What Should Democrats Do About Republicans’ Insistence on Lining Their Own Pockets With the Stimulus Plan?

NEIL H. BUCHANAN

UF Levin College of Law professor and economist Neil H. Buchanan discusses the ongoing negotiations in Congress over the stimulus bill that would purportedly start to address the present economic crisis. Buchanan argues that while Democrats are right to try to stop Republicans from writing a huge unrestricted corporate handout into the bill, they will have to agree to something quickly—and the sooner the better.

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Will Coronavirus Stop America from Carrying Out Executions?

AUSTIN SARAT

Guest columnist Austin Sarat—Associate Provost, Associate Dean of the Faculty and William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science at Amherst College—points out one unusual effect of the COVID-19 pandemic: deferring the executions of death row inmates. Sarat observes that while past pandemics have not affected the rate at which states have executed inmates, last week the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals granted 60-day stays in the execution sentences of two men, and other states seem poised to follow suit.

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Guerrero-Lasprilla v. Barr

Docket: 18-776

Opinion Date: March 23, 2020

Judge: Stephen G. Breyer

Areas of Law: Civil Procedure, Civil Rights, Constitutional Law, Immigration Law

Aliens who lived in the U.S. committed drug crimes and were ordered removed. Neither moved to reopen his removal proceedings within 90 days, 8 U.S.C. 1229a(c)(7)(C)(i). Each later unsuccessfully asked the Board of Immigration Appeals to reopen their removal proceedings, arguing equitable tolling. Both had become eligible for discretionary relief based on judicial and Board decisions years after their removal. The Fifth Circuit denied their requests for review, holding that under the Limited Review Provision, 8 U.S.C. 1252(a)(2)(D), it could consider only only “constitutional claims or questions of law.” The Supreme Court vacated. The Provision’s phrase “questions of law” includes the application of a legal standard to undisputed or established facts. The Fifth Circuit had jurisdiction to consider claims of due diligence for equitable tolling purposes. A strong presumption favors judicial review of administrative action and a contrary interpretation of “questions of law” would result in a barrier to meaningful judicial review. The Provision’s statutory context, history, and precedent contradict the government’s claim that “questions of law” excludes the application of the law to settled facts. Congress has consolidated virtually all review of removal orders in one proceeding in the courts of appeals; the statutory history suggests it sought an “adequate substitute” for habeas review. If “questions of law” in the Provision does not include the misapplication of a legal standard to undisputed facts, then review would not include an element that was traditionally reviewable in habeas proceedings.

Comcast Corp. v. National Association of African-American Owned Media

Docket: 18-1171

Opinion Date: March 23, 2020

Judge: Neil M. Gorsuch

Areas of Law: Civil Procedure, Civil Rights, Constitutional Law

ESN, an African-American-owned television-network operator, sought to have cable television conglomerate Comcast carry its channels. Comcast refused, citing lack of demand, bandwidth constraints, and a preference for different programming. ESN alleged that Comcast violated 42 U.S.C. 1981, which guarantees “[a]ll persons . . . the same right . . . to make and enforce contracts . . . as is enjoyed by white citizens.” The Ninth Circuit reversed the dismissal of the suit, holding that ESN needed only to plead facts plausibly showing that race played “some role” in the decision-making process. The Supreme Court vacated. A section 1981 plaintiff bears the burden of showing that the plaintiff’s race was a but-for cause of its injury; that burden remains constant over the life of the lawsuit. The statute’s text suggests but-for causation and does not suggest that the test should be different in the face of a motion to dismiss. When the “motivating factor” test was added to Title VII in the Civil Rights Act of 1991, Congress also amended section 1981 without mentioning “motivating factors.” The burden-shifting framework of McDonnell Douglas provides no support for the reading ESN seeks. The court of appeals should determine how ESN’s amended complaint fares under the proper standard.

Allen v. Cooper

Docket: 18-877

Opinion Date: March 23, 2020

Judge: Elena Kagan

Areas of Law: Civil Procedure, Constitutional Law, Copyright, Government & Administrative Law, Intellectual Property

In 1996, Intersal, a marine salvage company, discovered the shipwreck of the Queen Anne’s Revenge off the North Carolina coast. North Carolina, the shipwreck’s legal owner, contracted with Intersal to conduct recovery. Intersal hired videographer Allen to document the efforts. Allen recorded the recovery for years. He registered copyrights in all of his works. When North Carolina published some of Allen’s videos and photos online, Allen sued for copyright infringement, arguing that the Copyright Remedy Clarification Act of 1990 (CRCA, 17 U.S.C. 511(a)) removed the states’ sovereign immunity in copyright infringement cases. The Supreme Court affirmed the Fourth Circuit, ruling in favor of North Carolina. Congress lacked the authority to abrogate the states’ immunity from copyright infringement suits in the CRCA. A federal court may not hear a suit brought by any person against a nonconsenting state unless Congress has enacted “unequivocal statutory language” abrogating the states’ immunity from suit and some constitutional provision allows Congress to have thus encroached on the states’ sovereignty. Under existing precedent, neither the Intellectual Property Clause, Art. I, section 8, cl. 8, nor Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, which authorizes Congress to “enforce” the commands of the Due Process Clause, provides that authority.

Kahler v. Kansas

Docket: 18-6135

Opinion Date: March 23, 2020

Judge: Elena Kagan

Areas of Law: Constitutional Law, Criminal Law

Kansas adopted the “cognitive incapacity” test for the insanity defense, which examines whether a defendant was able to understand what he was doing when he committed a crime. A defendant may raise mental illness to show that he “lacked the culpable mental state required as an element of the offense charged,” Kan. Stat. 21–5209. Otherwise, a defendant may use evidence of mental illness to argue for a lesser punishment. Kansas does not recognize a moral-incapacity defense, which asks whether illness left the defendant unable to distinguish right from wrong with respect to his criminal conduct. Kahler, charged with capital murder after he killed four family members, unsuccessfully argued that Kansas’s insanity defense violated due process because it permits the conviction of a defendant whose mental illness prevented him from distinguishing right from wrong. Convicted, Kahler was sentenced to death. The Supreme Court affirmed. Due process does not require Kansas to adopt an insanity test that turns on a defendant’s ability to recognize that his crime was morally wrong. A state rule about criminal liability violates due process only if it “offends some principle of justice so rooted in the traditions and conscience our people as to be ranked as fundamental.” Early common law reveals no consensus favoring Kahler’s approach. The tapestry of approaches adopted by the states indicates that no version of the insanity defense has become so ingrained in American law as to be “fundamental.” The defense sits at the juncture of medical views of mental illness and moral and legal theories of criminal culpability—areas of conflict and change--and is a matter for state governance, not constitutional law.