The Future of Faithless Electors and the National Popular Vote Compact: Part Two in a Two-Part Series

VIKRAM DAVID AMAR

In this second of a two-part series of columns about the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in the “faithless elector cases, Illinois Law dean and professor Vikram David Amar describes some good news that we may glean from those cases. Specifically, Amar points out that states have many ways of reducing elector faithlessness, and he lists three ways in which the Court’s decision paves the way for advances in the National Popular Vote (NPV) Interstate Compact movement.

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Impoverishing Women: Supreme Court Upholds Trump Administration’s Religious and Moral Exemptions to Contraceptive Mandate

JOANNA L. GROSSMAN

SMU Dedman School of Law professor Joanna L. Grossman comments on the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision upholding the Trump administration’s religious and moral exemptions to the contraceptive mandate of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Grossman provides a brief history of the conflict over the growing politicization of contraception in the United States and argues that the exemptions at issue in this case should never have been promulgated in the first place because they have no support in science or public policy.

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State v. Wilson

Citation: 2020 S.D. 41

Opinion Date: July 15, 2020

Judge: Salter

Areas of Law: Criminal Law

The Supreme Court affirmed Defendant's conviction of aggravated assault (domestic), simple assault (domestic), interference with emergency communications, and disorderly conduct but remanded with instructions to issue a new judgment removing the domestic designation from Defendant's assault convictions, holding that the court lacked authority to designate the assault conviction as domestic and order payment of the statutory domestic violence fees. Specifically, the Supreme Court held (1) Defendant did not establish plain error through the admission of certain evidence; (2) Defendant did not demonstrate the existence of plain error regarding the prosecutor's closing argument; (3) the circuit court correctly denied Defendant's judgment for acquittal on the assault charges, but the assault convictions should not have been designated as domestic, and the court should not have imposed two $25 domestic violence fees for Defendant's assault convictions; and (4) Defendant did not demonstrate prejudicial error resulting from his absence at a stipulated post-judgment sentence modification meeting.

Leedom v. Leedom

Citation: 2020 S.D. 40

Opinion Date: July 15, 2020

Judge: Jensen

Areas of Law: Family Law

The Supreme Court affirmed the order of the circuit court holding that David Leedom's obligation to pay Cindy Leedom monthly alimony in the amount of $3,000 was continuing until modified by the court, that David pay Cindy the accrued alimony of $87,000, and that David's ongoing alimony obligation was $1,750 per month, holding that the circuit court did not err or abuse its discretion. In 2004, the divorce court ordered David to pay Cindy $3,000 in monthly alimony. In 2017, after he reached the age of social security eligibility, David stopped paying alimony. Cindy filed a motion to restore alimony, alleging that David was obligated to pay lifetime alimony of $3,000 monthly. The circuit court ordered David to pay the accrued alimony of $87,000 to Cindy and reduced David's ongoing alimony obligation to $1,750 per month. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the circuit court did not err by determining that the original alimony award did not terminate upon David reaching the age of social security eligibility; and (2) the circuit court did not abuse its discretion when it modified the terms of the alimony obligation.