Here’s the domestic legal news we covered this week:
The
Kentucky Senate [official website] approved a
bill [text, PDF] on Thursday that outlaws the use of the dilation and excavation abortion method for patients in their eleventh week of pregnancy or later.
US
President Donald Trump [official website] signed a
presidential memorandum [text] on Thursday calling for the
US Trade Representative [official website] to develop a list of proposed tariffs against goods from China.
The trade representative has 15 days to publish the list of proposed tariffs, which will undergo a period of notice and comment.
[JURIST] In a ruling from the bench on Thursday, Wisconsin Dane County Circuit Judge Josann Reynolds
ordered [MJS report] the state’s
Governor Scott Walker [official website] to call special elections to fill two empty seats which were previously held by Republicans.
[JURIST] Washington
Governor Jay Inslee [official website] signed a bill known as the
Reproductive Parity Act (RPA) [materials] into law on Wednesday, which will require insurers in the state of Washington to provide coverage for elective abortions and contraception if they also provide coverage for maternity care.
The
US House of Representatives [official website] on Wednesday
approved [bill, PDF] the “Right to Try Act of 2017,” which would give terminally ill patients the “right to try” unproven experimental treatments.
The
United States Senate [official site] on Tuesday voted in favor of a motion to proceed with consideration of
House Bill 1865 [text] aimed at curbing online sex trafficking.
The US Supreme Court
held [opinion, PDF] Wednesday in
Ayestas v Davis [SCOTUSblog materials] that the
US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit [official website] applied the wrong standard when they denied Carlos Ayestas funding for investigative services in his habeas petition.
Ayestas was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in a Texas court.
The US
Supreme Court [official website] on Tuesday granted a
stay [order PDF] to Russell Bucklew who was scheduled to be executed that evening.
The brief order stayed the execution pending a writ of certiorari to the court because of the urgency of Bucklew’s pending execution.
The US
Supreme Court [official website] heard
oral argument [text, PDF] on Tuesday concerning the constitutional validity of California’s
Reproductive Fact Act [text, PDF], which has been challenged on
First and
Fourteenth Amendment [GPO backgrounders, PDF] grounds.
The Act requires licensed clinics that list their primary purpose as providing family planning or pregnancy-related services to notify and inform all clients concerning the availability of free or low-cost access to comprehensive family planning services, prenatal care and abortion for eligible women.
A judge for the US District Court for the Western District of Tennessee on Monday
dismissed [order] an action by the state of Tennessee against the federal refugee resettlement program.
The plaintiffs on behalf of the state of Tennessee asserted that the federal government was violating the Tenth Amendment [text] to the Constitution, reserving all powers not delegated to the federal government by the Constitution to the states.
The US Supreme Court
ruled [opinion, PDF] unanimously Tuesday that the
Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act of 1998 (SLUSA) [text, PDF] did not strip state courts of jurisdiction over class action lawsuits under the
1933 Securities Act [text, PDF].
The Supreme Court decided that the statute does not say that state courts cannot hear class actions brought only on federal claims, and therefore states have concurrent jurisdiction over these cases.
The US
Supreme Court [official website] heard
oral arguments [text, PDF] Monday in a case concerning the Minnesota revocation-upon-divorce statute, which revokes an ex-spouse’s beneficiary designation once the couple divorces.
Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant on Monday signed into law the country’s strictest abortion law, prompting Mississippi’s only abortion clinic to file a
lawsuit [text, PDF] in the
US District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi [official website] challenging the Act’s constitutionality and requesting it be immediately blocked.
The US Supreme Court on Monday
declined [order list, PDF] to hear a
case [SCOTUSblog materials] challenging the constitutionality of the death penalty in Arizona under the Eighth Amendment.
News