Today in Supreme Court History: April 27, 1822

4/27/1822: President Ulysses S. Grant's birthday. He would appoint four Justices to the Supreme Court: Chief Justice Waite, Justice Strong, Justice Bradley, and Justice Hunt.

President Grant's appointees

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, 563 U.S. 333 (decided April 27, 2011): Federal Arbitration Act preempts California common law rule against arbitration clauses in consumer contracts (dismissing suit by customers alleging that cell phone “giveaway” was fraudulent because sales tax added to bill)

United States v. Sun-Diamond Growers of California, 526 U.S. 398 (decided April 27, 1999): Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy was one of the only two people in the much-investigated Clinton Administration who actually got indicted (the other was Henry Cisneros). The indictment was for receiving improper gifts (for which he was acquitted). In a probably related case, a lobbyist was charged with giving him $5,900 in “gratuities” (food, hotel rooms, tickets to sports events, etc.). Court holds that the gratuities statute (18 U.S.C. §201(c)(1)(A)) does not apply because there is no showing of what Espy did in return for the gifts (how often can such a showing really be made?).

Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc., 590 U.S. — (decided April 27, 2020): not a copyright infringement to reprint official annotated code (well, duh! hard to believe Georgia sued over this — the Court says the fact that the code contains annotations makes this case “different” but for a lot of states the official code is an annotated one)

City of Chicago v. Fieldcrest Dairies, 316 U.S. 168 (decided April 27, 1942): whether a city ordinance Constitutionally conflicts with state law (here, over whether milk can be sold in paper containers) should be decided by state courts even though technically federal court has jurisdiction

Montana v. Hall, 481 U.S. 400 (decided April 27, 1987): no Double Jeopardy problem with trying defendant for more specific offense (incest) after first prosecution (for general sexual assault) was dismissed before trial as overly broad

U.S. Trust Co. of New York v. New Jersey, 431 U.S. 1 (decided April 27, 1977): Contracts Clause (as to Port Authority’s contracts with bondholders) was violated by New Jersey – New York agreement retroactively changing funding mechanism (Robert Moses held king-like power over large sections of New York State because the Contracts Clause kept governors and mayors from interfering with his arrangements with bondholders of his numerous “public authorities”; this ended with Gov. Rockefeller (whose brother David’s bank, Chase, held most of the bonds and dropped all objections)

Hampton v. United States, 425 U.S. 484 (decided April 27, 1976): informant gave defendant heroin which he then sold to undercover police officer; no entrapment because defendant was predisposed to commit crime (he had already offered to buy some for another informant who had heroin tracks on his arm)

Tooahnippah v. Hickel, 397 U.S. 598 (decided April 27, 1970): will by Native American disposing of allotted land can’t be invalidated by Secretary of the Interior (who has to approve it, 25 U.S.C. §373) so long as it’s rational (doesn’t matter if it seems inequitable)

Harman v. Forssenius, 380 U.S. 528 (decided April 27, 1965): Twenty-Fourth Amendment (invalidating poll taxes for federal elections) violated by Virginia statute requiring either paying poll tax or supplying certificate of residence

Giles v. Harris, 189 U.S. 475 (decided April 27, 1903): Court can’t order state to register black persons prohibited by “grandfather clause” from being registered (this decision was in effect later overruled)

[John F. Carr]

The intermediate appeals court of Massachusetts has banned the expression "grandfather clause" due to its unsound etymology.

[Dan Schiavetta]

That is strange. Most people would not connect the phrase “grandfather clause” with Jim Crow.

[Michael P]

Why not? Is there some other origin of the phrase?

[Dan Schiavetta]

Most people, when they hear that something was “grandfathered in”, understand it to mean . . . well look at the dictionary definition. Most understand it in the general sense, not the specific, historical, legal sense. It’s a useful phrase, and it’s hard to think of a substitute, unless one is artificially created, which is awkward and (to my mind) unnecessary.

There’s something strange about what is being done in Massachusetts that I have seen in some sense elsewhere. Phrases we use today being looked at in the slavery or Jim Crow era sense. This reminds me, some years back, of an article in the Atlantic Monthly about alternatives for the word “hysterical”, presupposing that it’s always used in the old medical, misogynist sense. In fact it’s been used in a general sense for years now, detached from the uterus. “Hysterical” behavior is just as readily ascribed to men as to women. Garry Wills, in his 1988 article on the Underground Railroad, referred to the months leading up to Secession as a “period of hysteria”, and we all understood what he meant. Again, it’s hard to think of a substitute.

When I was in law school, the name “Picnic Day”, an annual tradition in April, was changed because someone dug up a story about “picking n*****s” and said that was the original derivation of the word. I mean, What's the point??

I’m also reminded of the saying, “The censor has the dirtiest mind.” He will detect sexual double meanings in ordinary words that the rest of us would never suspect. Of course, once he’s rubbed our faces in it, the word is ruined. I see no advance in this.

There must be a word for the above tendency.

