45 Cases Await Returning High Court Justices

The Supreme Court opens its new term Monday and is set to consider whether states may refuse to pay for religious teaching, whether employers may refuse to hire reformed drug users and whether gerrymandering by state lawmakers is unconstitutional.

The court also will decide whether the police may set up roadblocks to ask motorists about a recent accident involving a crime, and whether police detectives must warn suspects of their right to remain silent before questioning them.

The justices will hear 45 cases this term, including 10 that were granted review last week. Waiting in the wings are more appeals that could be added to the docket for this year’s term -- including the dispute over the words “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance and the federal government’s move to strip doctors in California and Arizona of their right to prescribe drugs if they recommend marijuana to sick patients.

So far, the federal courts on the West Coast have blocked the government’s bid to enforce the marijuana policy, but Bush administration lawyers are urging the Supreme Court to take up their appeal and uphold it.

Potentially one of the most significant of the pending cases is a religious-rights dispute from Washington state. The case could have a wide impact on government funding of church-related schools, day care centers or social service programs. At issue is whether states must fund church-related teaching on the same basis as other private and public schools.

Joshua Davey was turned down for a state scholarship because he was preparing to be a minister. The state Constitution in Washington, like those of California and 35 other states, includes a strict ban on using taxpayers’ money to pay for religious teaching.

“No public money or property shall be ... applied to any religious worship, exercise or instruction,” says the Constitution of Washington.

But the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the 1st Amendment requires the state to give Davey the scholarship. Bush administration lawyers agreed, urging the court to say the state cannot “single out religion for discriminatory treatment.” If the justices agree as well, it would boost the drive for school vouchers in several states and give church-run programs an equal claim to state support. The case, Locke vs. Davey, will be argued on Dec. 2.

A pair of job bias cases will test the frontiers of workers’ rights. In the first, the court will decide whether a company may refuse to rehire a worker who had used drugs in the past. Joel Hernandez, a veteran technician, quit his job with the Hughes Missile Systems in Tucson because he was using drugs. Three years later, after completing a recovery program, he reapplied for his job but was rejected.

Last year, the 9th Circuit Court said the company’s policy of not hiring former drug users violated the Americans with Disabilities Act. The 1990 law says current drug users and heavy drinkers cannot claim to have a disability. However, it also says recovered addicts cannot be discriminated against for their past use of drugs or alcohol.

On Wednesday, the court will hear the company’s appeal in Raytheon Co. vs. Hernandez.

The court also will take up the first “reverse bias” age discrimination case. At issue is whether employers may offer special retirement benefits to their older workers, but not to middle-aged employees. Last year, a U.S. appeals court in Cincinnati surprised corporate lawyers when it ruled that this favoritism for older workers violated the federal law against age discrimination.

This is “nothing short of absurd,” the company’s lawyers said in their appeal. The anti-age bias law was intended to favor older workers, they say.

However, the younger workers counter that the 1967 law says employers may not “discriminate against any individual” over age 40 “because of age.” The dispute arose when General Dynamics, the military contractor, promised health benefits in retirement to workers who were over age 50, but not to those who were younger. A group of 40-year-olds sued and won a preliminary victory in the appeals court. The case, General Dynamics vs. Cline, will be heard Nov. 12.

Police questioning and the Miranda warnings will be debated in four cases to be heard this term. At issue is whether police may evade the requirement that they warn suspects of their “right to remain silent” and still make use of what they learn in the interrogation.

Just three years ago, the court in a 7-2 decision described the Miranda decision as having set a “constitutional rule” that may not be overturned by Congress. However, it remains unclear how this rule works in practice.

For example, can detectives question suspects for hours and then warn them of their right to remain silent only after they have confessed? And can police press suspects to reveal physical evidence, such as a gun or cash, and use this evidence in court, even if no Miranda warnings were given? On Dec. 9, the court will take up these questions in the cases of Missouri vs. Seibert and U.S. vs. Patane.

The constitutionality of police roadblocks will be considered in a suburban Chicago case. In the past, the court upheld roadblocks to check for drunk drivers or illegal immigrants near the border on the grounds that they were regulatory measures. Last year, however, the court struck down a roadblock designed to catch drug dealers. This was crime fighting, the justices said, and the 4th Amendment’s ban on “unreasonable searches and seizures” bars the police from stopping large numbers of innocent people in hopes of finding a criminal.

The new roadblock case falls in between. Police had stopped motorists in a Chicago suburb to ask if they knew anything about a fatal hit-and-run accident that took place there a week before. The Illinois courts ruled this roadblock unconstitutional because it amounted to crime fighting. In their appeal of Illinois vs. Lidster, government lawyers say “informational checkpoints” should be allowed to further public safety.

