Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, 573 U.S. 682 (decided June 30, 2014): for-profit corporation is a “person” and if closely held can refuse under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act to follow federal regulation (Affordable Care Act’s requirement to provide insurance coverage for contraceptives)
New York Times v. United States, 403 U.S. 713 (decided June 30, 1971): First Amendment allowed printing of “The Pentagon Papers” (McNamara’s secret history of the Vietnam War) despite Espionage Act banning disclosure of national defense material “to the injury of the United States” (it came out in paperback shortly afterwards and I read it -- an eye opener!)
Biden v. Nebraska, 600 U.S. --- (decided June 30, 2023): Secretary of Education did not have power to cancel (instead of suspend) student debts due to Covid; Missouri had standing to sue because it created an independent loan program which would lose payments
NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U.S. 449 (decided June 30, 1958): Due Process violated by Alabama’s order for NAACP to produce membership list
Cox v. Larios, 542 U.S. 947 (decided June 30, 2004): one-person, one-vote rule can be violated even when differential between districts is less than 10% (here, Georgia’s plan as a whole favored urban, Democratic districts at the expense of rural, Republican)
Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (decided June 30, 1986): upheld Georgia law criminalizing sodomy (defined as putting genitals of one into mouth or anus of another) (of course, it was a gay man who was prosecuted, as if women never gave blow jobs) (overruled by Lawrence v. Kansas, 2003)
Biden v. Texas, 597 U.S. 785 (decided June 30, 2022): In 2019 the lame-duck Republican Congress authorized the Trump administration to return to Mexico non-Mexicans who had tried illegally to enter through that country. Biden suspended this policy his first day in office. Here the Court holds that Biden had the authority to do that, given the discretionary language in the statute and the claimed foreign affairs implications.
West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, 597 U.S. 697 (decided June 30, 2022): In 2015 Obama’s EPA started requiring coal-fired plants to in essence phase out; the Court stayed the rule almost immediately and Trump repealed it. Biden tried to re-implement it. The Court holds that the rule exceeds the EPA’s authority under the Clean Air Act.
United States v. Ortiz, 422 U.S. 891 (decided June 30, 1975): can’t search cars at fixed border checkpoints unless “probable cause” (Ortiz’s car here turned out to have three illegal aliens in the trunk; evidence suppressed and conviction for transporting illegals vacated)
United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U.S. 873 (decided June 30, 1975): roving border patrol can’t stop car just because occupants “look Mexican” (this was in southern California, which at that point had been part of Mexico longer than it was part of the United States)
Madsen v. Women’s Health Center, Inc., 512 U.S. 753 (decided June 30, 1994): First Amendment not violated by noise restriction and 30-foot buffer zone between abortion protesters and clinic, but 36-foot buffer on private property side and forbidding “images visible” from the clinic was overbroad
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