“First Monday” this year is October 7, when the Court returns from summer recess to hear the first set of arguments this term. The Court typically hears arguments on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays for two weeks in a row each calendar month. Further information amount attending arguments are on this page. This term, the Court will quickly take on some high-profile cases, involving Title VII coverage of sexual orientation and gender identity discrimination, a defendant’s right to a unanimous verdict, life without parole for one of the DC-area snipers, and other issues. Those cases are discussed below.
Looking ahead, I will offer a post before the November arguments, which will include cases involving DACA and other immigration issues, the Clean Water Act, and police accountability. Looking even further ahead, the Court has agreed to hear, but has not yet scheduled arguments in, cases involving environmental law, the Second Amendment, the death penalty, religious establishment, mismanagement of employee retirement funds, and other issues. I will offer recommendations regarding those cases in the weeks before they are argued. This term is going to include a lot of cases that will generate great public interest.
Monday, October 7
The term opens with a case involving legal insanity and the death penalty, Kahler v. Kansas. Legal insanity means different things in different states. Some states instruct the jury to consider whether the defendant was capable of understanding right from wrong and was morally responsible. But in Kansas, a jury can consider mental capacity only as indication that the defendant did not have the mens rea (essentially, the intent required under the law) — in the case of murder, an intent to kill. So in a classic example that the ABA notes in its brief, a father “who knowingly and intentionally killed his son under the psychotic delusion that he was the biblical Abraham, and his son the biblical Isaac” would not be legally insane under the Kansas standard. Predictably, this case has generated a large number of amicus briefs, and I strongly recommend reviewing at least one or two before the arguments to get a sense of some of the legal tests and positions that will be argued. I also recommend arriving very early — these sorts of cases always draw a large crowd, as does First Monday even without a case that’s so contentious.
The second case this morning will not generate nearly as much public interest. Peter v. NantKwest Inc. involves the fees that someone has to pay to appeal the denial of a patent. If you plan to stay for this argument (there will be a short break and many people will leave the courtroom after Kahler), read the overview here.
The Court will also hear an afternoon argument — an important one involving the right to a unanimous jury verdict. Ten jurors found Ramos guilty of second degree murder, but two jurors voted to acquit. At the time, that was good enough to convict him under Louisiana law (although that changed with a state constitutional amendment in 2018, requiring unanimous verdicts going forward; only Oregon still allows split juries). The current state of the law is confused, at least according to Ramos’s attorneys. The last time the Supreme Court directly decided this issue was in 1972, when it ruled that states could authorize convictions with less-than-unanimous juries. However, it was a plurality opinion — no single view of the constitutional issues commanded a majority of the justices. Moreover, since then, the Court has been more emphatic that there should be “no daylight” between state and federal standards when Bill of Rights principles are “incorporated” by the 14th Amendment as applying to the states; and the Court has held that the 6th Amendment requires unanimous verdicts in federal criminal trials. This “incorporation doctrine” will be important in the arguments. Also note the racism that underlies these provisions: at the founding, all states and the federal system required unanimous verdicts, but Louisiana changed that after Reconstruction allowed for black jurors and Oregon did so in 1934 amid public outrage over immigration. The primary brief covers these and the legal issues quite well, and there are a large number of briefs from advocacy organizations on his side; Louisiana is alone, but you can see all the briefs here.
Lines for afternoon arguments are hard to predict because they are relatively rare (although there’s another one next week). Many members of the public don’t know about afternoon arguments, although this one is significant enough that it could draw a crowd of interested lawyers and law students. Some people who arrive for the 10am arguments but don’t get in may also decide to be first in line for this 1pm argument.
Tuesday, October 8
The cases today involve employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity — some of the most high-profile cases of the term. Although many states and cities have non-discrimination laws that specifically prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity, many others do not and federal law does not include such phrases. However, Title VII of the Civil Rights Acts prohibits discrimination “because of . . . sex.” 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2. Courts and others have disagreed about whether this language includes sexual orientation and gender discrimination. It’s unlikely Congress had this type of discrimination in mind when it wrote the law, and for some, that is enough to defeat such claims. For an example of the opposite conclusion, there’s a remarkable 7th Circuit case, Hively v. Ivy Tech., in which the majority found for a lesbian based on a logical analysis that her sex was the reason for the discrimination: a) the employer discriminated against her because she was in a relationship with a woman; b) if an otherwise identical employee were male and in a relationship with a woman, the employer would not have treated her this way; c) therefore, sex is the definitive variable and the discrimination was because of the employee’s sex. The majority reasoned that this analysis comports more with the judge’s role to apply the plain language of the law, not guess at what Congress had in mind when it chose that language. In a concurring opinion, Judge Posner (a much-celebrated jurist who has since retired) was more bold, declaring a refusal to be an “obedient servant[] of the 88th Congress” and instead saying he was engaged in “judicial interpretive updating” of the law.
But that’s not the case being heard today…. I just find the two opinions to represent fascinating reasoning and exchange, and a good starting point for understanding why this is an issue. For the cases today, listen to this ScotusTalk podcast and review the scotusblog overview, and see the many filings in the cases at the following links. Briefly, Altitude Express Inc. v. Zarda and Bostock v. Clayton County both involve sexual orientation discrimination. They will be argued together in the first hour. In the second hour, R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes Inc. v. EEOC will take on transgender discrimination.