Three antipollution cases before the court test the balance of power between state and federal regulators. One of them challenges a new Los Angeles-area regulation that requires fleets of buses, trucks, taxis and airport shuttles to replace their older, diesel-burning vehicles with new models that burn cleaner fuel.

The auto and truck makers say this strict local rule is trumped by the less demanding standards set by the Clean Air Act. This case, Engine Manufacturers Assn. vs. South Coast Air Quality District, will be heard early next year.

Two election-laws cases could rewrite the rules for politics and politicians. The first, heard last month, will determine the fate of the McCain-Feingold Act. It bars corporations, unions and the wealthy from funneling large amounts of money to political parties or for use in attack ads near election day. Critics say it violates the 1st Amendment.

Meanwhile, the court will take up a Pennsylvania case to decide whether one party may use its control of the state Legislature to draw electoral districts that lock in its party’s control of congressional seats for a decade.

Gerrymandering is hardly new. Its name was derived from Massachusetts Gov. Eldridge Gerry who in 1811 drew a salamander-shaped district designed to ensure the election of a fellow Democrat. Seventeen years ago, the Supreme Court said gerrymandering may be challenged in court. But it has not set a standard to decide when ordinary political redistricting crosses the line into unconstitutional gerrymandering.

Pennsylvania is such an extreme example that its redistricting plan should be struck down as an unconstitutional gerrymander, the plaintiffs say. Republicans, who are in the minority in voter registration, used their narrow control of the state legislatures to lock in about two-thirds of the congressional seats for the GOP, they allege. This violates the Constitution’s guarantee of “equal treatment for all voters,” they contend, citing the Bush vs. Gore ruling. On Dec. 10, the court will take up their claim in the case of Vieth vs. Jubelirer.

Finally, the justices will revisit the 1993 death of the White House Deputy Counsel Vincent Foster to weigh the value of public disclosure versus personal privacy. Allan Favish, a Los Angeles lawyer who suspects Foster’s reported suicide may have been a homicide, sued under the Freedom of Information Act to obtain photos in the official files, including close-up views of his dead body.

The government refused his request, arguing that the privacy of Foster’s survivors outweighs any public value of disclosing the information.

The court will consider the issue on Dec. 3 in Office of Independent Counsel vs. Favish.

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Supreme Court’s fall docket

Here are the key cases to be heard by the Supreme Court this fall:

* Religious rights -- May a state that offers college scholarships refuse to pay for a student to prepare for the ministry because its state constitution forbids all taxpayer aid for religion? No, the 9th Circuit Court said in a Washington state case, because the exclusion amounts to discrimination against religion. (Locke vs. Davey)

* Police questioning -- May police detectives question suspects first and warn them of their right to remain silent only after they have confessed? The case is one of four that test the warnings required under Miranda vs. Arizona. (Missouri vs. Seibert)

* Former drug users -- May employers refuse to hire, or rehire, recovered drug users? The 9th Circuit Court said this refusal was illegal discrimination against people with a disability. (Raytheon Co. vs. Hernandez)

* Disabled access -- Can a person in a wheelchair sue the state for discrimination if he cannot reach a second-floor courthouse that has no ramp or elevator? The state says it is shielded from such suits. (Tennessee vs. Lane)

* Age bias -- May employers offer special retirement benefits to older workers but not to those who are middle-aged? No, ruled an appeals court in the Midwest in the first ruling that upheld a claim of “reverse age discrimination.” (General Dynamics vs. Cline)

* Roadblocks -- Can the police set up a roadblock to ask motorists about a recent accident at the same site? In the past, the court has upheld roadblocks to check for drunk drivers or illegal border crossers, but not to pursue drug crimes. Bush administration lawyers urged the court to allow “information checkpoints.” (Illinois vs. Lidster)

* Gerrymandering -- Can state lawmakers draw congressional districts in a way that ensures their party will win most of the seats? The practice is being challenged as unconstitutional in a Pennsylvania case. (Vieth vs. Jubelirer)

* Clean air -- Can Southern California’s air-quality district require owners of bus and truck fleets to replace older vehicles with new, cleaner-burning models? The auto industry says this strict local rule is trumped by the more lenient federal standards. (Engine Manufacturers Assn. vs. South Coast Air Quality Management District)

* Death photos -- Must officials release close-up photos of the dead body of White House Deputy Counsel Vincent Foster under the Freedom of Information Act, or may they refuse to protect his family’s privacy? (Office of Independent Counsel vs. Favish)

Source: Los Angeles Times

Los Angeles Times