Supreme Court starts new season Monday with cases on First, Second Amendment

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The U.S. Supreme Court will gavel back into session Monday after the summer recess.

The justices have agreed to hear 34 cases so far, including cases involving the First Amendment and Second Amendment to the Constitution. On Friday, the court added 12 cases to the list.

One of the first cases will be a challenge to the growing administrative state, involving the constitutionality of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and how it is funded.

In that case, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the CFPB’s funding mechanism violates the Appropriations Clause of the U.S. Constitution. It vacated the bureau’s payday lending rule.

On Wednesday, the court will hear the case from a disabled person who sued hotels that she never even visited and was never likely to visit for failing to provide disabled accommodations information on their websites. The plaintiff, Deborah Laufer, sued Acheson Hotels for failing to make it clear whether the hotel was accessible, as required by the Americans With Disabilities Act.

At issue is a new tactic by the disabilities rights community, including the ACLU, that uses “testers” to scour the internet for violations of the Americans With Disabilities Act, when they clearly never intended to use the services.

In the First Amendment cases that will be heard, the justices will be asked to decide if conservatives can be discriminated against by social media and technology companies, as they currently are.

The Texas Legislature passed a law that bars social media companies with at least 50 million users from blocking, removing, or demonetizing content based on a user’s political views. In Florida, the Stop Social Media Censorship Act, S.B. 7072, outlaws the banning of candidates and journalistic enterprise from being able to use social media platforms.

The tech companies appealed the law in Texas, saying that it violates the First Amendment right of these companies to determine what speech appears on their platforms. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Texas law, which was then appealed to the Supreme Court by the social media companies.

In Florida, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals blocked S.B. 7072, and the state appealed it to the Supreme Court.

Another social media case involves whether elected officials can block users from viewing or interacting with their social media accounts. In O’Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier, the question is whether there is a First Amendment violation if an official blocks someone from the official’s personal social media account that typically has content related to their office and policy matters.

In the Second Amendment case to be heard Nov. 7, the question in U.S. v. Rahimi is whether a law that bans people who are under restraining orders due to domestic violence convictions from owning firearms violates the Second Amendment.

The complete list of cases granted a hearing is at this list.

7 COMMENTS

  1. Boy, I sure do hate administrative lawfare… Reminder that space x is being sued for not hiring illegal aliens and “refugees” – because hiring illegal aliens and “refugees” is against the law for companies dealing with state secrets.

  2. It’s my belief that generations of Americans have come and gone since the US Supreme Court read the constitution as it does today. That is, this court finds it is unable to interpret the constitution for what it could have said, or what 5 or more justices wish it said. That’s in accord with how I was taught the constitution in high school, sixty years ago: That the document has plain language meant to mean what it says and only what it says.

    While liberals in Juneau might disagree, this takes power away from the court, power it would otherwise have in larger quantities because voters and Congress are so evenly split on so many contemporary matters. Individual Americans and state governments gain power that a different court would be willing to seize. This could lead to even more surprises from this court. Those Alaskans who really do believe in less government control over our lives should be pleased.

    I don’t see the gun matter as a big deal. Family practice attorneys have used (often abused) the threat of having the police take a fellow’s guns as a bargaining tactic in divorces. Often no court has ruled that the fellow has actually committed domestic violence but the police are still happy to take his guns. It would be better if the female just shot the fellow between the eyes if he really is committing abuse, but I suppose that would remove a source of child support payments.

    • My training partner at the police academy had a wife that didn’t want him to become a cop. So, she filed for a DVRO. And tried to have his guns seized during the semester. He offered to sell them to me. Too bad I didn’t have the cash. He ended up prevailing in court , thanks to an expensive attorney that got the order quashed! He eventually graduated and was hired.

      • It is a sad fact that many divorce attorneys advise their clients to take out a DVRO that they know will not be continued because of the lack of domestic violence occurring. Seems the ones who really need it seldom use it, maybe because they have little faith that it offers protection. A failure of a system.

  3. The left will use this case as an emotional springboard to take away 2A rights – they will not stop until they succeed, much in the same way they used emotional appeal to push baby-murdering. They know that if they can restrict the 2A, it is restrictable and the boundary will be continually challenged. Guns make us citizens – take them away and we become slaves. Stand strong SCOTUS!

  4. Which Constitution are they using, the Constitution for the united States of America (the original equity contract), the Constitution of the United States of America, or the Constitution of the United States. I wish they would be more specific. None of these Constitutions really apply to the American Public, but they do apply to those persons providing governmental services. They are the Charters they are required to operate under. as foreign subcontractors occupying public offices.

  5. The US and USA are corporations that have had numerous bankruptcies. If you are a US Citizen (a MUNICIPAL PERSON) or a citizen of the USA (a Territorial Person under British rule) you do not have Constitutional guarantees and you do not have “rights”. What you have are “privileges” granted by limited liability persons, and privileges are not rights. You are a mere franchise of corporations providing governmental services until the actual government of, for and by the people is reconstructed. Most of the men who tried to properly reconstruct it after the “Civil War” were murdered. The actual people’s government cannot go bankrupt. Lincoln was not an American President because he had a Title of Nobility (Esquire). He was President of a corporation and he bankrupted the United States of America Inc. In 2015 Obama bankrupted the UNITED STATES INC. and the Territorial United States of America Inc. went bankrupt in 2017 under the Trump Administration. Only corporations can go bankrupt. The State of Alaska is a “public corporation” – AS 45.77.020 (3) (actually it’s more private than public), and the STATE OF ALASKA is a MUNICIPAL CORPORATION, a franchise of the MUNICIPAL UNITED STATES INC. When they go bankrupt they leave their debts for the people to pay. It’s called hypothecation of odious debt. It’s a word game to keep the people confused. .

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