The Supreme Court decided Evenwel v. Abbott this week – a case with vast implications for legislative districts. Some see the decision as snubbing Republicans by ruling that states and localities should use total rather than voting population to draw these districts. Other commentary views the ruling as sufficiently narrow to allow future litigation in the same…
Category: Historic
Zubik and the Free Exercise Context
(image via The Atlantic) One of the most anticipated decisions of the current Supreme Court Term is forthcoming in the case Zubik v. Burwell. Zubik follows in the footsteps of another recent case: Hobby Lobby v. Burwell, 134 S.Ct. 2751 (2014). Both cases deal with First Amendment challenges under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) to…
Friedrichs as a Per Curiam Decision
The Court released its decision today in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Assn. The decision which has garnered considerable attention is a single sentence reading: “The judgment is affirmed by an equally divided Court.” From this we know the Justices split 4-4 and so there was no precedential value to the ruling, and that by doing this the Court…
Much Ado About Nothing?
Today the Supreme Court decided the seemingly innocuous case of Hawkins v. Community Bank of Raymore. This case dealt with the liability of spousal guarantors under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act. On any other day this ruling might have gone unnoticed. The decision is one line reading, “The judgment is affirmed by an equally divided…
empiricalscotus.com 