Live blog of opinions - Thursday, June 18, 2020
We live-blogged on Thursday, June 18, as the Supreme Court released its opinion in Department of Homeland Security v. Regents of the University of California. SCOTUSblog is sponsored by Casetext: Making litigation more efficient with A.I. and machine learning technology.
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And speaking of the court’s calendar, the color key is starting to look like a line of nautical flags, which is perhaps appropriate in a term with several cases about or referencing pirate ships. After Monday’s glitches in getting opinions out, the USS Supreme Court might want to fly the “kilo” flag from the International Code of Signals: “I wish to communicate with you.”
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We're delighted to have more people here as we get closer to the end of the term. It also means that we get more questions. If you ask a question and we don't seem to be answering it, one possibility is that we answer it in our FAQs, which we published on Monday: https://www.scotusblog.com/2020/06/faqs-announcements-of-orders-and-opinions-4/
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The Washington Post write-up about Justice Powell's regret over his vote in Bowers contained this gem: "Powell's reservations notwithstanding, the court seems highly unlikely to disturb its ruling in Bowers with Powell's replacement by Justice Anthony M. Kennedy and the addition of Justice David H. Souter to take the place of retired justice William J. Brennan Jr., who was one of the four dissenters in the case."
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Lots of commentary and speculation on the three justices who did not write an opinion for October. One was probably the dismissed case. Any chance Bostock/Altitude Express and Harris Funeral Homes were originally two different opinions? They were argued separately albeit back-to-back on similar questions.
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Reader2: I had wondered whether Gorsuch was originally with the transgender plaintiffs but not the sexual orientation plaintiffs and then switched, possibly persuading the Chief along with him. RBG could in theory have been the majority writer in one of those cases, and once Gorsuch switched, his draft became the controlling opinion for both -especially once it appeared to win the Chief over. (Total speculation, obviously.)
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How does the election impact any of these decisions? Delaying the financial case could have an enormous impact on the election and really keeps the wool over the public's eye. Does the court consider the need for the public to process decisions to make electoral decisions?
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I personally believe Roberts gave the opinion to Gorsuch to try and lessen the political blowback from conservatives, Roberts has been giving too many concessions recently and Gorsuch was a Trump Appointee, so carries some conservative clout. The result was a non-eventful tweet from the President and overall acceptance of the ruling, could have been wildly different with a Ginsburg/Roberts opinion.
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