The U.S. Supreme Court has turned into something like the most popular girl in high school, with over a dozen states jostling to invite it to the legal equivalent of senior prom in a few weeks.
September 29 is the big date when the Justices return from their summer vacation, which we assume they spent backpacking around Europe and staying at hostels in an attempt to “discover themselves.” They’ll be meeting in a closed session to look at some of the petitions before them, and decide which ones they want to take.
Or they might not. They could always decide to put off the decision until later. That would be particularly likely if there’s a decision in the Ninth or Sixth Circuits between now and the end of the month. A whole bunch of cases are awaiting a decision right now, and the Justices might decide to wait until petitions from those cases show up. (Or they might not. They are capricious, like cats.)
Also this week, we have some delightful news about Stuart Delery, one of the unsung heroes of the marriage equality movement who just got a well-deserved raise. While you were getting all worked up about whether Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie should get married, Stuart was leading all the hard work at the Department of Justice to overturn DOMA. For years, he’s been the DOJ’s champion for marriage equality, and with last week’s raise, he’s now the highest-ranking out government lawyer in American history. Somebody please throw a parade so we can make him grand marshall of it.
How about we take this to the next level?
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lkeels
Apparently, you left out a paragraph between 2 and 3, because the transition doesn’t make any sense…”or they might not”?
mcflyer54
That’s scary because it made perfect sense to me. Or maybe I’ve finally learned to read between the lines.
DonW
@mcflyer54: Made sense to me too. I read it as “they might not decide.”
Xzamilio
@lkeels: He didn’t. Some writers mold their own speaking dialogue with the way they write. “Or they might not” is the follow up sentence to the last one discussing if the Justices will take up any cases regarding same sex couples marrying.
Elloreigh
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has made statements recently that would seem to indicate the Court may wait to take action until there is a ruling from one of the lower appeals court that differs from the others by upholding the bans, creating a clear conflict in the interpretation of law that the Supreme Court would need to settle with some urgency. She said to watch for the decision pending from the 6th Circuit (which covers my state). So long as all the appeals courts keep issuing rulings that agree with each other by striking the bans, it seems the Supreme Court will be in no rush to take up a case.