Supreme Court U S

The nation's home healthcare aides are not entitled to minimum wages or overtime pay under federal law, even if they work for private employers, the Supreme Court ruled Monday. The 9-0 decision, which keeps in place a long-standing rule that denies minimum wages and overtime pay to those who provide "companionship services" at home, could trigger a move in Congress to amend the law.

If the Supreme Court scraps the Affordable Care Act in the coming days, California will lose out on as much as $15 billion annually in new federal money slated to come its way, dealing what state officials say would be a critical blow to efforts to expand coverage to the poor and uninsured. The state is one of the biggest beneficiaries of the federal healthcare law because of its large number of uninsured residents - about 7 million people, or nearly 20% of California's population.

The Supreme Court announced Thursday a potentially significant change in how crime lab reports are used in trials, ruling that a defendant has the right to cross-examine in front of the jury the experts who prepared these reports. Crime labs have been subjected to criticism in the last decade, much of it because of DNA evidence that has shown at least 240 prisoners were in fact not guilty.

California's legal battle over same-sex nuptials is now headed to the U.S. Supreme Court, the final chapter in four years of litigation over the constitutionality of Proposition 8's ban on gay marriage. In a brief order Tuesday, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said a majority of the court's active judges voted against reconsidering a three-judge panel's decision to overturn the voter-approved 2008 state constitutional amendment. Three dissenting 9th Circuit judges who favored review called the panel's ruling a "gross misapplication" of the law that "roundly trumped California's democratic process.

It's turkey season in Mississippi, and Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was tramping through the countryside here this month in pursuit of the big birds. His hunting partners, as usual, included Charles W. Pickering Sr., the federal judge who President Bush recently elevated to the U.S. court of appeals; and his son, Rep. Charles W. "Chip" Pickering, a four-term Republican member of Congress. For turkey hunters, this country is unrivaled.

The Supreme Court agreed for the first time Monday to reconsider the long prison terms meted out to the mostly black defendants who are convicted of selling crack cocaine. At least 25,000 defendants per year are sent to federal prison on crack cocaine charges, and their prison terms are usually 50% longer than those for dealers selling powder cocaine.

A Los Angeles lawyer's solitary probe into the "mysterious death" nearly 10 years ago of former White House deputy counsel Vincent Foster has forced the U.S. Supreme Court to confront a recurring dispute in the aftermath of a tragedy. What is the proper line between the public's right to know and the right to privacy of the families who lost a loved one? Lawyer Allan J. Favish says the public cannot know the truth about the Foster case unless it has all the facts.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday let stand lower court rulings that require W.R. Grace & Co. to pay a $54.5-million federal bill for asbestos cleanup in a Montana mining town described by federal regulators as one of the nation's most contaminated Superfund sites. The court rejected Grace's appeal of a decision in favor of the Environmental Protection Agency, which sued Grace five years ago to recover the cleanup costs at a vermiculite mine in the town of Libby.

Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts Jr. worked behind the scenes for gay rights activists, and his legal expertise helped them persuade the Supreme Court to issue a landmark 1996 ruling protecting people from discrimination because of their sexual orientation. Then a lawyer specializing in appellate work, the conservative Roberts helped represent the gay rights activists as part of his law firm's pro bono work.

In 1985, President Reagan's attorney general, Edwin Meese III, criticized the Supreme Court's decisions and called on the justices to decide cases based on the "original intent" of the Constitution. The justices were wrong to rely on contemporary views of liberty and equality, Meese said; instead, they should rely on the understanding of those concepts in the late 18th century, when the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were written.

