The U.S. Supreme Court kicked off its 2012-13 term on Monday with an upcoming docket that, while perhaps not containing the high stakes legal fireworks that marked the end of the 2011-12 term, has a number of interesting cases set for the coming months.
In its first case of the new term, the Court heard oral arguments in Kiobel v. Dutch Petroleum, which deals with whether parties — including corporations — can be sued under Federal law for human rights violations on either U.S. or foreign soil. Kiobel was originally argued last term, but it was relisted in order to address broader issues surrounding the Federal law in question, the Alien Tort Statute.
While Kiobel presents some thought-provoking questions about corporate responsibility and the ability of U.S. Courts to render judgment on actions that take place wholly on foreign soil, Fisher v. University of Texas will garner most of the attention in the early weeks of the Court. In Fisher, which will be argued on October 10 (and will be the subject of the November issue of Supreme Court Debates), the Court once again wades in to the politically charged realm of affirmative action in education, as it decides whether including race as a factor in determining undergraduate admissions violates the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
When the Court (and Supreme Court Debates) last visited this topic, it was in 2003’s Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger. In Grutter, the Court upheld by a 5-to-4 vote the University of Michigan Law School’s use of race as one factor among many when determining admissions. In Gratz, the Court struck down by a 6-to-3 vote the Michigan undergraduate program’s use of a race as part of a point-based admissions system.
Grutter and Gratz were decided by a differently constituted Court, however — one in which moderate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, who wrote the opinion upholding the Michigan Law School’s policy, often held sway. Now, O’Connor is gone, and a more conservative court could rule the University of Texas’s consideration of race to be unconstitutional.
Another civil-rights related case that’s generating attention is Shelby County v. Holder, a constitutional challenge to Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which requires certain States with a history of voting rights discrimination to receive Federal preclearance for any changes to its voting procedures and policies. The topic had come up two years ago, in Northwest Austin Municipal Water District No. 1 v. Holder, in which the Court by an 8-to-1 vote declined to strike down Section 5 but held that the Federal government should be able to grant “bailouts” that free individual “political subdivisions” from the preclearance requirements. Now, however, the Court is considering the constitutionality of Section 5 head-on.
Just added to the docket last week, and not yet scheduled for argument, is another case that is likely to stir debate. In Missouri v. McNeely, the Court will consider whether police can take a blood sample of a suspected drunk driver without first obtaining a warrant.
The Court is sure to add more noteworthy and potentially high-profile cases to the docket in the coming months. Still on the horizon, for instance, are challenges to the Federal Defense of Marriage Act and California’s Proposition 8, which prohibited State recognition of gay marriages.
As always, Supreme Court Debates will keep track of the current crop of important cases, and any new ones that emerge, over the course of the new term.