[David Nieporent]

At least the argument about the origin of the phrase "grandfather clause" is correct. The "picnic" one, like many of the other p.c. arguments of this nature, is not. (Nor is "master bedroom" a slave-related term.)

[Bored Lawyer]

And how about "master cylinder." Another symbol of white supremacy!

[Dan Schiavetta]

Actually the other cylinders are called "slave cylinders". At least they were in the 1980's when I was a mechanic.

[Magister]

"Legacy" would seem to be an appropriate word for things grandfathered.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Too general a term. “Legacy” does not denote something that is currently not permitted.

[Frank Drackman]

I learned it in Highschool History (OK, in Alabama) but then again "Most People" are idiots.

Frank "Wait till you find out what "Cock Fighting" is

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

A Noble Prize for achievement in identifying error in Today in Supreme Court History has been awarded to (and earned by) Max.

Celebrating Max's achievement ("Isn't that only 4"), commenters observed:

So who was this mysterious fifth Justice? Wikipedia doesn’t have a fifth Grant appointment listed – they only list four – so the cover-up must be really deep. Was the fifth justice spotted on the grassy knoll? Has anyone seen his long-form birth certificate?

i don’t know why Barnett and Blackman keep parading such incompetence. Hasn’t anyone pointed what a laughingstock this series has become? They must not care.

These guys suggest this stuff be used in schools?

Now the post is down to saying four. The cover-up continues!

No indication of the revision. Shabby form.

At least it shows someone is checking up on these errors. (At last.)

Another installment of Today in Supreme Court History: 100 Cases Professors Barnett and Blackman Really Need to Bone Up On!

[Syd Henderson]

The fifth is Edwin Stanton, who was approved by the Senate but died before he took office.

[Estragon]

“The justice of the cause which in the end prevailed, will, I doubt not, come to be acknowledged by every citizen of the land, in time. For the present, and so long as there are living witnesses of the great war of sections, there will be people who will not be consoled for the loss of a cause which they believed to be holy. As time passes, people, even of the South, will begin to wonder how it was possible that their ancestors ever fought for or justified institutions which acknowledged the right of property in man.”

Amazingly, we’re still not there yet

[Frank Drackman]

Might sound strange, but even as a Southerner, I like Grant,
partly the name, how can you not like "US"?? The Cigar, The Beard, that he wasn't a career Military Officer (Resigned as a Captain with 11 years in) Probably the best POTUS for Jews until Richard Milhouse,
I liked Lincoln too,

Frank "It's complicated"

[Hugo S. Cunningham]

Grant was the last President to oversee a change in the Supreme Court's size (to nine). The Judicial Circuits Act (1866) reduced the Court's authorized size to 7, meaning that far-Right President Andrew Johnson would not be able to appoint any justices in the mold of Roger Taney. As Grant became President in 1869, a Republican Congress restored SCotUS to a full nine members (Judiciary Act of 1869).
(2) Some on the Left say changing the size of the Court is no big deal because it has been done before. But the last time was 150 years ago in a time of civil war, hardly a reassuring precedent.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Twain arranged publication of the memoirs but didn’t help write them.

[Estragon]

Let me guess— you’re a jubal early guy

[Frank Drackman]

Well that's the problem, War is butchery, so do it right, now we have light in the loafer Homo Generals wearing Rainbow armbands. And been awhile since I studied the Grant Presidency, but did he have a crack addict son taking bribes from China? Did he start any stupid foreign wars? Did he fuck up the entire Medical system?

Frank

[Hugo S. Cunningham]

Many of the same people who excoriate Grant (properly) for Cold Harbor give Lee a pass for Pickett's Charge, an equally senseless slaughter.
(2) Although McClellan (Antietam) and Meade (Gettysburg) each won a defensive battle against Lee, Grant was the only general able to maintain an offensive against Lee, keeping him pinned down and unable to help other generals.
(3) President Grant's associates were corrupt, but so were his political opponents at that time, marked by rapidly expanding government responsibilities and instability. Similarly, mixed-race "carpetbagger" governments in the South tended to be corrupt, but no more so than their lily-white successors. The carpetbaggers, at least, set up universal public education, something unheard of in the antebellum South.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Does even a single professor who still writes for this blog ever consider why (1) the Volokh Conspiracy attracts such a striking concentration of reprehensible, downscale bigots or (2) why any halfway decent person would continue to associate with this blog.

Just one of you? For just a few seconds, maybe?

I sense not.

Carry on, clingers. Without the respect of better Americans.

[Frank Drackman]

"Reprehensible, downscale bigots"??
Well Jerry, you're the all-time Most Reprehensible/Down-est Scale Bigot of them all, and claim to be a "Reverend" to boot (To bad Reverends don't enforce that "Stolen Valor" thang like Veterans do)
Although with such "Reverends" as Jim Jones, Louie Chaka-Farra-Khan, Al Sharpton, maybe you really are a "Reverend"
pretty sure the Priesthood better fits your "Proclivities"

Frank "NOT a Reverend"

[David Nieporent]

You flatter yourself to describe yourself as "halfway decent."