SCOTUS Hears Oral Arguments in Five Cases

The U.S. Supreme Court’s November argument sitting continued last week, with five cases on the docket. The justices considered several important constitutional issues, including the religious rights of death row inmates and municipal ordinances regulating digital billboards.

Below is a brief summary of the cases before the Court:

Unicolors, Inc v. H&M Hennes & Mauritz, LP: The case seeks to resolve a circuit split over how to interpret 17 U.S.C. § 411 (b), which provides that if a party in a copyright infringement lawsuit alleges that a certificate of registration issued by the Copyright Office contains knowingly inaccurate information, then a court shall ask the Register to advise the court whether if the Register knew of that inaccuracy, he or she would have refused registration. The specific question before the Court is “[w]hether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit erred in breaking with its own prior precedent and the findings of other circuits and the Copyright Office in holding that 17 U.S.C. § 411 requires referral to the Copyright Office where there is no indicia of fraud or material error as to the work at issue in the subject copyright registration.”

Federal Bureau of Investigation v. Fazaga: The case involves Section 1806 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA), which governs the “[u]se of information” obtained or derived from electronic surveillance for foreign-intelligence purposes under FISA. Section 1806 (c) and (d) require the federal or a state government to provide notice to an aggrieved person whenever it intends to introduce such information as evidence in any proceedings against that person. Section 1806(e) affords the aggrieved person the opportunity to move to suppress any such information that was not obtained in compliance with FISA. And Section 1806(f) establishes special in camera and ex parte procedures to determine the admissibility of such evidence, if the Attorney General attests that a typical adversarial hearing would harm the national security of the United States. The justices have agreed to decide the following: “Whether Section 1806(f) of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 displaces the state-secrets privilege and authorizes a district court to resolve, in camera and ex parte, the merits of a lawsuit challenging the lawfulness of government surveillance by considering the privileged evidence.”

U.S. v. Vaello-Madero: The case concerns whether Congress can exclude Puerto Rico from federal disability benefits. The issue the justices must decide is: “Whether Congress violated the equal-protection component of the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment by establishing Supplemental Security Income — a program that provides benefits to needy aged, blind and disabled individuals — in the 50 states and the District of Columbia, and in the Northern Mariana Islands pursuant to a negotiated covenant, but not extending it to Puerto Rico.”

Ramirez v. Collier: The case involves how the Free Exercise Clause and Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) impacts the rights of death-row inmates. The Court has agreed to answer two questions: “Whether, consistent with the free exercise clause and RLUIPA, Texas’ decision to allow Ramirez’s pastor to enter the execution chamber, but forbidding the pastor from laying his hands on his parishioner as he dies, substantially burden the exercise of his religion, so as to require Texas to justify the deprivation as the least restrictive means of advancing a compelling governmental interest; and (2) whether, considering the free exercise clause and RLUIPA, Texas’ decision to allow Ramirez’s pastor to enter the execution chamber, but forbidding the pastor from singing prayers, saying prayers or scripture, or whispering prayers or scripture, substantially burden the exercise of his religion, so as to require Texas to justify the deprivation as the least restrictive means of advancing a compelling governmental interest.”

Ramirez v. Collier: The case involves how the Free Exercise Clause and Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) impacts the rights of death-row inmates. The Court has agreed to answer two questions: “Whether, consistent with the free exercise clause and RLUIPA, Texas’ decision to allow Ramirez’s pastor to enter the execution chamber, but forbidding the pastor from laying his hands on his parishioner as he dies, substantially burden the exercise of his religion, so as to require Texas to justify the deprivation as the least restrictive means of advancing a compelling governmental interest; and (2) whether, considering the free exercise clause and RLUIPA, Texas’ decision to allow Ramirez’s pastor to enter the execution chamber, but forbidding the pastor from singing prayers, saying prayers or scripture, or whispering prayers or scripture, substantially burden the exercise of his religion, so as to require Texas to justify the deprivation as the least restrictive means of advancing a compelling governmental interest.”