The 2019â2020 term of the Supreme Court was the most eventful in decades. The significance and sheer number of the major cases was stunning. This yearâs rulings focused on LGBT discrimination, abortion regulation, subpoenas of the Trump administration, the Electoral College, immigration, Native rights, the rights of noncitizens, the Second Amendment, church and state, presidential power over executive agencies, and criminal justice concerns about unanimous juries, the insanity defense, and public fraud. The range of constitutional and legal controversy is remarkable, raising questions about the nature of representation in our elections, religious liberty, restitution for the violation of constitutional rights, the separation of powers between the Congress and the presidency, the role of precedent as a controlling doctrine of constitutional law, the proper way to read the text of laws, and how the Court comprehends evolving social realities.
While many of these controversies were being considered, the Chief Justice presided over the impeachment trial of the President in the US Senate (as Article I, Section 3 of the Constitution requires). The proceedings of the Court were also interrupted by the Covid-19 pandemic, leading to the replacement of the traditional oral arguments in front of the Justices by arguments over the telephone under new rules for questioning.1 The combined delay led to the final rulings being rendered in mid-July, the first time the Courtâs season went this late in two decades. All of this transpired against the backdrop of the 2020 presidential campaign, with many of the major cases having not only constitutional but also powerful partisan implications.
To summarize the yearâs major rulings, they
- 1.Expand the prohibition of employment discrimination âon the basis of sexâ under the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to include LGBT employees,
- 2.Allow states to ban âfaithless electorsâ by requiring presidential electors to abide by their stateâs popular vote,
- 3.Overturn the Trump administrationâs rescission of the Obama administrationâs DACA program on the grounds that the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) requires a full disclosure and discussion of the relevant facts including the reliance interests of the DACA recipients who would be affected,
- 4.Overturn state limitations on the participation of religious schools in public benefit programs; uphold exemptions for religious organizations with objections to the Obamacare contraception mandate; and affirm the autonomy of religious schools to select teachers under the âministerial exceptionâ to employment regulations,
- 5.Disallow noncitizens from bringing suits for damages in federal courts as a remedy for excessive force by US agents when the event occurred beyond US borders,
- 6.Overturn Louisianaâs abortion regulations requiring practitioners to hold admitting privileges at a local hospital, upholding the precedent from Whole Womanâs Health in 2016,
- 7.Allow individual states to limit the boundaries of the insanity defense grounded in competing perceptions of mental illness,
- 8.Limit convictions for fraud under federal law to demonstrable cases of self-enrichment, but not diversion of funds for political purposes as in the Bridgegate controversy,
- 9.Recognize that the Creek Indian reservation in Eastern Oklahomaâestablished by treaties in the 1800sâhas never been disestablished by Congress, meaning that tribal sovereignty continues within Creek Nation boundaries and that major crimes must be tried in federal rather than state court,
- 10.Dismiss a claim of a constitutional violation when the local government has withdrawn the disputed regulation (making the original claim moot, in this case regarding gun regulation under the Second Amendment),
- 11.Disallow nonunanimous juries for criminal convictions under the Sixth Amendment,
- 12.Strike down the congressional limitation of the President to remove the head of a federal agency such as the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau as a violation of the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches of the federal government,
- 13.Allow the President to resist congressional subpoenas that do not have a clear connection to ongoing legislation, and reject the claim of absolute immunity of the President from subpoenas from local prosecutors investigating a possible criminal charge.
Table 1.1
2019â2020 major casesa
Ch. | Case | Issue | Vote | Majority & Author |
|---|---|---|---|---|
2 | Bostock | LGBT discrimination (statutory interpretation of Title VII) | 6-3 | 4 liberals +Gorsuch, Roberts (Gorsuch) |
3 | Chiafalo | The Electoral College (federalism) | 9-0 | unanimous (Kagan) |
4 | DHS v. U. of Cal. | Executive power (statutory interpretation, reliance interests) | 5-4 | 4 liberals +Roberts (Roberts) |
5 | Espinoza | Religious liberty (Free Exercise v. Establishment) | 5-4 | 5 conservatives (Roberts) |
Lady of Guadalupe | Religious liberty (Free Exercise v. employment regulation) | 7-2 | 5 conservatives +Breyer, Kagan (Alito) | |
Little Sisters of the Poor | Religious liberty (statutory interpretation of ACA, APA, RFRA) | 7-2 | 5 conservatives +Breyer, Kagan (Thomas) | |
6 | HernĂĄndez | Noncitizen rights (restitution for constitutional violations) | 5-4 | 5 conservatives (Alito) |
7 | June Medical | Abortion regulation (precedent, federalism) | 5-4 | 4 liberals +Roberts (Breyer) |
8 | Kahler | Insanity defense (social facts, federalism) | 6-3 | 5 conservatives +Kagan (Kagan) |
9 | Kelly | Public fraud (statutory interpretation) | 9-0 | Unanimous (Kagan) |
10 | McGirt | Native rights (statutory interpretation) | 5-4 | 4 liberals +Gorsuch (Gorsuch) |
11 | NY Rifle & Pistol | 2nd Amendment (mootness) | 6-3 | 4 liberals +Kavanaugh, Roberts (unsigned) |
12 | Ramos | Nonunanimous juries (precedent) | 6-3 | 3 conservatives +3 liberals (Gorsuch) |
13 | Seila Law | Presidential power (separation of powers) | 5-4 | 5 conservatives (Roberts) |
14 | Trump v. Mazars | Presidential power re: Congress (separation of powers) | 7-2 | 4 liberals +3 conservatives (Roberts) (Alito, Thomas dissent to the right) |
Trump v. Vance | Presidential power re: state prosecutors (separation of powers) | 7-2 | 4 liberals +Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Roberts (Roberts) |