SCOTUS 2019

Major Decisions and Developments of the US Supreme Court

David Klein, Morgan Marietta, David Klein, Morgan Marietta

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9783030299552
• eBook ISBN: 9783030299569
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Public Law
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Each year, the Supreme Court of the United States announces new rulings with deep consequences for our lives. Thissecond volume in Palgrave's SCOTUS series explains and contextualizes the landmark cases of the US Supreme Court in the term ending 2019. With a close look at cases involving key issues and debates in American politics and society, SCOTUS 2019 tackles the Court's rulings on the census citizenship question, partisan gerrymandering, religious monuments, the death penalty, race in jury selection, double jeopardy, jury trials for reimprisonment during supervised release, Fourth Amendment protection for blood alcohol tests, deference to federal agencies, excessive fines under the Eighth Amendment and more. Written by notable scholars in political science and law, the chapters in SCOTUS 2019 present the details of each ruling, its meaning for constitutional debate, and its impact on public policy or partisan politics. Finally, SCOTUS 2019 offers an analysis of thecontroversialJustice Brett Kavanaugh's first term in office, as well as a big-picture look at the implications of the Court's decisions for the direction of this new Roberts Court.

© The Author(s) 2020

D. Klein, M. Marietta (eds.)SCOTUS 2019https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29956-9_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction: The 2018–2019 Term at the Supreme Court

Morgan Marietta¹

(1)

Department of Political Science, University of Massachusetts Lowell, Lowell, MA, USA

Morgan Marietta

End Abstract

Two hundred and thirty-one years after the signing of the US Constitution in 1787, the Supreme Court addressed its meaning in four key areas during the 2018–2019 term: defendants’ rights, fair elections, separation of powers , and the establishment of religion . Several major cases considered the rights of criminal defendants across a range of issues from jury selection to the death penalty. Two cases addressed election rules and the role of the Court in questions of partisan manipulation. Two cases dealt with how government agencies make influential decisions, grounded in how the Constitution divides powers among branches of the federal government. And the Court re-examined an old controversy about religious symbols in the public square. Each dispute has a strong influence on American life and law. In the following chapters, noted scholars of American law and politics discuss the major decisions of the year, concluding with a discussion of Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s first year and its implications for the future of the Court.

To summarize the year’s major rulings, they

1. 1.
   Allow the death penalty to proceed (under the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of “cruel and unusual punishment”) if the prisoner has a medical condition that causes excessive pain during the execution or does not remember the crime due to mental incapacitation, but not if a mental condition (including dementia) precludes the prisoner from understanding the reason for their execution,
2. 2.
   Allow separate prosecutions by state and federal governments for the same act under the separate sovereigns doctrine without violating the Fifth Amendment prohibition against double jeopardy,
3. 3.
   Allow law enforcement officers to draw a blood alcohol test from an unconscious driver without a warrant (which is not a violation of the Fourth Amendment’s protection against “unreasonable searches and seizures”),
4. 4.
   Apply the Excessive Fines Clause of the Eighth Amendment to actions by state governments (and await further proceedings to determine if civil asset forfeitures of cars or other high-value items are considered excessive),
5. 5.
   Enforce the prohibition against using race to dismiss potential jurors during jury selection (a Batson violation, supported by the Sixth Amendment’s jury right and the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection of the laws),
6. 6.
   Prohibit additional mandatory minimum prison sentences without a jury trial (protected by the Sixth Amendment) for the commission of crimes while on supervised release following a period of incarceration,
7. 7.
   Allow partisan gerrymandering—the practice of shifting the boundaries of electoral districts to advantage the party in power—as a political problem left to the representative branches rather than a question of rights determined by the judicial branch,
8. 8.
   Disallow the Census Bureau from adding a citizenship question to the 2020 census without an accurate justification,
9. 9.
   Continue to allow Congress to delegate policymaking authority to federal agencies without violating the separation of powers or the non-delegation doctrine,
10. 10.
    Continue to defer to federal agencies to determine the meaning of terms employed in their own regulations (known as Auer deference),
11. 11.
    Allow long-standing religious monuments to remain on public land (which is not a violation of the First Amendment’s prohibition of the establishment of religion).

