There’s already been a lot written about how Justice Scalia’s untimely death will affect pending cases, not to mention speculation about the possible nominees to replace him. Less attention has been given to the effect on the lower courts. Yet Justice Scalia’s departure gives liberal judges in lower courts more freedom than they’ve had in the past. Here, I’m specifically thinking of the D.C. Circuit and the Ninth Circuit, which between them are the most important forums for environmental litigation. It now looks like it could be at least a year until a successor is named. The 4-4 split gives lower courts more scope to take the initiative.
The main reason is that it is now much less likely that the Supreme Court will review liberal lower court decisions. In the past, the Chief Justice and Justices Thomas and Alito could look either to Justice Scalia or Justice Kennedy for a fourth vote — or indeed, it may have been Scalia who pushed them to hear a case. Now, they have to persuade Justice Kennedy. Apart from the fact that it seems pointless to take a case only to have a 4-4 ties on the merits, Kennedy has never been quite as much of a hardliner as Scalia on environmental issues. Moreover, the conservatives now have to take the risk that if they vote to hear a case, it might get affirmed if either Obama or a Democratic successor appoint Scalia’s replacement. That could elevate a bad lower court ruling into Supreme Court precedent, not a happy thought from their perspective
One might say, at the risk of making a somewhat undignified analogy, that lower court judges are a bit like grade school students whose teacher has stepped outside into the hallway. Time for some fun!
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Daniel Farber | February 25, 2016
There’s already been a lot written about how Justice Scalia’s untimely death will affect pending cases, not to mention speculation about the possible nominees to replace him. Less attention has been given to the effect on the lower courts. Yet Justice Scalia’s departure gives liberal judges in lower courts more freedom than they’ve had in […]
Katie Tracy | February 24, 2016
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has informally announced that it is unlikely to finalize its long-awaited rule to limit workers’ exposure to respirable crystalline silica by the month’s end, as the agency had expected. OSHA’s deputy assistant secretary of labor for occupational safety and health, Jordan Barab, told Politico on Friday, Feb. 18, […]
Evan Isaacson | February 23, 2016
Legislative committees in both the Maryland House and Senate are holding hearings this week on the Poultry Litter Management Act, a bill that has been attracting a lot of attention in Maryland and beyond. I have been asked to testify as part of a panel featuring representatives of the United States Geological Survey and the Chesapeake […]
Robert Verchick | February 22, 2016
Justice Antonin Scalia’s Supreme Court chair sits empty, draped in black wool to honor a man whose intellect and fire-breathing keyboard helped reshape the nation’s political landscape. Depending on how things go, that chair could be empty for a while. Unlike more recent nominations to replace a Justice, a nomination from President Obama could reorient […]
Mollie Rosenzweig | February 19, 2016
At a time when consumers are demanding greater transparency in the food system – and some food companies are delivering by means of genetically modified organism labeling and removal of artificial food dyes — a troubling North Carolina law that runs counter to that goal has recently gone into effect. The state’s so-called “ag-gag” law […]
Evan Isaacson | February 18, 2016
On May 12, 2009, the federal government finally got serious about protecting the Chesapeake Bay. That’s when President Obama signed Executive Order 13508 on Chesapeake Bay Protection and Restoration, which declared that the federal government would put its shoulder into the multi-state effort to restore the Bay. Taking turns at a podium perched on a […]
Daniel Farber | February 16, 2016
Scalia’s decisions were almost unremittingly anti-environmental. Over the past three decades, Justice Scalia did much to shape environmental law, nearly always in a conservative direction. Because of the importance of his rulings, environmental lawyers and scholars are all familiar with his work. But for the benefit of others, I thought it might be helpful to […]
James Goodwin | February 12, 2016
In case you didn’t get the memo: President Obama is entering the last year of his final term in office, so now we’re all supposed to be panicking over a dreaded phenomenon known as “midnight regulations.” According to legend, midnight rulemaking takes place when outgoing administrations rush out a bunch of regulations during their last […]
Matthew Freeman | February 11, 2016
Last month, Politico’s Michael Grunwald published what I suspect is going to be a first draft of history’s judgment of Barack Obama’s presidency. He writes that “a review of his record shows that the Obama era has produced much more sweeping change than most of his supporters or detractors realize.” Grunwald runs a long list […]