Yes, Justice Thomas, as usual, said that Congress doesn't have unlimited power, it is supposed to confine itself to the enumerated powers granted to it in the Constitution. There is no power to regulate the adoption of Indian children in Article 1, therefor the act exceeds the powers granted to Congress and is unconstitutional. A very cogent argument indeed.
Gorsuch continues to help Native Americans, but the usual justices rule against the Navajo Nation... Supreme Court rules against Navajo Nation in legal fight over water rights https://www.cbsnews.com/news/supreme-court-navajo-nation-water-rights-colorado-river/
it sounded to me like the Court is (once again) putting responsibility back into the hands of Congress where it belongs
https://reason.com/volokh/2023/06/2...s-as-the-supreme-court-hits-the-home-stretch/ 37 minutes ago Predicting Case Authors and Outcomes as the Supreme Court Hits the Home Stretch by Jonathan H. Adler 6.25.2023 11:22 AM This term the Supreme Court was extraordinarily slow to issue opinions, but they have been catching up. As of today, there are only ten argued cases yet to be decided, so it seems likely the Court will finish its October Term 2022 business this week. As Yogi Berra warned, it's tough to make predictions, expecially about the future. Nonetheless, here I offer a few likely-worthless predictions about which justices will write the remaining opinions, and how those cases might come out. To set the table, consider the following. The term heard fewer cases than normal, and has resulved fewer than fifty cases thus far. Justice Kavanaugh leads the pack with seven majority opinions to date. I think that's it for him. Ditto Justices Barrett, Jackson and Thomas, who have each authored six. Justice Gorsuch, Kagan, and Sotomayor have each authored five opinions, so it is reasonable to assume they were each assigned at least one more. Justice Alito and Chief Justice Roberts have each authored only three opinions, so we would expect each of them to have multiple additional opinions. Now the cases, in the order in which they were argued. Harvard/UNC Affirmative Action Cases—Chief Justice Roberts writes, holding both schools' use of race unlawful. The conservative justices splinter on how far to go limiting the use of race in college admissions, as not all are willing to eliminate the consideration of race or pursuit of racial diversity all together. If these cases produce two separate opinions, Justice Thomas may have one of them. Mallory v. Norfolk Southern – Justice Alito writes, limiting the ability of states to require consent to jurisdiction as a condition for doing business in the state. 303 Creative v. Elenis – Justice Gorsuch writes, concluding the state cannot compel a web designer to make websites contrary to their deeply held beliefs. Moore v. Harper – Chief Justice Roberts writes (perhaps as "per curiam") concluding that the case is moot and that grant of certiorari divested state courts of jurisdiction. Student Loan Cases—Chief Justice Roberts writes, finding Missouri has standing and the program is unlawful. (Unlike some, I see very little in the Texas immigration case that undermines the case for standing in this case.) Abitron Austria GmbH v. Hetronic International – Justice Sotomayor writes. I have no idea what the outcome might be as I know very little about the applicability of the Lanham Act. Heck, I barely understand the issues in this case (let alone why it's taken so long for a decision here to issue). Groff v. DeJoy – Justice Alito writes, siding with the employee who sought religious accommodation. Counterman v. Colorado – Justice Kagan writes, rejecting the objective "reasonable person" standard for determining what is a "true threat" and remanding back to the Colorado courts. If my predictions are correct, I will tweet and blog repeatedly about how this demonstrates my keen insight about the Court. In the (more likely) event that many of these predictions are gobsmacklingly wrong, I will delete this post and hope that people do not use the Wayback Machine to find it.
interesting assessment Justice Kavanaugh's Arrested Development U.S. v. Texas, Linda v. Richard, and Brett v. Amy. https://reason.com/volokh/2023/06/26/justice-kavanaughs-arrested-development/ excerpt: Last week, Justice Kavanaugh wrote four opinions of exceedingly short length. Arizona v. Navajo Nations was thirteen pages, Pugin v. Garland was ten pages, Coinbase, Inc. v. Bielski was ten pages, and United States v. Texas was fourteen pages. I am generally a fan of short opinions. Brevity is the sole of wit, after all. But Justice Kavanaugh's opinions are not short and witty. Rather, he consistently presents a very narrow conception of the facts, and then quietly modifies precedent to fit those sterilized facts. I've already written about Kavanaugh's anemic opinion in Navajo Nations. I don't have time to write about Pugin and Coinbase, but you should skim the dissents, which I found more persuasive than I expected. (Just CTRL-F the word "majority"). Here, I will discuss Justice Kavanaugh's majority opinion in United States v. Texas–in particular, what he included and what he excluded. The majority opinion turns almost entirely on Linda R.S. v. Richard D. (1973). The facts of that case are unusual. At the time, Texas law apparently obligated prosecutors to bring charges against married fathers who did not pay child support. But the law did not require prosecutors to bring charges against unmarried fathers who failed to pay child support. The mother of an illegitimate child filed a suit that would have compelled prosecutors to charge these deadbeat dads. You'll be forgiven if you missed Linda R.S. The Solicitor General's brief devoted about two paragraphs to the case, and Texas's brief devoted about two sentences to the Marshall decision. But that decision included a very useful sentence: "A citizen lacks standing to contest the policies of the prosecuting authority when he himself is neither prosecuted nor threatened with prosecution." And, as Justice Kavanaugh sees it, that is exactly the relief Texas sought: "The States essentially want the Federal Judiciary to order the Executive Branch to alter its arrest policy so as to make more arrests." Therefore, the Court held, the plaintiffs do not assert a judicially cognizable injury-in-fact. Justice Barrett's concurrence demonstrates that Justice Kavanaugh misread Linda R.S. That case concerned what Lujan described as the redressability prong. The Court indeed found that the plaintiff had suffered an injury, but concluded that the Court could not issue a remedy that would redress the injury. Specifically, ordering the prosecutor to bring charges against the deadbeat dad would not necessarily compel him to pay child support. (Indeed, an incarcerated father seems less likely to pay child support.) The relationship between injury and redressability often blurs together–the ability for the court to order some remedy that redresses an injury often turns on what the asserted injury is. But it is possible to have an injury, even if the court cannot issue an order that would redress that injury. I noted earlier that Justices Gorsuch, Thomas, and Barrett concluded that a statute prohibited the issuance of an injunction in this case–thus the states suffered an injury that the courts could not redress. *** After five years on the Court, Justice Kavanaugh continues to confound me. I know he is more capable than the work-product he produces. Just this past week, he wrote four super-short opinions, which cut corners on law and fact, and failed to respond to pointed concurrences/dissents. Justice Kavanaugh was a well-regarded circuit justice for more than a decade. He routinely prepared intricate and careful decisions about the most arcane topics. But on the Supreme Court, his breezy approach to judging leaves so much to be desired. What happened? To use a theme from the case, his development was arrested. I'm about to write a sentence I never thought I would write: Justice Jackson's opinions this term have displayed more analytical rigor than Justice Kavanaugh's. Seriously, read her dissent in Coinbase v. Bielski, and tell me you were not persuaded–at least Justice Thomas was. At this point, Justice Kavanaugh is probably done with majority opinions for this term, so at most we'll get a few frustrating concurring opinions. I hope next term brings an improvement. more at the link
I admit I’m surprised by some of these rulings as they don’t completely fit the ideological Make up of the court. I’m wondering if Roberts is asserting more pressure on some of the newer members to be less ideological given recent criticisms of the court.
Perhaps. It’s also possible they are releasing a few lesser rulings then laying out the hammer with a big ruling (eg protecting trump)
No such thing as ISL per the court. But, of course, Thomas voted to nuke the power of the courts across the country.
