Blog Post

Five cases to watch in the upcoming Supreme Court term

September 7, 2016 | by NCC Staff

The United States Supreme Court will be back in full business in less than a month. So what are the significant early cases people are already talking about?

640px-Inside_the_United_States_Supreme_CourtThis summer, a lot of the buzz has been about court orders shaped by the current ideological split after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia. At least for this fall, the Court will still have an even number of Justices, who often split on ideological grounds.

The Court will have heard at least 18 cases by the end of November.  The Court actually starts its business on September 26 with a private conference, and on the first Monday of October, it hears the first cases for the 2016 term.

Perhaps the highest-profile case has yet to be scheduled. Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia v. Pauley seeks to answer the question of whether religiously affiliated schools can be constitutionally denied equal access to a government benefit, even if the benefit has nothing to do with matters of faith.  At issue is a program in Missouri that provides rubberized material for school playgrounds, made out of old tires. Missouri’s constitution bars parochial schools from such public benefits. The Court actually accepted this case back in January, before Justice Scalia’s passing, but it won’t hear arguments until December at the earliest.

A big patent case brings two of the world’s huge electronics brands to the Court on October 11. In Samsung Electronics Co. v. Apple, the latest battle in Apple’s design patent case against Samsung centers on the question of how much Samsung will need to pay Apple for infringing on Apple iPhone patents used on Samsung smartphones. Samsung wants damages limited to the value of the components at issue. Apple wants damages for the full value of the Samsung products sold. Digital giants Google and Facebook have sided with Samsung, while more than 100 designers have sided with Apple.

Racial gerrymandering is back in front of the Justices in Bethune-Hill v. Virginia State Board of Elections. The case is about a plan approved in 2011 by the Virginia legislature, based on a federal census, for its House of Delegates.  The plan allowed for 12 districts to have majority populations of minorities.  The Supreme Court had ruled previously districting maps can’t use race as a predominant factor in drawing election boundaries. But a federal district court said Virginia’s acts weren’t unconstitutional because they were taken to avoid violating a federal civil rights law. Arguments have not yet been scheduled in this case.

Another interesting case is Fry v. Napoleon Community Schools. The controversy here is over the rights of a disabled child’s parents to sue a public school receiving federal funding after the school wouldn’t allow the child to bring a service dog to school to help her during her classes. The school believed the child had enough support from a personal aide. The dispute is over a requirement that the family must first try to work out a settlement with the school under a state law, before it can sue for damages under a federal anti-discrimination law. Arguments will be heard on October 31, 2016.

Also on Halloween, the Court will decide the fate of a case involving cheerleading outfits that could have a big impact on the clothing designers. In Star Athletica, LLC v. Varsity Brands, Inc., the Justices will have if and how parts of a piece of clothing can have copyright protection, such as stripes and patterns on cheerleading uniforms.


 
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