Today in Supreme Court History: November 1, 1961

11/1/1961: Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut opens center in New Haven, CT.

"Specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance." An ''emanation'' refers to a ray of light. During a lunar eclipse, the ''umbra'' refers to the darkest part of the shadow formed when the Earth orbits between the sun and the moon. The ''penumbra'' refers to the lighter part of the shadow, where some of the ''emanations'' from the sun are visible.

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

Graham v. Fulton County Special Purpose Grand Jury, 143 S.Ct. 397 (decided November 1, 2022): According to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, Sen. Linsey Graham leaned on him after the 2020 election to discard some absentee ballots. Does the Speech and Debate Clause (art. I, §6, cl. 1) prohibit questioning of Graham about this in front of a Georgia grand jury investigating Trump’s interference with the election results? The Court’s short order affirms that the Clause applies to Graham’s “informal investigation” (arguably a legislative activity), but does not mention the wider context, which was that Graham could still be questioned about his contacts with the Trump campaign. Graham testified as to those on November 22, 2022, his suit was dismissed as moot by the Eleventh Circuit on December 20, and Trump and eighteen others were indicted on August 14, 2023.

Manila Investment Co. v. Park Trammell, 239 U.S. 31 (decided November 1, 1915): suit alleging breach of trust as to property was mere contract dispute and not Equal Protection violation and so no federal court jurisdiction

Anderson v. Harless, 459 U.S. 4 (decided November 1, 1982): another case holding that you can’t seek habeas in federal court until the issue (here, a faulty jury instruction on how to find malice) has been argued in state court and the appellate process there has been exhausted

Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority v. Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Co. of Virginia, 464 U.S. 30 (decided November 1, 1983): telephone company forced to relocate lines due to street realignment wasn’t “displaced person” entitled to benefits under federal relocation assistance statute; statute did not displace common law rule that public utilities forced to relocate from right-of-way must do so at own expense (we all hated the telephone company, but couldn’t a Fifth Amendment “takings” argument have been made?)

[The Margrave of Azilia]

"telephone company forced to relocate lines due to street realignment wasn’t “displaced person” entitled to benefits under federal relocation assistance statute"

Please tell me the phone company's argument wasn't as stupid as it sounds.

[Magister]

From the Court's opinion:

There is no doubt that a utility company could, under certain circumstances, be a "displaced person" within the meaning of the Relocation Act. Businesses as well as natural persons are eligible for relocation benefits. Thus, for example, if a branch office of C&P were located in a building condemned by the NRHA, C&P might well be entitled to recover the cost of moving its office equipment and furnishings. C&P, just like any other legitimate business, would be "displaced" by the federally funded project.

"Person" in the law includes a business, not just a natural person. But the Court decided that relocation of telephone lines was not covered by the law.

[Frank Drackman]

Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut opens center in New Haven, CT. Millions of dead babies to follow.

[Mr. Bumble]

Shouldn't the real name be Planned Un-Parenthood?

[Martinned]

Do you plan when you go to work or do you plan when you don't go to work?

[Frank Drackman]

I work when I want, that's how we rich peoples be.
But of course because I love my work, and the Shekels that come with it, I probably work more than you, at whatever bullshit legal/IT job you slave away at (love when you ask someone what they do and they can't tell you in a sentence (OK, maybe 2)

Frank "work work work work"

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Another rousing meeting of Libertarians for Statist Womb Management (joint meeting with Libertarians for Big-Government Micromanagement of Ladyparts Clinics), convened at the internet's leading gathering point for disaffected, faux libertarian right-wing culture war casualties.

[Martinned]

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/amendments/amendment-ix/interpretations/131

[Frank Drackman]

I've got an idea!
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people"
Would be a good amendment.

Frank

[Commenter_XY]

The picture, with the accompanying description, was humorous. Nicely done.

[Frank Drackman]

I’m not sure if the fact that the Moon’s orbit is tilted 5 degrees, resulting in the relative rarity of Total Solar Eclipses makes me believe less in Creation by a Surpreme Being, or believe more. Even the Surpremist being would have to get tired creating the Orbits of 9 Planets (Yes, Pluto is a “Planet”) and don’t forget Saturn’s 83 Moons, they all gotta have orbits to. So a 5% tilt?? Not too bad, and for all you Global Warning Idiots who know what the temperature’s gonna be a billion years from now, they can’t predict Total Solar Eclipses for more than a few thousand years, because of the varying rotational speed of the Earth (see Tired Surpreme Being comments above) Once you get more than 5,000 years in the future (like we’ll be here) they can’t even predict what hemisphere the eclipse will be in.

Frank

[defaultdotxbe]

If Pluto is a planet why doesn't Eris get to be a planet?

[Frank Drackman]

Why doesn't who get to be a planet?
I think you see my point.

[defaultdotxbe]

Eris is a trans-Neptunian dwarf planet, the same classification as Pluto, but more massive.

But it seems your point is to just wait until the average person has never heard of Pluto having been a planet and the issue will resolve itself.

