Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our live blog.
We have one new grant, in Ritzen Group v. Jackson Masonry.
The Court denies review in Daniel v. United States, involving the Feres doctrine -- the idea that military personnel injured by a federal employee cannot sue the US under the Federal Tort Claims Act. Interestingly, Justice Thomas has a dissent from the denial of review, while Justice Ginsburg indicates that she would grant the petition but does not join his dissent.
The justices send the case of Reinaldo Santos back to the Eleventh Circuit for further consideration in light of the government's position in the Supreme Court, much as they did in a similar case last week. Justice Alito dissents from this disposition, joined by Justice Thomas.
Nothing on the Indiana abortion cases.
Nothing on Oregon wedding cakes (aka Masterpiece Cakeshop part 2).
The justices also denied review in Shabo v. Barr, the case of an Iraqi immigrant fighting deportation to Iraq who argues that he is likely to be harmed if he returns because he is a Christian. The Sixth Circuit had held in his case that it lacked the power to review the factual findings that support the denial of an immigrant’s request for withholding or deferral of removal.
That seems to be all for the order list today unless anyone has specific questions. As for why they haven't acted on any of the high-profile, repeatedly relisted petitions, so hard to say at this point. For the Indiana abortion case, I had thought that perhaps they were waiting for the "other" Indiana abortion case -- a challenge to the requirement that a pregnant woman have an ultrasound at least 18 hours before an abortion -- to make its way to the Supreme Court, but it's here now. And they did eventually take the LGBT cases after repeatedly relisting them, so there's that.
Five-minute buzzer just sounded.
Melissa Quinn of the Washington Examiner reports that we have two boxes of opinions today. For the uninitiated, the number of boxes of opinions waiting to be distributed in the public information office is a rough proxy for the number of opinions that we might expect.
Okay, headed in to see what we'll get today. Back soon with our first opinion.
We have the first opinion, from Justice Kagan. It is in Mission Product Holdings v. Tempnology. The question in the case is whether the debtor-licensor's rejection of a contract in bankruptcy deprives the licensee of the right to use the trademark. The court holds that it does not.
The decision of the First Circuit is reversed and remanded.
The decision is 8-1. Sotomayor files a concurring opinion; Gorsuch files a dissenting opinion.
The next opinion is in Herrera v. Wyoming, from Sotomayor.
The lower court is vacated and remanded. The decision is 5-4. Ginsburg, Breyer, Kagan, and Gorsuch join Sotomayor.
Alito dissents, joined by the Chief, Thomas and Kavanaugh.
The court holds that the Crow Tribe's hunting rights under the 1868 treaty with the US, in which the tribe ceded most of its territory to the US in exchange for hunting rights, did not expire upon Wyoming's statehood.
Herrera, a member of the tribe, had invoked the treaty as a defense against charges of off-season hunting in a national forest in Wyoming.
Court says that the hunting rights survived statehood and the lands within Bighorn National Forest did not become categorically occupied when set aside as a national reserve.
We have the third and final opinion, from Justice Breyer.
It is in Merck Sharp and Dohme Corp. v. Albrecht. The decision of the Third Circuit is vacated and remanded.
Breyer's opinion is joined by Thomas, Ginsburg, Sotomayor, Kagan, and Gorsuch. Thomas has a concurring opinion. Alito concurs in the judgment, in an opinion joined by the Chief and Kavanaugh.
This is a case involving drug labeling and preemption. The court has already held, Breyer explains, that "clear evidence" that the Food and Drug Administration would not have approved a change to a drug's label pre-empts a claim, grounded in state law, that a drug manufacturer failed to warn consumers of the change-related risks associated with using the drug. Today the court holds that the preemption question is something that a judge, rather than a jury should decide.
The court also holds that "clear evidence" is evidence that shows the court that the drug manufacturer fully informed the FDA of the justifications for the warning required by state law and that the FDA, in turn, informed the manufacturer that the FDA would not approve a change to the label to include that warning.
Hi all, we're going to shut it down for today. We'll have Amy covering orders and three different law professors covering today's three opinions. We'll also have our next SCOTUStalk podcast episode. Hope to be back with you next Monday!
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