Busy Day in Washington: Since 10am EST SCOTUSblog has been reporting on the Supreme Court's actions. First, the Court released orders from the Justice's private conference last Thursday. The Court granted certiorari in non-criminal cases Hertz Corporation v. Friend (08-1107) and Milavetz, Gallop, & Milavetz, P.A., et al. v. United States ; United States v. Milavetz, Gallop, & Milavetz, P.A., et al. (08-1119) and (08-12245). The Court then announced opinions in Boyle v. United States, U.S. ex rel Eisenstein v. City of New York, Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal Company Inc., et al., United States v. Denedo, and Republic of Iraq v. Beaty, et al.; Republic of Iraq, et al, v. Robert Simon, et al. SCOTUSblog also provided a brief summary of the Court's decisions, including Justice Kennedy's 5-4 opinion in Caperton. According to Lyle Denniston, the Court held that based on Caperton's facts it was unconstitutional for a state supreme court justice to sit on a
case involving the financial interests of a major donor to the judge's
election campaign. Tony Mauro at Blog of Legal Times reports that after Caperton was announced judicial reformers began "celebrating the decision." And finally, SCOTUSblog informs us that today, just moments before a 4pm deadline, Justice Ginsburg put a temporary hold on the deal to sell Chrysler to save it from collapse. Denniston reports the order has no significant legal consequence, it just gives the full Court time to decide whether the sale should be delayed any longer. Ashby Jones also posts on Justice Ginsburg's order at Wall Street Journal's Law Blog.
Rove, Epstein, and Judicial Activism: At Bench Memos, Matthew J. Franck comments on University of Chicago Law Professor Richard Epstein's criticism of Karl Rove's argument against judicical activism in the Wall Street Journal. Franck takes issue with Epstein's unwritten argument that because the Founders "understood the risk of faction" they would have approved of what Franck calls a "broad-ranging judicial power as a check on the depredations of winners against losers in the process of majority rule." Franck does not believe that Epstein's view of judicial power is consistent with the Founders' intent, and he finds Epstein's criticism of Rove to be "woefully underdeveloped."
Pricey Habitual Offenders Laws: Doug Berman posts on an article discussing the cost of North Carolina's habitual offender law at Sentencing Law and Policy. In an article titled "Low-level felons add millions to spending," Joseph Neff reports that a study by The News & Observer of Raleigh shows that longer sentences add an average $195,000 in prison costs for each habitual felon. He reports that since the habitual offender law took effect in 1994, taxpayers have paid an additional $1.5 billion to house habitual felons and $264 million to build prisons. Neff's argues that a change in North Carolina's habitual felon law could help the state ease its $4.5 billion budget shortfall. He argues that "[i]f the state stopped sentencing people to eight to 10 years for low-level offenses, it would save roughly $5 million in the first year." Thankfully changing the habitual felon law isn't the only thing Neff reports on that could fix the budget. He reports that the state still spends $8 million a year so that booster clubs can pay discounted in-state tuition rates for out-of-state athletes and $100million a year to pave little-used dirt roads. Are the costs offset by the savings in crimes not committed by the habitual criminals? Neff cites some simplistic cross-jurisdictional comparisons to argue they are not, but we know those don't mean much.
Rove, Epstein, and Judicial Activism: At Bench Memos, Matthew J. Franck comments on University of Chicago Law Professor Richard Epstein's criticism of Karl Rove's argument against judicical activism in the Wall Street Journal. Franck takes issue with Epstein's unwritten argument that because the Founders "understood the risk of faction" they would have approved of what Franck calls a "broad-ranging judicial power as a check on the depredations of winners against losers in the process of majority rule." Franck does not believe that Epstein's view of judicial power is consistent with the Founders' intent, and he finds Epstein's criticism of Rove to be "woefully underdeveloped."
Pricey Habitual Offenders Laws: Doug Berman posts on an article discussing the cost of North Carolina's habitual offender law at Sentencing Law and Policy. In an article titled "Low-level felons add millions to spending," Joseph Neff reports that a study by The News & Observer of Raleigh shows that longer sentences add an average $195,000 in prison costs for each habitual felon. He reports that since the habitual offender law took effect in 1994, taxpayers have paid an additional $1.5 billion to house habitual felons and $264 million to build prisons. Neff's argues that a change in North Carolina's habitual felon law could help the state ease its $4.5 billion budget shortfall. He argues that "[i]f the state stopped sentencing people to eight to 10 years for low-level offenses, it would save roughly $5 million in the first year." Thankfully changing the habitual felon law isn't the only thing Neff reports on that could fix the budget. He reports that the state still spends $8 million a year so that booster clubs can pay discounted in-state tuition rates for out-of-state athletes and $100million a year to pave little-used dirt roads. Are the costs offset by the savings in crimes not committed by the habitual criminals? Neff cites some simplistic cross-jurisdictional comparisons to argue they are not, but we know those don't mean much.
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