[Frank Drackman]

Just busting Spheres, I had never heard of Eris (but I have heard of Eros, weird) Looked at all sorts of stuff with my Dad's Celestron 8 (other kids had Color TV, we had a Celestron 8) Was able to find Neptune once (And yes, I know the "I can see Uranus very clearly tonight" joke) but never Pluto.
Then Dad came back from Veet'nam, we moved from North Dakota to Los Angeles (don't think I saw a single (Astronomical) Star the whole time we lived there) and the Celestron got sold at a yard sale...

Frank

[taqmcg]

Currently the best estimate has Pluto slightly larger than Eris (stellar occultation measurements replacing the HST observations that had Eris a trifle larger). Until a spacecraft visits Eris, we probably won't have a direct mass measurement or a definitive radius. That said, the IAU definition of a planet is clearly at odds with the word's usage generally. First, no extrasolar planet can satisfy the definition. The definition is specifically limited to objects that orbit our Sun but, even if it wasn't, one of the criteria requires that you be able to determine if there are objects in crossing orbits, which is impossible outside the solar system. To say nothing of 'planets' not gravitationally bound to any star. Second, the current definition means that the existing official planets were not always 'planets' for some undefined period of time after they formed. In the early Solar System there were lots of collisions. Only when these collisions declined below some arbitrary and I believe currently undefined level, so that the body could have been said to have cleared its orbit, would the Earth and other 7 be deemed 'planets'.

The IAU definition is tied to an extrinsic, time varying, and difficult to measure characteristic of the body. The cleaner definition would be to have defined anything for which gravity forces sphericity as a planet -- possibly excluding objects which orbit other planets. That would include Ceres, Pluto, Eris and a couple more trans-Neptunian objects (TNO's), with the likelihood of many more discovered in the future.

In our solar system we'd have the small inner planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars and Ceres, the gas giants: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune (some astronomers like to divide split these into two pairs), and the TNOs. Many extrasolar planets will generally fall into the same categories, though because of their small mass and very long periods, it will be a while before we are finding the equivalent of extrasolar TNO's -- though they are likely the most common type of planet.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Having grown up with Pluto as a planet, it took me a while to adjust, but I’m now on board with the new definition. Even Clyde Tombaugh, who discovered Pluto, finally got on board with it, much to everyone's thanks and relief, because he was widely loved among astronomers and downgrading Pluto seemed disrespectful to him.

Planets are quantitatively different than other objects orbiting the sun. They affect the other bodies (and each other) in ways that the other objects don’t, and play a role individually, as opposed to in the aggregate. Think of them as generals of armies, with the other objects being soldiers.

As a practical matter, anyone learning about the solar system can learn the names of the eight planets. Not the names of the 600,000 or so other objects currently identified.

[taqmcg]

Excluding moons, there are only a little over a dozen objects in the Solar System sufficiently massive to force sphericity. The overwhelming majority of minor planets, aka asteroids, and TNO’s are far too small. So there’s no current issue there, though with the advent of the Rubin observatory the number will grow by a factor of two or more.

For me the fatal flaw in the IAU definition of a planet is that it cannot be used outside the Solar System even though the term is used universally in the literature there. A definition that does not cover many if not most current usages of the term is silly, and extrasolar planets are one of the hottest topics in the field.

P.S., in my prior comment I used TNO’s where I meant only the largest trans-Neptunian objects (large enough to force sphericity) while the normal usage is for any object beyond Uranus’ orbit. I probably should have said “large TNO’s” or some such.

P.P.S. Tombaugh died in 1997, while the change in the status of Pluto was done at an IAU meeting in 2006. I don't know of any indication that he was in favor of the change.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Sphericity as a definition would include too many objects to be useful, particularly since some of the sphericals are (by anyone’s terms) moons and not planets. There might be hundreds more out there, beyond Pluto and Eris.

The official change was made in 2006, but for some years before that it was a matter for debate. Tombaugh didn't object to his discovery being downgraded; he said the important thing about Pluto was that “it’s there”.

[taqmcg]

According to Wikipedia's article on Tombaugh:
"Tombaugh's widow Patricia stated after the IAU's decision that while he might have been disappointed with the change since he had resisted attempts to remove Pluto's planetary status in his lifetime, he would have accepted the decision now if he were alive. She noted that he "was a scientist."
This seems to contradict your statement that Tombaugh accepted the change but perhaps you have another source or perhaps you have confused the family belief with his.

It's generally not a problem to exclude moons since they are readily identified -- though from the planetary scientists point of view, many moons are treated as planets (i.e., they have the geologic processes associated with planets). As to the multiplicity issue: we now have thousands of objects which we call planets, some of which may not have cleared their orbits and some of which don't even have orbits (except around the Galaxy). But according to the IAU they are not planets.

[Dan Schiavetta]

It is a typically juvenile attempt to make fun of women’s right to what they do with their bodies. If pressed to be serious I don’t think Josh would really agree that the state has the right to ban contraceptives. In fact we all agree with Douglas that the Constitution protects a right to privacy. If a law impacted men's bodies instead of women's, you can be sure that we would hear an "emanations" style objection from Josh.

Most conservatives in fact believe in emanations, particularly in respect to the gun “right” in the Second Amendment, the Free Exercise Clause, and the Takings Clause.

