The petition of the day is: R. K. B. v. E. T. 17-942 Issue: Whether the Indian Child Welfare Act defines “parent” in 25 U.S.C. § 1903(9) to include an unwed biological father who has not complied with state law rules to attain legal status as a parent. The...
The federal government’s attempts to define the statutory phrase “waters of the United States” — and in turn, to establish the geographic reach of the federal government’s regulatory authority under the Clean Water Act — have repeatedly spurred litigation over the years. Most recently, when...
Today is the first weekday of the federal government shutdown, but few court-watchers are surprised that the Supreme Court is open for business. As Andrew Hamm reported for this blog on Sunday, the court operated as usual during the 2013 and 1995 government shutdowns, even conducting...
This morning the Supreme Court issued additional orders from last week’s conference. On Friday, the justices announced that they would review Hawaii’s challenge to the most recent iteration of the president’s “travel ban.” Today the court granted review in an environmental-law case, Weyerhaeuser Co. v....
Almost 10 years ago, Theodore Wesby attended a party in the northeast section of Washington, D.C., that his own attorney would later describe as “raucous.” There were strippers offering lap dances, plenty of alcohol, people having sex upstairs, and (at least the smell of) marijuana....
The Supreme Court on Monday cleared Washington, D.C., police officers of liability in the case of a house party a decade ago in which partygoers alleged that police had no right to arrest them. A federal jury had awarded $680,000 in damages that eventually reached...