Recent News About U.S. Supreme Court
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Last year’s decision in Janus v. AFSCME (2018) is properly seen as a landmark ruling in the area of compelled speech (e.g., here and here), but it is more than that. By overruling Abood v. Detroit Board of Education(1977), the Supreme Court in Janus acknowledged that its extension of private-sector labor law precedents concerning union-security clauses to the public sector was erroneous. I have previously written about “the road to Abood” (here and here), and explained why the Court’s poorly-reasoned decisions under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) should not govern arrangements involving government employees. Justice Alito, who authored Janus and the decisions leading up to it, scathingly dissected the Court’s NLRA precedents, most of which were issued during the heyday of the Warren Court.
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In 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court rendered a unanimous decision in favor of TC Heartland, an Indiana-based company challenging the venue Kraft Foods had chosen for filing a patent infringement lawsuit against it. The ruling limited patent infringement lawsuits to districts where the defendant is incorporated or has an established place of business.
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AUSTIN – Compelling Lone Star attorneys to pay dues to the State Bar of Texas in order to fund “diversity” initiatives and legislative programs violates their First Amendment rights, according to a recently filed lawsuit.
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MARSHALL – Last year alone, a total of eight patent lawsuits were brought against Apple in the Eastern District of Texas – a hotspot for infringement litigation and home to numerous patent trolls.
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Attorney General Ken Paxton today applauded Governor Greg Abbott’s appointment of Brett Busby to the Texas Supreme Court to replace Justice Phil Johnson, who retired at the end of last year.
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That expression is figuratively true when applied to life in general, insofar as we all have to make an effort, accept sacrifices, face setbacks, and overcome obstacles to get ahead in this world.
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PHILADELPHIA – It's curious that a group of lawyers and scholars that traditionally sought to help judges by restating existing laws - but has since been accused of trying to create its own - is involving federal judges as it explains itself, attorneys feel.
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AUSTIN – Another line in the sand has been drawn, as the Texas Public Policy Foundation recently asked Attorney General Ken Paxton to affirm that the use of mandatory State Bar dues for political advocacy is unconstitutional.
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Art Anthony, Partner in Locke Lord’s Dallas office and Co-Chair of the Firm’s Board of Directors, has been selected by the National Bar Association (NBA) as a 2019 recipient of the prestigious Heman M.
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AUSTIN – A former Texas Bar president is asking the current to withdraw an opinion request made to Attorney General Ken Paxton, who has been called upon to determine if 76,000 “senior” lawyers around the state have the right to vote on the election of Texas Young Lawyers Association officials.
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McGinnis Lochridge announced today the growth of the firm’s International Trade and Transactions Practice Group with the addition of Jamie Joiner and Lindsey Roskopf, one of the state’s leading attorney teams focusing on international trade law, including export controls, sanctions, and customs matters.
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I have reminisced at length about my student days at the University of Texas School of Law (here), and also expressed concern about the leftward drift of the Texas Law Review, on whose editorial board I served during 1979-80 (here). Recent events have only heightened my concerns (here). Specifically, on February 7-8, 2019, the TLR is co-hosting (with the left-leaning American Constitution Society) a constitutional law symposium at the law school, entitled “Reclaiming—and Restoring—Constitutional Norms,” that appears to be little more than an anti-Trump political rally. The announcement is here.
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BEAUMONT – Should approximately 76,000, due-paying attorneys have the right to vote on the election of Texas Young Lawyers Association officials – that’s the question State Bar President Joe Longley is asking Attorney General Ken Paxton to answer.
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Littler, the world’s largest employment and labor law practice representing management, has appointed Rob Friedman as office managing shareholder (OMS) of the firm’s Austin, Dallas and Fayetteville offices.
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The 85-year old Ruth Bader Ginsburg, appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court by President Bill Clinton in 1993, is approaching her 25th anniversary as a justice. She is historic in many respects: the second female to serve on the high court, the first Jewish female justice, and the longest-serving Jewish justice ever. Her record as a reliable liberal vote on the court, along with her well-publicized background as a trail-blazer for women’s rights, has made her an icon on the Left—celebrated as the “Notorious RBG” and featured in the recent film “On the Basis of Sex.”
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HOUSTON – A Texas man convicted of misdemeanor assault by contact is still entitled to a license to carry a handgun, the Court of Appeals for the 1st District of Texas determined Nov. 27.
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AUSTIN – Leading a coalition that includes 11 states, Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the U.S. Supreme Court asking the court to review the case of the two Oregon bakers last month.
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WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) - The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments yesterday in a case that could end cy pres, the practice of steering money in class action settlements to organizations with absolutely no connection to the underlying lawsuit.
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On July 5th I wrote that conservatives remembered what the left had done to Judge Robert Bork and believed Judge Brett Kavanaugh would be a just appointment to the seat Bork was denied. The extreme efforts to stop his nomination confirm that the left was determined to prevent that from happening. Of course, at the end of the day the ferocity of the opposition to this appointment illustrates the outsized power the court has assumed in our country. The fear of losing the power of the court as their vanguard, of the gavel being in the hand of others, explains the lefts willingness to “do anything” to defeat the nomination. Indeed, some even suggested Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley was not qualified to lead the committee because he is not a lawyer. The fact is Senator Grassley has as many hours in law school as Senator Feinstein, the ranking minority member.
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AUSTIN – Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton responded on Sept. 24 to a request by Tarrant County’s Criminal District Attorney Sharen Wilson to clarify the legal disclosure obligations of her office under article 39.14 of the Code of Criminal Procedure.
