The Supreme Court returns for its two week post-Thanksgiving argument session tomorrow. In five days there is not a single criminal or habeas case. There is one crime-related immigration case, Gonzales v. Duenas-Alvarez on Dec. 5. The question is whether "aggravated felony" for the purpose of 8 U.S.C. § 1101 (a)(43)(G), includes aiding and abetting a qualifying theft offense.

The Court will probably announce an orders list from Wednesday's conference. If they had decided to grant a case and intended to hear it in February, they would normally have announced it the same day to cramp the briefing schedule as little as possible. They did not, so it appears that any granted cases will be for March, and the February calendar will be light.

The remarks of Justices Scalia and Alito to the Federalist Society are available on C-SPAN. Go to their home page, click on the "All Recent Programs" link at the bottom, and page through until you get to the programs of Nov. 18.