Criminal Law and the Rights of Defendants

Of the ten Amendments that form the Bill of Rights, four address the rights of defendants in criminal prosecutions. This emphasis reflects the Founders’ concerns with a common practice of tyrannical governments: charging enemies of the regime with crimes they did not commit, in order to remove them and intimidate others. This was done by the British crown (and other European royals) in the 1700s just as it is done by the Russian government (among others) today. The same threat applies to individuals and groups that are simply not popular with the majority or with the current elected leaders. For these reasons, Amendments IV, V, VI, and VIII include a wide range of protections against false prosecution. A major theme of this year’s cases is the tension between legitimate aims of law enforcement and necessary protections of individual rights against government overreach.

The Court addressed defendants’ and convicts’ rights regarding the death penalty, double jeopardy, blood alcohol tests, excessive fines, jury selection, and re-imprisonment during supervised release. Given the current Court’s conservative majority (Justices Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Roberts, and Thomas), we might expect a consistent set of law and order outcomes ruling in favor of government prosecutors, with the four liberal Justices (Breyer, Ginsburg, Kagan, and Sotomayor) in dissent supporting the rights of defendants. But the outcomes were much more balanced and mixed.

To start with the most extreme imposition on liberty—the death penalty—the Court upheld the constitutionality of capital punishment when its imposition may cause severe pain, because as Justice Gorsuch phrased it, “the Eighth Amendment does not guarantee a prisoner a painless death.”¹ However, in a different case the Court ruled that a prisoner cannot be executed if he is unable to “rationally understand the reasons for his death sentence,” which may be caused by dementia as well as forms of psychosis already recognized by the Court.² One outcome supported the imposition of the death penalty (5-4 divided by ideology) and the other limited it (with Chief Justice Roberts joining the four liberal Justices). In his discussion of these cases in Chapter 9, Mark Graber describes them as disputes over capital punishment at the margins, accepting the core constitutionality of the practice but not the details of its application. The debates reveal long-term disagreements among the Justices over the purposes as well as the procedures of the death penalty.

In the next two controversies, the Court upheld government prosecutions. Gamble v. U.S. allows for successive prosecutions by both state and federal governments (in Terance Gamble’s case for the illegal possession of a firearm). In Chapter 5, Rory Little explains how seven Justices believe this practice does not violate the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Likewise, Mitchell v. Wisconsin allows an unconscious motorist to be subjected to a blood alcohol test without violating the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. In Chapter 10, Pamela Corley explains the Court’s closely divided 5-4 ruling and its potential ramifications for allowing other searches without a warrant under the exigent circumstances exception.

One of the unresolved questions of the US Constitution was whether the Eighth Amendment’s protections against excessive fines create a restriction against the actions of state governments (in addition to the federal government). In Chapter 12’s discussion of Timbs v. Indiana , Marian Williams explains how that question has been resolved, but still to be decided is its application to the constitutionality of civil forfeiture: Can a state government seize assets like cars or boats used in the commission of crimes, especially when those assets are disproportionately large?

The last two cases clearly uphold the rights of defendants and convicts. In Flowers v. Mississippi , the Court addressed another chapter of the long-standing controversy about the role of race in jury selection. In Chapter 4, Jennifer Bowie discusses how the Batson decision in 1986 outlawed the dismissal of potential jurors on the basis of race. In Flowers, a decisive majority upheld a claim that Batson had been violated in a repeated set of trials characterized by the dismissal of black jurors by the prosecutor without adequate race-neutral justifications. The Court clearly reaffirmed its commitment to the Batson holding, including the types of evidence defendants may use in making a Batson challenge.

The final criminal law case addresses the right to a jury trial during post-conviction proceedings. Supervised release is the term for the period...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Introduction: The 2018–2019 Term at the Supreme Court
• 2. American Legion v. American Humanist on Religious Monuments Under the First Amendment
• 3. Department of Commerce v. New York on the Census Citizenship Question
• 4. Flowers v. Mississippi on Race in Jury Selection
• 5. Gamble v. U.S. on Double Jeopardy
• 6. Gundy v. U.S. on Delegation of Power
• 7. U.S. v. Haymond on Re-imprisonment Without a Jury Trial
• 8. Kisor v. Wilkie on Deference to Federal Agencies
• 9. Madison, Bucklew, Dunn, and Murphy on Capital Punishment at the Margins
• 10. Mitchell v. Wisconsin on Blood Alcohol Tests Under the Fourth Amendment
• 11. Rucho v. Common Cause on Partisan Gerrymandering and the Political Questions Doctrine
• 12. Timbs v. Indiana on Excessive Fines and Civil Forfeitures
• 13. Other Major Cases
• 14. Justice Brett Kavanaugh Joins the Court
• Back Matter