A federal judge on Tuesday ruled that Washington state’s “top-two” primary election system is constitutional. Judge John Coughenour of the US District Court for the Western District of Washington held that voters were not confused by the current version of Washington state’s ballot, which allows candidates to list which political party they prefer even if [...]

The US Supreme Court voted Tuesday to stay the execution of convicted murderer Cleve Foster until it decides whether to grant his petition for certiorari. Foster, a former Army recruiter, denies allegations that he shot and killed a 30-year old woman in 2002 and then hid her body in a ditch. Foster claims that he [...]

The Illinois Senate , sitting in a lame-duck session, on Tuesday passed a bill abolishing the state’s death penalty . The amended bill (SB3539) , approved by the House last week, passed 35-22 and now proceeds to Governor Pat Quinn for his signature or veto. It marks the first time the state legislature has voted [...]

A Pakistani anti-terrorism court in the province of Punjab on Tuesday sentenced two men to life in prison for violating Pakistan’s blasphemy law . Mohammad Shafi and his son Mohammad Aslam were convicted in the city of Dera Ghazi for having torn down and trampled a poster advertising a gathering marking the birthday of Prophet [...]

A federal judge in the US District Court for the District of Columbia on Tuesday denied the habeas corpus petition of Guantanamo Bay detainee Abdul Razak Ali. The judge rejected Razak Ali’s claim of mistaken identity and ruled that US officials acted on sufficient credible evidence of his association with al Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah [...]

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed emergency legislation Tuesday making it a crime to picket or protest a funeral. The move comes after Reverend Fred Phelps’s Westboro Baptist Church announced plans to picket the funeral of Christina Green, a 9-year-old girl killed Saturday in the shooting that injured Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and killed federal judge [...]

The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday in J. McIntyre Machinery v. Nicastro on the ability of a state, under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause , to exercise specific personal jurisdiction over a foreign company that targets the US market and sells its product in the US. The case involves an accident where [...]

The National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill released its full final report on Tuesday, tracing the deeper root causes of the spill and recommending steps to avoid future incidents. The report highlights mistakes made by British Petroleum (BP), as well as its partners Haliburton and Transocean , as the starting point that [...]

China has failed to achieve the goals it set out in its first national human rights plan, Human Rights Watch (HRW) declared in a report released on Tuesday. In its assessment of the government’s National Human Rights Action Plan of China (NHRAP) , HRW decried China’s continued use of torture, illegal detentions, and the government’s [...]

The US Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled 8-0 in Mayo Foundation for Medical Research v. United States that medical residents are not classified as students for the purpose of federal tax exemption. The Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research had sought to exempt stipends paid to doctors during the residency portion of their medical [...]