Free Republic

The U.S. Supreme Court, in a 5-4 ruling, upheld President Donald Trump's restriction on travel to the United States from a handful of Muslim countries on Tuesday, giving the White House its first high court victory on the merits of a presidential initiative.

The United States Supreme Court has ruled that a California law that compels pro-life pregnancy centers to advertise abortion services is unconstitutional. In a 5-4 decision authored by Justice Clarence Thomas and released Tuesday, the high court ruled in National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra that the Reproductive Freedom, Accountability, Comprehensive Care, and Transparency (FACT) Act "unduly burdens protected speech." "The unlicensed notice imposes a government-scripted, speaker-based disclosure requirement that is wholly disconnected from California's informational interest," wrote Justice Thomas. "California has offered no justification that the notice plausibly furthers. It targets speakers, not speech, and imposes...

SUPREME COURT UPHOLDS TRUMP TRAVEL BAN. Wow!

U.S. District Judge Julie Robinson on Monday ruled a Kansas law that requires new voters to prove citizenship is unconstitutional and ordered Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach to return to school as punishment for repeated violations of court rules. Her 118-page ruling sides with the American Civil Liberties Union in a two-year legal battle over the law’s burden and effect on elections. She provided a damning assessment of Kobach’s witnesses, calling their evidence flawed, invalid, biased, irrelevant, unreliable and untrustworthy.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court is allowing Ohio to clean up its voting rolls by targeting people who haven’t cast ballots in a while. The justices rejected, by a 5-4 vote Monday, arguments that the practice violates a federal law intended to increase the ranks of registered voters. A handful of other states also use voters’ inactivity to trigger a process that could lead to their removal from the voting rolls. Justice Samuel Alito said for the court that Ohio is complying with the 1993 National Voter Registration Act. He was joined by his four conservative colleagues. The four...

The Supreme Court’s ruling this Monday on my case, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, helped determine that people of faith remain free to pursue our chosen vocations. . . . after decades of developing my craft, my home state took it away from me. My case started in 2012 when I was asked to design a wedding cake celebrating a same-sex marriage. I politely declined that request because of my religious beliefs about marriage. But I told the customers that I would sell them anything else in my shop, or create a cake for them for a different...

The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a lower court’s decision that allowed an undocumented immigrant teenager to obtain an abortion over the protests of the Trump administration. The action, which came in an unsigned opinion without noted dissents, throws out a precedent that might allow other teenagers in the same circumstance to obtain an abortion.

The Supreme Court granted a limited victory Monday to a Colorado baker who refused to make a cake for a same-sex couple, finding the state showed fierce hostility toward his Christian beliefs when it ruled he broke the law with his refusal. The 7-2 decision sends the case back to Colorado with firm instructions to give Jack Phillips, the Christian baker, a fair hearing. But the ruling does not establish a First Amendment right to refuse services to same-sex couples, as Mr. Phillips and his conservative backers had hoped. Instead it suggests a road map for states such as Colorado,...

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday handed a narow victory to a Christian baker from Colorado who refused for religious reasons to make a wedding cake for a gay couple.

"Whatever the confluence of speech and free exercise principles might be in some cases, the Colorado Civil Rights Commission's consideration of this case was inconsistent with the State's obligation of religious neutrality. The reason and motive for the baker's refusal were based on his sincere religious beliefs and convictions." link to decision https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/17pdf/16-111_j4el.pdf

. The Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed Arkansas to enforce a law restricting medication abortions, rejecting an appeal from the Planned Parenthood affiliate in the state. Planned Parenthood had asked the high court to review an appeals court ruling on the abortion pill rules and reinstate a lower court order that had blocked them from taking effect. The law in question says doctors who provide abortion pills must hold a contract with another physician who has admitting privileges at a hospital, and would agree to handle and treat complications. The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had reversed a court...

