How Appealing



Monday, March 18, 2024

“Justices Seem Likely to Side With N.R.A. in First Amendment Dispute; The National Rifle Association argued that a New York official violated the First Amendment by encouraging entities to break ties with the group after the Parkland mass shooting”: Abbie VanSickle of The New York Times has this report.

Posted at 10:02 PM by Howard Bashman



“Outlawing abortion is just the start for some conservative judges”: Columnist Ruth Marcus has this essay online at The Washington Post.

Posted at 10:00 PM by Howard Bashman



“Stephen Breyer’s new book sheds light on Supreme Court cases on abortion, guns”: Amy B Wang of The Washington Post has this report.

Posted at 9:52 PM by Howard Bashman



“Supreme Court Wary of States’ Bid to Limit Federal Contact With Social Media Companies; The justices tried to distinguish between persuading social media sites to take down posts, which is permitted, and coercing them, which violates the First Amendment”: Adam Liptak of The New York Times has this report.

Ann E. Marimow and Cat Zakrzewski of The Washington Post report that “Supreme Court likely to reject limits on White House social media contacts.”

Jess Bravin and Jan Wolfe of The Wall Street Journal report that “Supreme Court Voices Skepticism Over Social-Media Censorship Claims Against Government; A majority of justices appear resistant to limiting Biden administration communications with tech companies over content.”

And Alex Swoyer and Stephen Dinan of The Washington Times report that “Supreme Court worries about limiting feds’ interactions with social media companies.”

Posted at 9:50 PM by Howard Bashman



“Texas grandmother thrown in jail after criticizing local government; Now her case heads to Supreme Court”: Hannah Ray Lambert of Fox News has this report.

And in commentary, in Tuesday’s edition of The Wall Street Journal, Anya Bidwell and Patrick Jaicomo will have an op-ed titled “When Local Officials Gag Dissenters With Handcuffs; In Gonzalez v. Trevino, the Supreme Court will decide if bureaucrats have legal immunity when they order critics arrested.”

Posted at 9:37 PM by Howard Bashman



“Potential TikTok Ban Tees Up Legal Showdown Over Free Speech; Litigation would force courts to weigh the government’s national-security objectives against First Amendment rights of TikTok, its users”: Jacob Gershman of The Wall Street Journal has this report.

Posted at 9:33 PM by Howard Bashman



“Ohio GOP Justice Sides with Democrats to Swing Some Outcomes; Cases centered on abortion ballot measure, removal of judges; Justice says it’s due to his textualist judicial philosophy”: Eric Heisig of Bloomberg Law has this report.

Posted at 12:48 PM by Howard Bashman



“Anti-Abortion Groups Defend Century-Old Mailing Law in Pill Case; Ban on abortion pill by mail has gone unenforced for years; GOP’s interest in act fuels concerns on future prosecutions”: Celine Castronuovo of Bloomberg News has this report.

Posted at 12:46 PM by Howard Bashman



“Justice Breyer, Off the Bench, Sounds an Alarm Over the Supreme Court’s Direction; In an interview in his chambers and in a new book, the justice, who retired in 2022, discussed Dobbs, originalism and the decline of trust in the court”: Adam Liptak will have this new installment of his “Sidebar” column in Tuesday’s edition of The New York Times.

Posted at 10:48 AM by Howard Bashman



“Moving Beyond Absolutes on Presidential Immunity; Presidents are sometimes immune from criminal prosecution, but only in limited circumstances; Trump’s case doesn’t come close”: Trevor Morrison has this post at the “Lawfare” blog.

Posted at 10:45 AM by Howard Bashman



“71. Murthy v. Missouri and the Court’s Culture-War Docket: Today’s argument in the social media jawboning case is a perfect illustration of how the Supreme Court has been (and has allowed itself to be) dragged into the middle of the culture wars.” Steve Vladeck has this post at his “One First” Substack site.

Posted at 10:44 AM by Howard Bashman



“Mike Johnson, the First Proudly Trumpian Speaker; Though he has adopted a ‘nerd constitutional-law guy’ persona, he is in lockstep with the law-flouting former President”: David D. Kirkpatrick has this article in the March 25, 2024 issue of The New Yorker.

Posted at 10:40 AM by Howard Bashman



“Which Justice Called Sandra Day O’Connor the ‘Worst Thing to Happen to the Federal Bench’? Supreme Court justices rarely say anything negative about each other in public. According to an Arizona lawmaker, one unnamed justice’s trip to NYU some 15 years ago went differently.” Jay Willis has this essay online at Balls and Strikes.

Posted at 10:32 AM by Howard Bashman



“Sonia Sotomayor Should Retire Now; If she leaves the Court this year, President Joe Biden will nominate a young and reliably liberal judge to replace her”: Josh Barro has this essay online at The Atlantic.

