Live blog of opinions | June 18, 2015
-
Good morning and welcome to this morning's live blog of opinions. We're glad to have you here! Amy and Lyle will be with us shortly.
-
Good morning, and welcome to our special Thursday edition of our live blog. We’re getting started now, but we don’t expect orders today – just opinions at 10 a.m.
-
Good morning from the press room at the Court, where rumor abound about what is coming down today. No one in the press room knows, but that has not made a difference.
-
As is almost always the case (unless it is the last day of the Term), we don’t know which opinions we are getting today, nor do we know how many. By the way, I would *not* give much weight to anything that you may hear or read about who may be at the Court today. The Court does not notify either the parties or the lawyers in advance when they issue a decision in a particular case. They used to call the lawyers as soon as the decision had been released to let them know that it was out, but I don’t know whether they still do that anymore. (My sense is that they do not, however.)
I am mentioning this because there was a lot of hullabaloo about Jim Obergefell, the named plaintiff in the challenge to state bans on same-sex marriage, being at the Court on Monday. And obviously we did not get the same-sex marriage decision on Monday. According to People magazine (and, yes, this may be our first reference to People on the blog), he has plans to return for every opinion day until the decision is released. You can read it yourself here: www.people.com (I am a little bitter, though, that I may have missed my chance to write for People.) -
What do we make of cases that were distributed for conference a long time ago but haven't been officially relisted? www.scotusblog.com
-
We have lots of readers today who may not join us on a regular basis. We are delighted that you are here! Because our readership numbers are rising as we get closer to the end of the Term, we get a lot of questions. More questions than we can handle. And a lot of the questions are similar. To try to answer as many as possible, last year I put together a list of FAQs, and you can see my answers here: www.scotusblog.com
If you have asked a question and don’t see an answer, please check the FAQs to see if it’s helpful. -
There are seventeen decisions left to be issued. (This counts the same-sex marriages cases as one, because we expect the Court to issue just one opinion. The caption on that opinion will be Obergefell v. Hodges, the Ohio case, because it has the lowest docket number of the four challenges.)
-
Hey Amy! The calendar seems to indicate you expect opinions on Friday as well, is that the case? Thanks!
-
Kedar Bhatia has put out the first preview of his invaluable Stat Pack, which is available here: www.scotusblog.com
As we get closer to the end of the Term, one of the things that we can start to do is predict (or rule out) the authors of opinions. This is because the Justices try very hard to keep the workload even not only over the course of the whole Term, but also from month to month. And so we can now look at the January sitting, for example, and see that everyone but Justices Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas have written majority opinions from January. This means that one of them is likely writing the decision in Reed v. Town of Gilbert, involving a town’s regulation of signs, and the other is writing in Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. The Inclusive Communities Project , in which the Court is considering whether the Fair Housing Act allows a cause of action based on disparate impact – that is, an allegation that a law or practice has a discriminatory effect even if not discriminatory intent.
There are too many opinions left in February (five) to make any predictions with confidence. The same goes for March (four opinions left) and April (only one opinion issued). -
Serious question from a newbie: Is there a difference between "opinion" and "ruling"? Or are they interchangeable?
-
Do those of you that watch the court get any sense of the attitude of justices toward cameras in the courtroom?
-
How common is it for the Court to add opinion days? Does it typically just happen at the end of a term, or consistently throughout?
-
Study for the Bar or watch SCOTUSBlog? SCOTUSBlog takes the day.
-
When will we know argument dates for the October Term cases? In particular, Campbell-Ewald, which seems to be a sleeper case, but could be one of the most significant class action/consumer cases in a long time.
-
Why doesn't the court announce ahead of time which cases they are ruling on on a given ruling day?
-
If you are new to the live blog / Court watching 1) welcome! We're glad to have you. And 2) Amy has answers to some FAQ's here. (There are no orders today, as Amy mentioned; the opinion-related FAQ's start in the middle of the page.)
-
Random question: Why does the Court sometimes grant motions for leave for file a brief as amicus curiae, but them simultaneously deny the underlying petition for certiorari? What purpose would granting leave to file a friend of court brief serve is the petition is denied in any event?
-
Hey Amy,
Do you *think* we will see a King v. Burwell decision today? -
When does a case name get finalized if an official changes (e.g., Holder -> Lynch, Sebelius -> Burwell)? At argument or when the slip opinion is published?
-
Curious ... what's the latest anyone can remember the court releasing an opinion? July? Aug? Sept?
-
Amy: Thank you, I really appreciate these liveblogs and your efforts to translate legalize into something closer to English...I was a bit surprised to see the media stakeout today. There's no particular reason to expect a marquee decision about ObamaCare or gay marriage today, right? Is it just that nobody wants to be taken off guard?
-
The NY Times reported the King is a veteran. Will that effect how the Court rules?
-
We expect seventeen more decisions before the end of the Term. Here is a list of the outstanding cases.
-
Hi Amy: Could is be that the Supreme Court is the only institution in all of Washington from which there are no leaks? I find that amazing and refreshing in this day and age.
-
Are there too many outstanding cases to start gaming out which Justices likely wrote which outstanding opinion?
-
Sorry for the delay. Just realized that I hadn't dialed into the conference call yet, which would make it hard to talk to Lyle.
-
Why would the Supreme Court post a direct link to the Party and Amicus briefs in the marriage equality case earlier this week--is that an indication that 'today is the day'?
-
has tom taken a step back from these chats for future press-credential-argument reasons?
-
How soon before the Twitter backlash on all the decisions "handed down by @ScotusBlog" ? :-P
-
Make sure to keep us updated with how many people are on the blog! That's always a fascinating number to see. Do you track this number from year to year? It would be interesting to see how the readership grows as opinion days become fewer and fewer.
-
Amy, how quickly will the opinions be posted online from the time they are announced?
-
Good morning...The White House recently voiced optimism in the same sex case. Does the President get any special briefing on opinions before they are released?
-
I'm going to ask Kali to post the FAQs, which hopefully will answer a lot of your questions. But to recap quickly: we don't know what decisions we are getting today or any day unless it's the last day of the term. So we could in theory get ACA subsidies, same-sex marriage, or any of the other fifteen opinions that we are waiting on. I don't think we will get either ACA subsidies or SSM today, personally, but we'll know soon enough.
-
Do I see correctly on the calendar that tomorrow is also an opinion day?
-
Would you please repost the pdf of cases remaining?
-
What do you guys make of public commentary by the justices? Do you think it gives any hints? I was at RBG's ACS thing and she seemed to talk about marriage like it was fait accompli.
-
I think @ScotusBlog gets blamed for the ACA and SSM cases, regardless of outcome. Think you're safe on raisins, though.
-
Any updates on efforts to get press credentials (i.e. potential suit?)
-
Four -- count 'em, four -- boxes of opinions today. Maybe a lot, or maybe fat ones.
-
I take it Lyle is in the press room, is there any way to know what justices are present?
-
Unrelated: does every lawyer who argues before the Court get sketched? Is there an archive somewhere, official or otherwise?
Submit Event
