President Bush to Speak on Presidency and the Courts in Cincinnati: Tony Mauro reports at the BLT that President Bush will be speaking at a Federalist Society's conference on The Presidency and The Courts next Monday. Both the Cincinnati chapter of the Federalist Society and the Ashbrook Center for Public Affairs will host President Bush, former attorney general Edwin Meese III, former solicitor general Paul Clement, and M. Edward Whelan III. Mauro reports the specific details of President Bush's speech have not been released, but Whelan predicts the President will discuss the appointments of Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito. As Mauro reports, many analysts attribute the Court's move to the right to these men. It is viewed "as a success for conservatives."

The Washington Post on Kennedy: At Bench Memos, Matthew Franck has a post scolding the editors Washington Post for an editorial on the Supreme Court's decision in Kennedy v. Louisiana. The Post criticized the Court's decision not to rehear the case because "Supreme Court precedent dictates that justices take into account" the "'evolving standards of decency' and the absence of a 'national consensus,'" and refusing to rehear Kennedy left the decision "incomplete." Franck notes this is ridiculous "when precedents that were themselves conjured out of thin air are no constraint on the justices." For Franck, the editors of the Post have missed the point: "The real value of the amended Kennedy ruling is its exposure as a fraud of the whole body of Eighth Amendment jurisprudence."