Posted at 10:28 AM by Howard Bashman



Sunday, March 17, 2024

“Fifth Circuit Decision Granting Texas Parents a Right to Veto Federal Access to Contraception is a Hot Mess”: Michael C. Dorf has this post at his blog, “Dorf on Law.”

Posted at 9:48 PM by Howard Bashman



“The Priorities of the Judicial Conference of the United States; Rather than addressing bankruptcy and patent forum and judge shopping, on which there is a large bipartisan consensus, the Judicial Conference rushed through a botched proposal in response to political pressure and Twitter noise”: Josh Blackman has this post at “The Volokh Conspiracy.”

Posted at 9:46 PM by Howard Bashman



“How Trump’s Allies Are Winning the War Over Disinformation; Their claims of censorship have successfully stymied the effort to filter election lies online”: Jim Rutenberg and Steven Lee Myers of The New York Times have this report.

Naomi Nix, Cat Zakrzewski, and Ann E. Marimow of The Washington Post report that “‘Jawboning’ politicians who push to delete social media posts draw scrutiny; The Supreme Court is set to decide whether government demands to remove social media posts are censorship.”

Jan Wolfe and Jacob Gershman of The Wall Street Journal report that “Covid-Era Case on Free Speech to Test Supreme Court; Justices to consider whether federal officials unlawfully pressured tech companies to suppress posts opposed to vaccines.”

Maureen Groppe of USA Today reports that “Supreme Court to decide if White House went too far fighting social media misinformation; The case grew out of concern from conservatives that their views were being suppressed about 2020 election fraud, COVID-19 origins and treatments and other issues.”

John Fritze and Brian Fung of CNN report that “Supreme Court to debate whether White House crosses First Amendment line on social media disinformation.”

At the “Lawfare” blog, Justin Hendrix and Ryan Goodman have a post titled “A Conspiracy Theory Goes to the Supreme Court: How Did Murthy v Missouri Get This Far?

And also at the “Lawfare” blog, Mary B. McCord has a post titled “The Supreme Court Cannot Ignore the National Security Implications of the So-Called ‘Jawboning’ Case.”

Posted at 9:36 PM by Howard Bashman



Saturday, March 16, 2024

“A Numbers Game: Who Would The Judicial Conference’s New Policy Help And Who Would It Hurt? It will be harder for conservative litigants in blue states and liberal litigants in red states to obtain statewide relief. It will be harder for conservative litigants in red states to obtain nationwide relief. Liberal litigants will have virtually unchanged odds to obtain nationwide relief.” Josh Blackman has this post at “The Volokh Conspiracy.”

Posted at 10:03 PM by Howard Bashman



“Supreme Court Confronts Claim White House Bullied Social Giants; Justices to consider if US went too far on misinformation; Supreme Court social media focus critical in election year”: Kimberly Strawbridge Robinson of Bloomberg Law has this report.

Posted at 8:52 PM by Howard Bashman



“Who Gets to Lie Online? On Monday, the Supreme Court hears a case about the government’s ability to combat online misinformation about COVID and elections.” You can access today’s new episode of Slate’s “Amicus” podcast via this link.

Posted at 8:50 PM by Howard Bashman



“The Supreme Court’s puzzling decision to allow the government to ban drag shows, explained; This is a serious blow to the First Amendment and a victory for a notoriously anti-LGBTQ judge”: Ian Millhiser has this essay online at Vox.

Posted at 8:46 PM by Howard Bashman



“U.S. courts clarify policy limiting ‘judge shopping’; On Tuesday, officials said a new policy would mean assigning certain cases randomly. Now they say it is just guidance”: Tobi Raji of The Washington Post has this report.

Nate Raymond of Reuters reports that “US judiciary says courts have discretion to adopt ‘judge shopping’ policy.”

And Suzanne Monyak of Bloomberg Law reports that “Judiciary Issues Guidance to Courts on New Judge Shopping Policy.”

Posted at 8:32 PM by Howard Bashman



“Does Having a Gun Make a Person Suspicious? Courts Aren’t Sure Now. A U.S. Supreme Court ruling that could allow more New Yorkers to carry guns is raising thorny questions and has jeopardized at least one case so far.” Karen Zraick of The New York Times has this report.

Posted at 8:23 PM by Howard Bashman



Friday, March 15, 2024

“Without Senators in Sight, Christine Blasey Ford Retells Her Story; Her lucid memoir, ‘One Way Back,’ describes life before, during and after she testified that Brett Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her in high school”: Alexandra Jacobs has this book review online at The New York Times.

Posted at 9:56 PM by Howard Bashman



“Quiet Fears About Sotomayor Echo Ginsburg Retirement Concerns; Some predecessors faced more public pressure; Politics, health factor into timing of retirements”: Lydia Wheeler of Bloomberg News has this report.

Posted at 9:50 PM by Howard Bashman



“The Supreme Court seems bitterly divided. Two justices say otherwise.” Ann E. Marimow of The Washington Post has this report.

Posted at 9:44 PM by Howard Bashman