The Court sat for its traditional “class photo” yesterday, to the apparent amusement of less than half the members of the current Court. You can also find a video taken at the loosely termed “photo shoot” here. I should note that the Court released a few different photos from the shoot and in all of [...]

For all the trivia nerds out there, I forgot to mention two important, but oft-unmentioned facts about yesterday’s argument. General Kagan opted not to wear the traditional grey morning coat that male Solicitors General wear. Instead, according to the WSJ Law Blog, she wore a blue pants suit. Of course, the writing was on the [...]

When Chief Justice Roberts first sat on the Court on October 3, 2005 in IBP, Inc. v. Alvarez, he spoke twenty-four times and his first question appeared on page 15 of the transcript. Following that question, he went back and forth with Carter Phillips, a man with whom the Chief Justice was already acquainted, for [...]

Justice Sotomayor formally took her seat on the Supreme Court after her investiture ceremony this afternoon. Among other things, Attorney General Eric Holder delivered to her a commission – the same object at the center of controversy in Marbury v. Madison. She is wearing a Bentley and Simon J-71 robe that was given to her [...]

In anticipation of Sonia Sotomayor’s first oral argument next week, C-SPAN has revealed a 10-minute excerpt of interviews with several Supreme Court Justices. C-SPAN had previously announced that October 4-12 would be “Supreme Court Week” featuring interviews with each of the Justices, but it has announced just excerpts from those interviews that deal with issues [...]

The Congressional Research Service has published an interesting collection of Judge Sotomayor’s past opinions from the Second Circuit. They come to the conclusion that she is hard to categorize but that she generally has fairly rigid adherence to precedent. [h/t How Appealing]

As the term winds down, the Court will begin releasing opinions pretty rapidly. There are 14 cases left and the Court will decide all of them by June 29. Here are a few of the most important left to be decided, sorted by the date they were argued: Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts (07-591) (Argued November 10, [...]

Justice Ginsburg gave a speech recently at the Second Circuit Judicial Conference in New York. Justice Ginsburg serves as the Justice assigned to that circuit right now and that role was put in prominent view when she issued a temporary injunction last week to block Chrysler’s takeover by Fiat for a day. Her speech can [...]

Judge Sotomayor’s frequent encounters with major league sports are well-documented. She also grew up near Yankee Stadium in the Bronx and is a life-long fan of the Yankees. Justice Stevens, the Court’s longest-serving member, is a long-time fan of another famous baseball team: the Chicago. He was present at the game at Wrigley Field in [...]

President Obama’s nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace Justice David Souter is the type of decision we have come to expect from the Obama administration. It involved important political considerations and will likely prove to be good enough for liberals but not off-putting for conservatives. Let me start off with the assumption that she [...]