People will begin lining up to hear these arguments some time on Monday, if not before. If you are not willing to spend the night on the sidewalk, consider going to the Court to hear and/or take part in the demonstrations. I would expect protests starting around 8am and they certainly will continue until after noon, when the arguments will end and arguing counsel will make their way to the sidewalk in front of the court to give speeches and interviews.
[No arguments are scheduled for Wednesday the 9th, and the Court is closed on Monday the 14th for Columbus Day.]
Tuesday, October 15
There are 5 cases today, all consolidated to be argued together. The cases involve the authority of members of the Financial Oversight and Management Board created by the 2016 Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act. Congress gave the Board broad powers, in response to a “fiscal crisis” — and it also authorized the President to appoint Board members without them being confirmed by the Senate. That’s a problem because the “appointments clause” says all Officers of the United States shall be appointed “by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate” and Congress only has the authority to authorize the President alone to appoint “inferior Officers.” U.S. Const. Art. II, § 2. The line can be a little murky–the Supreme Court has said Officers are those who exercise “significant authority”–but these Board members had authority to rescind or revise laws and exercise other powers that almost certainly are inconsistent with their being mere “inferior Officers.” So a hedge fund and a union representing government workers sued to reverse Board actions on the basis that the Board Members did not have any authority because they were not confirmed as required by the Constitution. The First Circuit agreed that their appointments were unconstitutional but declined to reverse their actions, on the basis of the “de facto officer doctrine” and a finding that there would be “negative consequences for the many, if not thousands, of innocent third parties who have relied on the Board’s actions until now.” The Supreme Court has granted cert. on the question “Whether the de facto officer doctrine allows for unconstitutionally appointed principal Officers of the United States to continue acting, leaving the party that challenges their appointment with an ongoing injury and without an appropriate relief.”
Wednesday, October 16
The first case today raises complex issues relating to preemption doctrine — but it does so in the context of undocumented immigration. Garcia was already under investigation by a financial crimes detective when he was pulled over for speeding and told the traffic officer he was rushing to his job. The routine check revealed the ongoing financial investigation, the officer and detective talked, and the next day the detective obtained Garcia’s I-9 form from the employer. That form used a Social Security Number issued to another person. Garcia was then charged under state laws against identity theft. This has obvious political implications. The legal issue is that the I-9 form is part of a federal system, and the federal law specifies that the form and information on it “may not be used for purposes other than for enforcement of this chapter and [certain specified federal laws].” 8 U.S.C. § 1324a(b)(5). The Kansas Supreme Court held that “Garcia’s conviction must be reversed because the State’s prosecution based on the Social Security number was expressly preempted.” The US Supreme Court has accepted cert. on “(1) Whether the Immigration Reform and Control Act expressly pre-empts the states from using any information entered on or appended to a federal Form I-9, including common information such as name, date of birth, and social security number, in a prosecution of any person (citizen or alien) when that same, commonly used information also appears in non-IRCA documents, such as state tax forms, leases, and credit applications; and (2) whether the Immigration Reform and Control Act impliedly preempts Kansas’ prosecution of respondents.”
The second case today, Rotkiske v. Klemm, asks when the statute of limitations begins to run under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. A debt collector filed suit against Rotkiske but could not serve him because he no longer lived at the address and so withdrew the suit, but then refiled and served someone at the same old address, which the collector should have known was outdated. Rotkiske had no idea, and had a default judgment entered against him. He did not learn of this until years later, when he tried to obtain a mortgage. The issue for the Court is whether the statute of limitations begins to run when the misconduct occurs or when the plaintiff discovers the misconduct. The Fourth and Ninth Circuits have found a “discovery rule” but the Third Circuit in this case disagreed, holding that “the Act says what it means and means what it says: the statute of limitations runs from “the date on which the violation occurs.”
There is also an afternoon (1pm) argument today, challenging the life without parole sentence for one of the “DC area snipers” who was 17 at the time of the murders. This is another case with a lot of publicity. Malvo was sentenced in Virginia in 2004 to a term of two life sentences without the possibility of parole. The sentences were pursuant to pleas, under pressure of being charged with capital offenses. A year later, the Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional when the offense was committed by a minor. In 2010, Miller v. Alabama held that mandatory life without parole was unconstitutional when the offense was committed by a minor. And in 2016, the Court clarified, in Montgomery v. Louisiana, that these rulings were to be applied retroactively. Therefore in this case, the 4th Circuit held that Marvo had to be re-sentenced. He might still face life imprisonment, but the trial court was instructed “to determine (1) whether Malvo qualifies as one of the rare juvenile offenders who may, consistent with the Eighth Amendment, be sentenced to life without the possibility of parole because his ‘crimes reflect permanent incorrigibility’ or (2) whether those crimes instead ‘reflect the transient immaturity of youth,’ in which case he must receive a sentence short of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.” The state, on the other hand, urges that these cases apply only to sentencing schemes that require life without parole, while Virginia’s law provided for judicial discretion. Take a look at the briefs in this case and be prepared for a large and emotional crowd.