Today in Supreme Court History: June 26, 2003, June 26, 2013, and June 26, 2015

6/26/2003: Justice Kennedy writes the majority opinion in Lawrence v. Texas.

6/26/2013: Justice Kennedy writes the majority opinion in U.S. v. Windsor.

6/26/2015: Justice Kennedy writes the majority opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges.

Justice Anthony Kennedy

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. 644 (decided June 26, 2015): bans on same-sex marriage violated Equal Protection (ruling on various cases involving adoption laws, issuing of marriage licenses, etc.)

Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (decided June 26, 2003): Texas statute prohibiting putting the penis into mouth or anus struck down as violating Due Process clause (of course it was gay male couple getting arrested, as if women never gave blow jobs); overruled Bowers v. Hardwick, 1986, with the excuse that only 13 states now prohibited gay sex

United States v. Windsor, 570 U.S. 744 (decided June 26, 2013): striking down Defense of Marriage Act which denied federal recognition of same sex marriages (at issue was whether a surviving same-sex spouse from New York where gay marriage was legal could claim federal tax exemption on estate)

District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (decided June 26, 2008): right to keep and bear arms is not tied to militia service (overruling case law relying on Miller v. U.S, 1939) and applies to self-defense in the home (at issue was a D.C. handgun ban) though right is "not unlimited" and bans on concealed carry and restrictions on sale are permissible

Hollingsworth v. Perry, 570 U.S. 693 (decided June 26, 2013): no "case or controversy" when opponents of gay marriage tried to appeal the District Court's Equal Protection rejection of the anti-gay-marrige Proposition 8 after state officials refused to further defend it (my neighbors, California residents at the time, were among the gay couples whose legal marriage became illegal with Prop 8 and then legal again with the District Court decision)

Trump v. Hawaii, 585 U.S. --- (decided June 26, 2018): deferred to executive branch discretion in upholding restrictions imposed by Trump on travel from North Korea, Syria, Iran, Chad, Libya, Yemen, and Somalia; only text of executive order was analyzed, President's public declarations that it was based on race and religion disregarded

NLRB v. Canning, 573 U.S. 513 (decided June 26, 2014): President cannot use Recess Appointment Clause for appointments when Senate declares it is not in recess even though it actually is (plaintiff was contesting NLRB decision against his Pepsi distributorship on the basis that majority of commissioners were not validly appointed; Obama's appointments were designed to achieve statutory NLRB quorum because the Senate had refused to act on nominees, though Democrats had done the same with GW Bush nominees)

Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U.S. 702 (decided June 26, 1997): right to assisted suicide is not subject to Due Process clause (i.e., terminating one's life is not "life, liberty or property" protected by the clause)

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Those first three were some of the worst decisions in America's history.

[Mr. Bumble]

Agreed. In the case of Windsor and Obergefell it seems like a case of Eugene's "slippery slope".

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Turns out it wasn't a slippery slope at all, it was a greased slide.

[Sebastian Cremmington]

Remember when Trump let a Muslim assassin enter America during a pandemic??

[Frank Drackman]

AK, Reagan's Earl Warren (HT Alzheimer's)

[DaivdBehar]

Alzheimer described his syndrome 119 years after the writing of the constitution, in 1906. That does not excuse our not amending the constitution to comply with 116 year old medical knowledge.

The lifetime appointment was one of the 3 big mistakes in the constitution. The other 2 catastrophic ones were allowing slavery, and the term of the patent. Those were idiotic and catastrophic. They were known to be so at the time by all educated people, including Madison, a lawyer.

[DaivdBehar]

Homosexual marriage was the idea of the lawyer, not of the homosexual. They have above average incomes, and are not stupid. It was a scheme to revive the moribund Family Law racket and to plunder the assets of rich homosexuals. The first applicant was a law student.

It is a delusion. Nothing the vile, toxic lawyer profession says or does will ever change the reality that it is a friendship. The purpose of privileging marriage is to protect and to promote reproduction.

Homosexuals have not fallen for this lawyer trap. Very few have fallen into it, compared to hets.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Wrong. It was a scheme by activists to eradicate the institution of marriage.

Look at it now, it’s utterly meaningless.

[DaivdBehar]

Everyone agrees, murder should be illegal. Butt banging kills twice as many people a year. And, that number is 60% lower than in 2003, due to advances in treatment of AIDS.

[DaivdBehar]

I do not think arguments, facts, statistics sway people much. I do not think, yelling, protests, and death threats sway people. They may harden resistance.

I see the way to change the rent seeking and idiocy of the Supreme Court as moving it to Wichita, KS, the center of the continental US, with its Midwest culture. That is the real American culture. No one can overcome local culture. I predict Barrett will be changed in 2 years of living in Washington DC, and become another Kennedy.

[Frank Drackman]

and the "Reverend" Jerry/Arthur Sandusky's "Indefinite Leave of Absence"

[Tilion]

Interesting caption choice for the post: Crime.
Certainly Lawrence involved overturning a criminal statute, but Ms. Windsor only sought to have the tax paid by her late wife's estate refunded to her as inheritor and Mr. Obergefell only to be identified as spouse on his late husband's death certificate. Seems in inapt tag.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Sigmund Freud could have easily explained why that happened.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

That tag is unsurprising at a white, male, right-wing blog. Conservative bigots -- the people who generate and consume this blog's conduct -- believe homosexual conduct is criminal conduct.

Mostly because eight-pound, six-ounce sweet tiny infant Christmas baby Jesus told them so. In the clingerverse, cartoon characters call the shots.

Carry on, gullible clingers.

[Frank Drackman]

did you learn that at
https://law.udc.edu/
"Jerry"

Frank