COLLINS v. VIRGINIA 292 Va. 486, 790 S.E. 2d 611, reversed and remanded. Opinion [Sotomayor] Concurrence [Thomas] Dissent [Alito] Syllabus SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES Collins v. Virginia certiorari to the supreme court of virginia No. 16-1027. Argued January 9, 2018-Decided May 29, 2018 During the investigation of two traffic incidents involving an orange and black motorcycle with an extended frame, Officer David Rhodes learned that the motorcycle likely was stolen and in the possession of petitioner Ryan Collins. Officer Rhodes discovered photographs on Collins' Facebook profile of an orange and black motorcycle parked in the driveway of a...

President Trump's decision to block his Twitter followers for their political views is a violation of the First Amendment, a federal judge ruled Wednesday, saying that Trump's effort to silence his critics is not permissible because the digital space in which he engages with constituents is a public forum. The ruling rejects administration arguments that the First Amendment does not apply to Trump in this case because he was acting as a private individual. In a 75-page decision, Judge Naomi Buchwald said Trump, as a federal official, is not exempt from constitutional obligations to refrain from "viewpoint discrimination." "No government...

A federal court has ruled that four Christian universities based in Oklahoma will not be penalized for refusing to provide health care coverage for the birth control services they consider contrary to their religious beliefs. In 2013, Mid-America Christian University, Oklahoma Baptist University, Oklahoma Wesleyan University, and Southern Nazarene University filed suit against the Obama administration over their mandate that forced most employers, regardless of religious convictions, to provide insurance coverage for abortion-inducing drugs and contraception. A decision released Tuesday by the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma granted relief for the four universities, in large part...

On Monday, a divided Supreme Court said a court in a Louisiana murder case couldn’t accept a lawyer’s admission of his own client’s guilt over his client’s objections. In McCoy v. Louisiana, the Court considered a basic question about the proper role of attorneys in murder cases. Robert McCoy originally filed his own appeal directly to the Supreme Court about two questions related to his conviction on three murder charges. McCoy was sentenced to death in the case. McCoy was accused of killing three people in 2008 in a dispute with his then-wife and he was arrested after fleeing to...

The 10th Amendment provides that, if the Constitution does not either give a power to the federal government or take that power away from the states, that power is reserved for the states or the people themselves. The Supreme Court has long interpreted this provision to bar the federal government from “commandeering” the states to enforce federal laws or policies. Today the justices ruled that a federal law that bars states from legalizing sports betting violates the anti-commandeering doctrine. Their decision not only opens the door for states around the country to allow sports betting, but it also could give...

The Supreme Court on Monday struck down a federal law that bars gambling on football, basketball, baseball and other sports in most states, giving states the go-ahead to legalize betting on sports. The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 to strike down the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act. The 1992 law barred state-authorized sports gambling with some exceptions. It made Nevada the only state where a person could wager on the results of a single game.

The Supreme Court has struck down a federal law that banned sports betting in almost every state across the country, handing former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) a major win to bolster his legacy. New Jersey has been fighting since 2010 to make sports wagering legal at racetracks and casinos in the state, but had repeatedly been blocked by the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992. The Court ruled 7-2 that PASPA’s provisions prohibiting states from authorizing and licensing a sports gabling scheme violates the anti-commandeering rule. In delivering the opinion of the court, Justice Samuel Alito...

NORRISTOWN, Pa. (AP) — The Latest on Bill Cosby’s sexual assault retrial (all times local): 1:25 p.m. The jury is heading back to the courtroom and Bill Cosby’s defense team is saying there’s a verdict in his sexual assault retrial. The panel of seven men and five women have been deliberating about 14 hours. The 80-year-old comedian is accused of drugging and violating a woman at his suburban Philadelphia home in 2004. He’s charged with three counts of aggravated indecent assault. A conviction could put him in prison for up to 10 years on each count.

A Manhattan judge has ruled that a bar that ordered patron who was wearing a "Make America Great Again" hat to leave had a right to do so under the New York constitution. The judge rejected Greg Piatek's argument that he wore his MAGA hat to pay "spiritual tribute" to 9/11 victims and was thus discriminated against for his religious beliefs. Instead, the judge cited the state constitution which does not bar discrimination based on politics. Washington Times: “The purpose of the hat is that he wore it because he was visiting the 9/11 Memorial,” Piatek attorney Paul Liggierisaid in court Wednesday, according...