Tuesday round-up

This week is already shaping up to be a busy one on the Supreme Court’s unofficial coronavirus docket. The justices on Monday rejected an emergency request from incarcerated individuals at a Texas geriatric prison who had asked the court to reinstate stricter safety precautions to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the prison. Also on Monday, a group of Jewish organizations came to the court to challenge New York’s limits on attendance at religious services — just four days after the Catholic diocese of Brooklyn challenged those same limits. The state’s response to the Catholic diocese’s challenge is due Wednesday, and its response to the Jewish organizations’ challenge is due Friday.

Here’s a round-up of other Supreme Court-related news and commentary from around the web:

• Biden’s Top SCOTUS Lawyer Should Be Woman, Court Watchers Say (Kimberly Strawbridge Robinson & Jess Bravin, Bloomberg Law)
• Supreme Court Rejects Texas Inmates’ Plea for Stronger Health Measures (Jess Bravin, The Wall Street Journal)
• Smith Has Got to Go (James Phillips, National Review)
• Supreme Court Declines Appeal Backed by Illinois School Districts on Tax Remedies (Mark Walsh, Education Week)
• Reclaiming the Race Analogy in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia (Kyle Velte, Balkinization)
• Big Oil asks justices to thwart climate cases (Jennifer Hijazi, E&E News)

We rely on our readers to send us links for our round-up. If you have or know of a recent (published in the last two or three days) article, post, podcast or op-ed relating to the Supreme Court that you’d like us to consider for inclusion, please send it to roundup@scotusblog.com. Thank you!