Recent Decisions
Helsinn Healthcare S. A. v. Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc. (January 22, 2019)
Under the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act's "on sale" bar, a commercial sale to a third party who is required to keep the invention confidential can constitute invalidating prior art for subsequently-issued patents.
Stokeling v. United States (January 15, 2019)
The term “physical force” in the Armed Career Criminal Act encompasses the degree of force necessary to commit common-law robbery and encompasses a definition of burglary that requires the defendant to overcome the victim’s resistance.
New Prime Inc. v. Oliveira (January 15, 2019)
Despite the presence of a "delegation clause,” giving an arbitrator authority to decide threshold questions of arbitrability, a court should initially determine whether an exception to the Federal Arbitration Act applies. A contract calling a worker an "independent contractor" is a contract of employment for purposes of an exception to the Act.
Henry Schein, Inc. v. Archer & White Sales, Inc. (January 8, 2019)
Courts should enforce arbitration contracts according to their terms, including provisions that call for an arbitrator to decided gateway questions of arbitrability; the Federal Arbitration Act contains no "wholly groundless" exception.
Culbertson v. Berryhill (January 8, 2019)
Social Security Act section 406(b)(1)(A)’s 25% cap applies only to fees for court representation, not to the aggregate fees awarded under sections 406(a) and (b) for representation before the agency and before the court.
Latest Supreme Court News
Do American Women Still Need an Equal Rights Amendment?
The New York Times,
We’re already living in Phyllis Schlafly’s nightmare.
Court will review census citizenship dispute this term
SCOTUSblog,
The Supreme Court’s 2018-2019 term will end with a bang. In a brief order issued after the justices’ private conference, the court announced this afternoon that it will review a challenge to the Trump administration’s decision to add a question about citizenship to the 2020 census. The court will take up the case and hear…
Supreme Court to Hear Case on Census Citizenship Question
The New York Times,
The court’s move added a highly charged and consequential blockbuster to what had been a fairly sleepy term. Critics say that adding the question would undermine the count.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Returns to Work at Supreme Court
The New York Times,
The justice attended a private conference to consider adding cases to the court’s docket, including ones on the census and gay rights.
Not an Administrative Law Bang but a Whimper
Justia's Verdict,
NYU law professor Samuel Estreicher comments on Kisor v. Wilkie, a case currently before the US Supreme Court that raises the narrow question whether a court should accept an interpretation by the Department of Veterans Affairs of its own technical regulation but also gets at a broader question of judicial deference more generally. Estreicher argues that when agencies interpret their own regulations, courts should afford those interpretations only Skidmore respect, not the higher Chevron-style deference that has come to be commonplace.
Press Release Regarding Justice Ginsburg
Supreme Court of the United States,
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg underwent a pulmonary lobectomy today at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City. Two nodules in the lower lobe of her left lung were discovered incidentally during tests performed at George Washington University Hospital to diagnose and treat rib fractures sustained in a fall on November 7. According to the thoracic surgeon, Valerie W. Rusch, MD, FACS, both nodules removed during surgery were found to be malignant on initial pathology...
Current Supreme Court Justices
Chief Justice of the United States
Associate Justice
Associate Justice
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Associate Justice
Associate Justice
Associate Justice
Associate Justice
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Photos of the justices courtesy of the Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States
