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Monday, June 07, 2010

Courts - Monday's orders, explained by Lyle Denniston

In a lengthy and valuable new post, Denniston, of SCOTUSblog, writes that today the Supreme Court:

has put off, until after getting some advice from a state court, a significant test case on the constitutionality of requiring a juvenile to register as a sex offender, if the youth’s crime occurred before the federal law was passed in 2006. That question was before the Court in U.S. v. Juvenile Male (09-940), but the Court indicated Monday that it was not sure that the case remained a live controversy. After it hears from the Montana Supreme Court on that issue, it will decide whether to take the case for review, the Court indicated.
Furthermore:
the Court turned aside the first case to reach it challenging the legality of the federal mandates put on state governments and local school systems by the No Child Left Behind Act, an educational reform measure that was a signature program of the Bush Administration, and continues to have the support of the Obama Administration. Eight school districts, nine states and one city’s teachers unions, and the National Education Association argued in this first appeal that the 2001 law cannot legally impose requirements on local school districts, unless Congress puts up sufficient funds to cover the full costs of carrying out those mandates, which it has not done.

The dispute reached the Court in Pontiac School District, et al., v. Duncan (Education Secretary), 09-852. The Court, accepting the suggestion of the Obama Administration, declined to review the case, following its usual practice of providing no reason for doing so. The Administration had said the case was not a suitable one to test the funding issue, saying the challengers had sued rather than trying first to get changes in their own state programs under the Act, and that they had no support in their challenge by official state education agencies under whose plans they are obliged to satisfy the federal mandates. Moreover, the government brief said, no other federal court has ruled on the compliance issue. The Sixth Circuit Court had split 8-8 in refusing en banc review, thus leaving intact a federal District judge’s ruling rejecting the challenge.

Finally:
The Justices on Monday also refused to hear an issue that they had agreed once before to decide, only to have the issue elude review. The question in the new case, Jones v. Williams (09-948), was whether it violates a criminal suspect’s Sixth Amendment right to counsel if a defense lawyer has refused to accept a pre-trial plea bargain, and the suspect then goes to trial and gets convicted, receiving a longer sentence than offered by prosecutors in the bargain.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on June 7, 2010 12:35 PM
Posted to Courts in general