Court orders new review of ADA case
on Jan 16, 2007 at 10:03 am
UPDATE x2 11:45 AM: The Order List can now be found here. Justice Scalia wrote respecting the denial of cert. in U.S. v. Omer in an opinion here. Justice Ginsburg’s concurrence in Haas can be found here. Justice Stevens wrote respecting the denial of cert. in Joseph v. U.S. in an opinion here
The Supreme Court on Tuesday told the Sixth Circuit Court to reconsider a ruling that Congress did not have the authority to take away states’ immunity to private lawsuits claiming discrimination against the disabled in state prison systems. In a brief, unsigned order in Haas v. Quest Recovery Services (06-263), the Court directed the Circuit Court to consider the U.S. government’s views in defense of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act in the context of correctional facilities. The Court allowed the government to intervene in the appeal.
The Court did not grant review of any new cases Tuesday, and it issued no opinions in argued cases. The next opportunity for opinions on the merits will be Wednesday.
The Haas case sent back for review is a followup to the Court’s ruling last January, in U.S. v. Georgia, that Congress had validly removed states’ Eleventh Amendment immunity to private lawsuits under the public services section of ADA — that is, Title II — so far as the claims involved unconstitutional action by prison officials. The Sixth Circuit decided the Haas case following the Georgia ruling, but did not take that into account. Instead, it followed Circuit precedent in finding that Congress could not validly lift states’ immunity to private claims under Title II, at least when the claim was based on equal protection arguments.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg filed a separate opinion Tuesday as the Court ordered the new review of the Haas case. She wrote separately to point out what she called aspects of the Sixth Circuit Court that called into question what the lower court had decided as alternatives to its basic holding on the immunity issue.
The Court passed up another opportunity to decide whether failure to include in a criminal indictment an element of the offense could ever be excused as “harmless error.” That is the question the Court avoided deciding last Tuesday in U.S. v. Resendiz-Ponce (05-998) after finding that the indictment in that case was not defective. The Court had been holding another government appeal as it pondered the Resendiz-Ponce case — U.S. v. Omer (05-1101). On Tuesday, after the Justice Department had quickly filed a supplemental brief arguing that the indictment in this case also was not defective, the Court denied review of the Omer case — prompting a tartly worded statement by Justice Antonin Scalia — the lone dissenter in Resendiz-Ponce. Scalia complained that the Court had opened “another frontier of law…, full of opportunity and adventure for lawyers and judges.”
Among the other cases that the Court declined to hear Tuesday were these:
06-466, Pacific Gas & Electric v. San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace, involving a Ninth Circuit ruling that federal agencies must weigh the potential impact on the environment of a terrorist attack when they take action on a regulated project. The case involved a permit to build a spent nuclear fuel storage facility at an atomic energy plant in California.
06-760, Cooper v. IBM Personal Pension Plan, a test case on whether “cash balance” pension plans, as they existed before Congress changed pension law last year, are unlawful because they discriminated against older workers. The Seventh Circuit had rejected that claim in a case involving a class of about 250,000 current and former IBM employees.
06-652, Didden v. Village of Port Chester, a plea by a group of private landowners in Port Chester, N.Y., who have sued the town and local officials claiming they were victimized by a private developer acting in league with local officials to condemn their land for that developer’s private use. The appeal sought new limits on the Court’s controversial 2005 decision in Kelo v. New London, allowing condemnation of private property for redevelopment as a private renewal project. The Second Circuit rejected the challenge in Port Chester.
05-853, McGowan v. NJR Service Corp., an appeal seeking resolution of a conflict among Circuit Courts on whether an ERISA plan’s manager has the authority to deny a former spouse’s waiver of plan benefits as part of a divorce agreement. The Solicitor General, asked by the Court for the government’s views, acknowledged that lower courts were split on the issue, but said this case was not a good vehicle to resolve the question.
06-616, Kennewick v. Rogers, and 06-626, Dopke v. Rogers, seeking Supreme Court clarification of the constitutional risks that police officers take when they use a police dog in a search for suspects, and the dog while off the leash bites someone. This case from Washington State has not yet gone to trial on the police liability issue, reaching the Court only on a preliminary issue of police immunity.
06-499, Morrison v. North Carolina Board of Law Examiners, seeking Supreme Court clarification of the power of states to deny admission to law practice in the state to those admitted to practice in other states that do not afford reciprocity. The Fourth Circuit upheld the exclusion of a lawyer to practice in North Carolina; he was admitted to practice in California but that state does not have reciprocity with North Carolina on lawyer admissions.
