Supreme Court
June 28, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
Reportedly, the bottom line in the opinion upholding the individual mandate is this: “Our precedent demonstrates that Congress had the power to impose the exaction in Section 5000A under the taxing power, and that Section 5000A need not be read to do more than impose a tax. This is sufficient to sustain it.” Apparently, then, in the view of the majority this turns out not to be a Commerce Clause
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June 27, 2012 — John Hinderaker
We tried this first on Monday, but the Court put us off for a few days. Now, the day of reckoning is at hand: the Supreme Court’s Obamacare decision will be issued tomorrow at 10:00 a.m., Eastern time. Whatever the Court does, there will be lots to discuss. Whether your mood is mourning or exultation, Power Line Live will be open for you to discuss the Court’s opinions with fellow
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June 27, 2012 — John Hinderaker
Fellow Boomers will recognize the reference: “Eve of Destruction,” by Barry McGuire, was one of the big hits of 1965. Its chorus sticks in one’s head after all these years: But you tell me Over and over and over again, my friend Ah, you don’t believe We’re on the eve of destruction. That’s the way liberals are feeling tonight. Tomorrow has the potential to be the worst day for the
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June 27, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
Josh Gerstein, a fine reporter for Politico, considers the best- and worst-case results of tomorrow’s Obamacare decision for key players. Oddly, Gerstein concludes that a decision upholding the law in full is the best case scenario for both President Obama and Mitt Romney. According to Gerstein, Obama wins if his law is upheld because it represents the signature legislative achievement of his presidency and his most consequential legacy. And, although
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June 27, 2012 — Steven Hayward
One of the marvels of Washington is that there is still one institution that doesn’t leak: the Supreme Court. No one in the media has remarked that although the Obamacare case was argued three months ago, and the vote of the justices to decide the winner a few days later, the decision has not leaked out. Undoubtedly the media and many others have tried to find out. It is something
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June 26, 2012 — Steven Hayward
So, anything going on this week? I’m away most of this week in Ashland, Ohio, teaching my annual summer course in the Ashbrook Center’s master’s degree program in history and government for teachers (this year on the history of American foreign policy). Since I’m in the classroom four and a half hours every day, I’m a bit pinched for time to keep up my posts here. What’s that? The Supreme
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June 25, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
The Supreme Court’s decision strking down, on preemption grounds, major portions of an Arizona law designed to help that State cope with the massive and unlawful influx of aliens is an affront to federalism and to common sense. Justice Scalia has it right in his dissent: Arizona bears the brunt of the country’s illegal immigration problem. Its citizens feel themselves under siege by large numbers of illegal immigrants who invade
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June 24, 2012 — Steven Hayward
With the Supreme Court set to rule on Obamacare as soon as tomorrow, everyone is reading the tea leaves and making predictions. Orin Kerr, writing at the Volokh Conspiracy, took note of the jaunty bearing of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg in a recent speech before a liberal group, wondering if it meant she was pleased with the outcome of the case. Meanwhile, a poll of former Supreme Court clerks found
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June 21, 2012 — Steven Hayward
No Obamacare decision from the Supreme Court today. (There had been rumors that it might be announced today.) However, the Knox v. SEIU decision was handed down today, and it looks like an important blow against labor unions. And once again, the egregious Ninth Circus Court of Appeals was reversed. Knox concerns coercive union dues collected from non-members and used for political purposes. When dissenting employees brought suit against these
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June 8, 2012 — Steven Hayward
It’s still early Friday morning, and so there’s plenty of time for more things to go wrong for the Left before sundown today, but it’s already been another horrible, no good, very bad week for the Left. First, there’s obviously the Wisconsin result. If the “Progressive agenda” hits the wall in Wisconsin (and let’s keep in mind the local results on public employee pensions in San Diego and San Jose,
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May 26, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
George Will writes about the left’s laughable attempt to “put the squeeze” on Chief Justice Roberts in the Obamcare case. Liberals are, in Will’s words, “waging an embarrassingly obvious campaign, hoping he will buckle beneath the pressure of their disapproval and declare Obamacare constitutional.” It’s a familiar tactic, used in school cafeterias across the land: If you do X (here, strike down Obamacare), we’ll make sure everybody knows you’re Y
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May 15, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
Today, I attended a debate sponsored by the Federalist Society about “judicial activism” between our friend Ed Whelan and Prof. Jeffrey Rosen. At the heart of their debate was a disagreement over the definition of judicial activism. Ed defined judicial activism as a form of legal error – the type that occurs when a court wrongly decides that a statute is unconstitutional. Rosen defined it as the judicial overturning of
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April 25, 2012 — John Hinderaker
Some years ago, I worked on a big case in Alaska and spent a lot of time there. At that time, the local bar was buzzing about a lawyer who had a really bad day in court: he was kicked to death by a moose in the parking lot of the federal courthouse in Anchorage. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli didn’t have that bad a day today in the U.S. Supreme
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April 10, 2012 — Steven Hayward
One of the historical judgments about the Supreme Court striking down many of FDR’s early New Deal measures—especially the National Recovery Act and the Agricultural Adjustment Act (in an opinion written by a Justice named Roberts!)—is that these Court rulings actually helped FDR because it gave him a quick escape hatch from semi-socialist economic policies that had no hope of working. At the time the Court struck down the NRA
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April 9, 2012 — John Hinderaker
It appears that President Obama’s attacks on the Supreme Court were a swing and a miss, like so many of his recent efforts. Scott Rasmussen reports that the Court’s approval rating leaped after the three days it spent hearing arguments on Obamacare: Just before the highly publicized hearing on the constitutionality of President Obama’s health care law, ratings for the U.S. Supreme Court had fallen to the lowest level ever
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April 5, 2012 — John Hinderaker
Pretty much everyone is piling on President Obama in connection with his airy dismissal of the concept of judicial review. The Department of Justice backtracked today in the form of a letter from Eric Holder to the 5th Circuit panel that asked for clarification of DOJ’s position on that topic. In his letter, Holder admits the obvious: The power of the courts to review the constitutionality of legislation is beyond
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April 5, 2012 — Scott Johnson
Quote of the day goes to Peter Wallsten and Robert Barnes, from their Washington Post article “Obama’s Supreme Court comments lead some to question his strategy.” Review this: [T]he White House was forced to defend the assertion that overturning the health-care law would be unprecedented. According to the Congressional Research Service, the court through 2010 had ruled 165 times that laws passed by Congress were unconstitutional. Obama himself agreed with
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