Today in Supreme Court History: January 22, 1890

1/22/1890: Hans v. State of Louisiana argued.

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (decided January 22, 1973): balancing interests of the state vs. privacy interest of mother, invalidates Texas’s near-absolute ban on abortion (only exception was to save life of mother) and holds that Due Process prohibits state interference during first trimester; during second trimester the state may regulate abortion “in ways that are reasonably related to maternal health”; and during third trimester may forbid it except to save life of mother (reformulated by Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 1990; overruled by Dobbs, 2022)

Nostrand v. Little, 368 U.S. 436 (decided January 22, 1962): Court dismisses appeal for lack of a federal question, but as we learn from Douglas’s dissent (joined by Black), the statute in question required teachers to swear an oath that s/he is not a “subversive person”, defined as one who “advocates” the “destruction or alteration of the constitutional form of government of the United States”, which sure seems to me to present a federal issue; the Washington Supreme Court had held only that a teacher was entitled to a hearing on the question; as Douglas points out, this is not the same as declaratory relief because the teacher can get a hearing only if they refuse to take the oath and Constitutional issues would not be fully argued there

Hall v. Geiger-Jones Co., 242 U.S. 539 (decided January 22, 1917): upholding against Equal Protection and Dormant Commerce Clause attack state “blue sky” laws (which prohibit selling of fake securities — i.e., backed by nothing but “blue sky”) requiring brokers to be licensed

Louisville & Nashville R.R. Co. v. F.W. Cook Brewing Co., 223 U.S. 70 (decided January 22, 1912): Kentucky can prohibit intrastate shipments of liquor to counties that have voted to be “dry”, but to prohibit interstate shipments to such places violates Dormant Commerce Clause

Helsinn Healthcare S.A. v. Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc., 586 U.S. — (decided January 22, 2019): one-year deadline to apply for patent after sale of product applies even though the sale was to a distributor under a confidentiality agreement; America Invents Act of 2011 did not change prior rule (product was a drug to control chemotherapy-induced nausea; “patentee” was suing maker of generic version)

[defaultdotxbe]

Would Louisville & Nashville R.R. Co. v. F.W. Cook Brewing Co be overruled by Section 2 of the 21st Amendment?

Section 2. The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited.

[Dan Schiavetta]

I don’t think it had an effect.

The problem was Kentucky regulating interstate commerce by telling other states who they could and could not ship liquor to. A distributor in Newport, R.I., for example, could ship rum to Perry County (wet) but not to adjacent Leslie County (dry).

[Dan Schiavetta]

P.S. Also the result would not be different if (for some reason) it was something else (non-alcoholic) that Kentucky did not want shipped to certain counties.

[ReaderY]

That was precisely one of its intended effects. The 21st Amendment was intended to partially repeal the federal government’s ability to control state alcohol matters by prohibiting INTERSTATE shipping of alcohol in violation of STATE alcohol laws. It was intended among other things to repeal the dormant commerce clause as applied to alcohol.

[defaultdotxbe]

That was my reading of it well. The import of intoxicating liquors into Kentucky in violation of Kentucky law (e.g. being imported into a dry county) is prohibited.

But I'm not a lawyer and almost all of my understanding of law comes from interactions on this blog so I thought I'd ask.

[Syd Henderson]

Strange to have a case argued taking precedence over Roe v. Wade.

That said, I have to agree with the decision in Hans v. Louisiana. I have a problem with the later Alden v. Maine, which also forbid suing a state in state courts by a state resident without the state's consent. However, it looks like the Supreme Court decided it was out of its jurisdiction.

[Magister]

Hans v. Louisiana was decided on March 3; Blackman's post last year on that date was about Schenk v. United States (per captcrisis, "upholding Espionage Act conviction for mailing young men leaflets encouraging them protest the draft (during World War I)", although Blackman has it decided in 2019 rather than 1919). Blackman also doesn't mention Dobbs on June 24th because he never updates these posts, even when there are glaring errors. Sadly, important cases step on each other and then we get obscure birthdays on other days.

[SMP0328]

The obvious solution is to refer to both decisions. Just look at how captcrisis refers to multiple decisions. Why doesn't Josh do that?

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Because they are from his and Barnett's book of "100 cases" or something? Not sure and not interested enough to chase it down.

[SMP0328]

Now I get it. Roe v. Wade has been overruled, so it's not in Josh's casebook anymore. That's why he didn't refer to it today. Dobbs knocked Roe out of the Top 100.

Josh and Randy claim their casebook is about Supreme Court decisions "everyone should know." Roe v. Wade is essential to understanding Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization and so should be included in a list of SCOTUS decisions people should know, even though it's no longer good law.

[Dan Schiavetta]

I don’t Josh has ever listed Roe. He didn’t on this day in 2022, which was before Dobbs came down.

[SMP0328]

Same for 2020 and 2021. So Josh and Randy never considered Roe v. Wade to be in the top “100 Supreme Court Cases Everyone Should Know.” I’m sure most people would agree with me in thinking that makes no sense.

[defaultdotxbe]

He has it on Oct 11 (the date it was argued)

https://reason.com/volokh/2023/10/11/today-in-supreme-court-history-october-11-1972-5/

[Syd Henderson]

I guess it gets difficult to discuss cases when several decisions may be decided on the same date, So it is one of the top 100.