The U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing California to continue granting reduced, in-state tuition to college students who are illegal immigrants is likely to bolster similar proposals across the nation, as well as a California measure to provide financial aid for the undocumented. The high court's action Monday upholds a California Supreme Court ruling last year that said the state's policy is legal because it grants in-state tuition on the basis of students' graduation from California high schools, not on their citizenship.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor's decision last month to oppose expanded gun rights under the 2nd Amendment is being cited by the National Rifle Assn. as reason for senators to oppose Elena Kagan, President Obama's second nominee to the Supreme Court. The NRA released an anti-Kagan ad this week that shows Sotomayor seemingly assuring senators during her confirmation hearing last year that she supports individual gun rights. Citing her vote in June to uphold a handgun ban in Chicago, the ad urges members to call their senators and "tell them not to fall for the same trick twice."

Congress is set to allow the Pentagon to keep new pictures of foreign detainees abused by their U.S. captors from the public, a move intended to end a legal fight over the photographs' release that has reached the Supreme Court. Federal courts have rejected the government's arguments against the release of 21 color photographs showing prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq being abused by Americans. The Obama administration believes that giving the Defense secretary the imminent grant of authority over the release of such pictures would short-circuit a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union under the Freedom of Information Act. The White House is asking the justices to put off consideration of the case until after a vote on the measure in the House and Senate, as early as this week.

Could the government outlaw a hypothetical "Human Sacrifice Channel" on cable TV? That question became the focus of a Supreme Court argument Tuesday on the reach of the 1st Amendment and whether Congress can outlaw videos showing dogs fighting or other small animals being tortured and killed. Last year, a federal appeals court, citing freedom of speech, struck down a law against selling videos with scenes of animal cruelty. The law applied only to illegal acts of torturing or killing animals, not legal hunting or fishing.

By mid-morning on the first day of the Supreme Court's term, it was clear new Justice Sonia Sotomayor would fit right in -- and in particular with her talkative fellow New Yorkers. Sotomayor peppered the lawyers with questions in a pair of cases, joining with Justices Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg during the oral arguments. Together, they left the other justices sitting in silence for much of the time. In the first hour alone, Sotomayor asked 36 questions, and Scalia followed with 30. Ginsburg is particularly interested in legal procedures, and she and Sotomayor dominated the questioning for much of the second hour.

Joe Sullivan was 13 years old when he and two older boys broke into a home, where they robbed and raped an elderly woman. After a one-day trial in 1989, Sullivan was sentenced to life in prison with no chance for parole. Terrance Graham was 16 when he and two others robbed a restaurant. When he was arrested again a year later for a home break-in, a Florida judge said he was incorrigible. In 2005, Graham received a life term with no parole. The two young convicts represent an American phenomenon, one the Supreme Court is set to reconsider in the fall term that opens Oct. 5. At issue is whether it is cruel and unusual punishment to imprison a minor until he or she dies when the crime does not involve murder.

The video images were disturbing -- a tiny white kitten singed with the flame from a lighter; a gray cat struggling beneath a woman's spiked heel; pit bulls tearing into a trapped animal. The Supreme Court has often said that freedom of speech includes ugly and foul language. But this fall the justices will be looking at video clips like these to decide whether selling films of dogfights or animal torture is protected from prosecution under the 1st Amendment. The dispute, expected to be heard in early October, has driven a wedge between traditional free-speech advocates and defenders of the humane treatment of animals.

The Supreme Court, declaring that public officials may not seek to advance or promote religion, on Monday struck down the posting of the Ten Commandments on the walls of two Kentucky courthouses. But the court did not set a clear rule for deciding when the government had gone too far in permitting religious displays, and the decision probably wasn't the last word. In its 5-4 ruling, the court said the commandments were "a sacred text" that carried an "unmistakably religious" message.

President Theodore Roosevelt campaigned as a trust-busting reformer, but was embarrassed by revelations that his 1904 campaign had received secret contributions from New York insurance companies. At his urging, Congress passed a law to keep corporate money out of political races. Now, that century-old ban stands in danger of being overturned by the Supreme Court's conservative majority, on the basis of an equally venerable principle: free speech in politics. The justices signaled the prospect of a profound shift in election law by scheduling an unusual special argument for Sept.