of higher pay floors for U.S. workers are running low on options.”
- In a podcast for Reveal, Neena Satija puts the pending challenge to the University of Texas’s consideration of race in its undergraduate admissions process in context with profiles of two Texas high school students.
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