[Commenter_XY]

captcrisis, of the many ways we can disagree, is there anything objectionable in the picture. Is it uncivil?

[Dan Schiavetta]

It implies (rather broadly) that Douglas imported out of context words to justify an otherwise unjustifiable result. But the words are entirely fitting (see my comment below) and the result indisputably justifiable.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

I don’t know about Blackman (who knows what he will say) but enforcing the privileges and immunities of U. S. citizens (Amd. 14(1)) or the reserved rights of the people (9A) doesn’t mean making things up as one goes along. Enforcing recognized, long-established American rights isn’t the same as pulling rights out of one’s hat.

The following have stood the test of time and been recognized as American rights.

-For injuries to person, property or reputation there’s a right to judicial redress

-There’s a right to conduct an honest business subject to bona fide restrictions for the common good

-right to bail in noncapital cases (recognized by all but 2 states admitted to the union since 1789)

-No dividing up confiscated property before it’s actually been confiscated (English Bill of Rights)

-etc.

I haven't come across a right to party in my admittedly non-comprehensive survey.

I don't think this has anything to do with emanations or penumbras or any of that astral plane stuff.

[Dan Schiavetta]

Neither you nor Josh appear to know that the word “penumbra” was used in non-astronomical contexts for years before Griswold. It means “half-shadow”. He probably would have the same reaction if someone talked about, say, Bowers v. Hardwick being “eclipsed” (another old word). (In a previous post, he seemed to think the word “suasion” was a new word.) And of course “emanations” is a word that developed outside astronomy.

As to the right to contraceptives being something "pulled out of a hat", most women would say that risking pregnancy every time they have intercourse is hardly something the law requires them to put up with.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

I don’t think the Shirley-Maclainesque reference to “penumbras and emanations” had been used before (and probably not very often since then).

You keep referring to contraception as if it only impacts women. Both men and women – many of them – want it, and they’re politically powerful enough to get it without having to meddle with the Constitution. Indeed, the country is peddling contraception to foreign brown people, which goes *beyond* what Griswold requires.

[Magister]

In combination with "emanations", probably not.. But penumbra had much earlier uses than the Griswold opinion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penumbra_(law)

Women have health risks in pregnancy that men do not; I don't see that captcrisis is asserting that only women are impacted, though.

[Krayt]

I'm fine with new rights that would not have been considered so back in the day. This is in keeping with the principle of people having rights, and government no power over them unless explicitely granted such by the people.

I am not fine with changing attitudes giving government new powers that would have been laughed out of the room back in the day, sans amendment. If the power hungry wish to wield new power, they can convince The People who, if they find it wise, will approve the amendment. This is not a job for judges to do.

[arch1]

The diagram’s sloppiness needlessly muddles the reader’s understanding of the analogized-to concept. I’m not grousing at the distance/diameter distortions - those are needed for illustrative clarity.

But a reader who actually thinks through the definition of penumbra here realizes that each line should be tangent to Earth & Sun - and is greeted with a diagram that manages to to botch that eight times out of eight.

[Dan Schiavetta]

A google search of this image indicates that this diagram was created by Josh. Similar images, from various science sources, correctly depict the tangents and areas of shadow, though as you point out are foreshortened for clarity.

Perhaps I'm being pedantic, but Josh's image also leaves out the antumbra. I suppose that's for rights in the Constitution which are actually smaller than what the text says.

[arch1]

I don’t fault Josh for not mentioning the antumbra (the points from which an observer would see an annular eclipse), as it is just a subset of the penumbra (the set of points from which an observer would see a partial eclipse), and AFAIK Josh’s legal point doesn’t involve anything analogous to the annular/partial distinction.

Or maybe I’m wrong, in which case Josh can coin a new legal concept, with a hat tip to you:-)

[Nameless But Highly Opinionated]

Correct:

Umbra too big.
Penumbra too small.
Trump too... never mind.

[John F. Carr]

(posted in wrong thread)

[Frank Drackman]

Somebody has to, and your (late) Pimps Floyd George, Rodney King, Michael Brown were Embryos before they grew up to be a neer’do-well (an Adjective that deserves a rebirth) criminals. Heck, even Barry Hussein Osama was conceived (Immaculately) and an Embryo (Imagine a World where Ann Dunham used a Diaphragm)

Frank

[windycityattorney]

IL legislature just abolished cash bail in all cases. There was a big ol' fight about it. But the IL SUP CT said it was legal so here we are.

Curiously, the right to bail or sureties was enshrined in our state constitution but the IL SUP CT did some sophistry and deduced that posting bail don't always mean money so ya..

People are still being detained pre-trial and the exaggerations of lawlessness and anarchy have not been fulfilled. Some lower level offenders are sitting in jail now instead of posting $500 or whatever they would have had to post before the new law took effect.

[Dan Schiavetta]

That constitutional right was in the antumbra (see below).

[John F. Carr]

For a year one of the best paid employees in the city where I used to live was a senior member of the school system's custodial staff. High hourly rate plus maximum overtime. More often police officers grab the top spots.