On October 11, 2011, the Supreme Court denied certiorari in Adar v. Smith, an important case affecting the rights of gay parents and their adopted children to have their valid adoption orders recognized nation-wide. In August, CAC filed an amicus curiae brief, in support of the Petition for Writ of Certiorari, arguing that the Court should grant review to clarify that the Full Faith and Credit Clause requires states to recognize rights protected by an out-of-state judgment of adoption, and that this guarantee may be enforced by individuals under Section 1983.
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Prior Cases
On June 27, 2011, in an ideologically divided, 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court struck down Arizona’s campaign finance law, designed to combat corruption in Arizona’s elections, as an unacceptable restriction on free speech, in violation of the First Amendment. But as Justice Elena Kagan noted in her dissent, the conservative majority’s decision “is in tension with broad swaths of our First Amendment doctrine.”
On April 27, 2011, the sharply divided Supreme Court handed down a 5-4 decision in favor of AT&T. Ruling against their professed commitment to federalism, the Court's conservative Justices decided to support a remarkable expansion of pro-corporate federal arbitration rules that help shield corporations from liability in federal and state courts. As CAC explained in our brief, the Court's conclusion is contrary to both the text of the Federal Arbitration Act and the text of the Supremacy Clause.
On May 25, 2011, CAC filed an amicus curiae brief in the Supreme Court in support of the petition for a writ of certiorari in Blueford v. Arkansas. The petitioner has asked the Court to hear the case to decide whether the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment, applied to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, permits the government to subject a criminal defendant to a second trial for the same serious charges of which a jury has acquitted him, simply because the jury deadlocked on a lesser-included offense.
On September 3, 2009, the D.C. Circuit granted the parties’ joint motion to voluntarily dismiss the petitions for review. The case had originally been filed after the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) blocked California’s auto emissions standards by refusing to grant the State a waiver of federal preemption under the Clean Air Act. But after the election of President Obama in 2008, the EPA reconsidered that granted the waiver of federal preemption requested by the State of California and supported by CAC.
On June 8, 2009, the Supreme Court released its opinion in Caperton v. Massey, a case raising the question of whether the 14th Amendment’s Due Process Clause requires an elected state judge to recuse himself when a litigant appearing before him has made substantial contributions to the judge’s election campaign.
On July 31, 2009, CAC filed a brief with the League of Women Voters of the United States, explaining that the text and history of our Constitution make clear that campaign expenditures by corporations can be subject to greater regulation than expenditures by individuals. In a special session on Thursday, January 21, 2010, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Citizens United, reversing the judgment of the D.C. Circuit Court.
On October 3, 2011, the Supreme Court denied cert in Farina v. Nokia. Previously, CAC filed an amicus curiae brief in the Supreme Court in support of the petition for a writ of certiorari. CAC’s brief in Farina urged the Supreme Court to grant review in order to clarify the extent to which an agency’s views should be considered as a basis for implied preemption when Congress has expressly disclaimed any implied preemption of state law.
On April 8, 2011, CAC filed a brief in the Eleventh Circuit, supporting the government's appeal and continuing to defend the constitutionality of the health care reform law. On August 12, a divided panel of the Eleventh Circuit upheld Judge Vinson’s ruling striking down the Act’s minimum coverage provision.