As reported by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Pennsylvania is considering a bill to reorganize arbitration law in the state. The bill has the support of the Pennsylvania Bar Association but is opposed by the Pennsylvania Association for Justice, the trial lawyer lobbying group. As I explain in my recent Heritage Backgrounder, …
On Monday, the Supreme Court agreed to review an important case on race and sex discrimination (also known as affirmative action) that will give it another chance to overturn a court of appeals ruling and confirm that discrimination is always wrong. Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action is an …
This morning, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Hollingsworth v. Perry, a constitutional challenge to California’s definition of marriage as the union of a man and woman. During the oral argument, both Justices Anthony Kennedy and Samuel Alito noted that same-sex marriage was a very recent experiment—just over a …
George Will opens his recent column criticizing the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) on federalism grounds by quoting from a 1948 Supreme Court case: “[U]nder the Constitution, the regulation and control of marital and family relationships are reserved to the States.” What he doesn’t point out is that the citation …
Should the contents of your e-mail messages be protected from unwarranted law enforcement scrutiny to the same extent as your physical letters sent through the mail? To ask the question makes the answer seem obvious. E-mail is today’s postal service and the personal contents of your e-mail messages are as …
In a unanimous opinion yesterday by Justice Stephen Breyer in Standard Fire Ins. Co. v. Knowles, the Supreme Court concluded that plaintiffs’ attorneys can’t evade federal law on class action lawsuits through a self-serving stipulation designed to keep a case in state court and out of the federal system. Like …
A Long Island man is facing 30 days in jail for laughing in his own home, according to The Huffington Post. Forty-two-year-old Robert Schiavelli, who suffers from a mental disability, was cited twice for “disturbing the peace” due to his loud laughter. What was he laughing at? Allegedly, Schiavelli’s neighbor …
In what most would consider a foolish class action lawsuit and a glaring example of what is broken in our tort system, Subway was recently accused of fraudulent marketing practices related to its well-known “footlong” sandwiches. The plaintiff, Barry Gross, filed suit against the Doctor’s Associates-owned chain of Subway in …
