How Appealing



Monday, April 5, 2021

“Guillermo del Toro Overcomes Claim ‘The Shape of Water’ Was Plagiarized; A copyright suit alleging the Oscar winner ripped off a Pulitzer Prize winning author was revived last year by an appeals court; Now comes a dismissal and a statement how claims of plagiarism were ‘unfounded'”: Eriq Gardner has this post at the “THR, Esq.” blog of The Hollywood Reporter.

In earlier related coverage, Blake Brittain of Bloomberg Law reported last June that “Ex-Judge Kozinski Wins IP Ruling After Scandal-Marred Retirement.”

Posted at 9:18 PM by Howard Bashman



“Warhol a Lame Copier? The Judges Who Said So Are Sadly Mistaken. An appeals court ruled that Andy Warhol violated a photographer’s copyright by appropriating her image for a silk-screen he did in 1984. Our critic disagrees.” Blake Gopnik has this “Critic’s Notebook” essay online at The New York Times.

Posted at 9:08 PM by Howard Bashman



“Senator Mazie Hirono Opens Up On SCOTUS; She talks about Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, Barrett, and Ginsburg; Merrick Garland makes a guest appearance”: Josh Blackman has this post at “The Volokh Conspiracy.”

Posted at 8:45 PM by Howard Bashman



“The Progressive Case for Libel Reform: Judge Silberman is a conservative, but he’s right about Sullivan.” Jeremy Lewin will have this op-ed in Tuesday’s edition of The Wall Street Journal.

Posted at 8:20 PM by Howard Bashman



“Congratulations To The 2021 Bristow Fellows; Plus the law schools and lower-court judges producing the most Bristows”: David Lat has this post at his “Original Jurisdiction” Substack site.

Posted at 2:11 PM by Howard Bashman



“Seven Clerks for Seven Justices in 2021-2022, Continuing the Five-Decade UChicago Alumni Clerkship Streak at the Supreme Court”: Becky Beaupre Gillespie of the University of Chicago School of Law has this report.

Posted at 1:28 PM by Howard Bashman



“Attorney Richard A. Sprague — the ‘fearless, fearsome and feared’ giant of the Philadelphia legal world — has died at 95; Sprague died Saturday after a brief illness and a near seven-decade career as a relenteless prosecutor, peerless civil litigator and towering figure in the history of Philadelphia courts”: Jeremy Roebuck of The Philadelphia Inquirer has this report.

Posted at 1:22 PM by Howard Bashman



“Why to Clerk & How to Land a Clerkship: Practical Advice from Former Clerks.” The American Constitution Society has posted this video on YouTube.

Posted at 1:18 PM by Howard Bashman



Access today’s ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court in an argued case: Justice Stephen G. Breyer delivered the opinion of the Court in Google LLC v. Oracle America, Inc., No. 18-956. Justice Clarence Thomas issued a dissenting opinion, in which Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. joined. And Justice Amy Coney Barrett did not participate in the ruling. You can access the oral argument via this link.

Posted at 10:02 AM by Howard Bashman



Access today’s Order List of the U.S. Supreme Court: At this link. The Court granted review in one case and called for the views of the Solicitor General’s Office in one case.

In the case that is now rather ironically captioned Biden v. Knight First Am. Inst., No. 20–197, the Court issued a per curiam Munsingwear vacatur. And Justice Clarence Thomas issued a concurring opinion.

And in Small v. Memphis Light, Gas & Water, No. 19–1388, Justice Neil M. Gorsuch issued a dissent, in which Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. joined, from the denial of certiorari.

Posted at 9:32 AM by Howard Bashman



“An Extraordinary Winning Streak for Religion at the Supreme Court; More broadly, one new study found, ‘the politicization of religious freedom has infiltrated every level of the federal judiciary'”: Adam Liptak will have this new installment of his “Sidebar” column in Tuesday’s edition of The New York Times.

The new study referenced in the headline is a paper titled “The Roberts Court and the Transformation of Constitutional Protections for Religion: A Statistical Portrait” by law professors Lee Epstein and Eric A. Posner.

Posted at 8:14 AM by Howard Bashman