Summary: A brief overview of the six major cases the Supreme Court will soon rule over.
The Supreme Court is about to deliver some interesting decisions on six landmark cases, and we are expecting all the results by Monday. Number one of interest is the same-sex marriage decision, which we can expect as of June 29 or 30. The Supreme Court is considering separate cases from Ohio, Michigan, Tennessee, and Kentucky, consolidated into one case that will decide whether gays and lesbians have a right to same-sex marriage. The court, led by Justice Anthony Kennedy, is expected to rule in favor of homosexual marriage, striking down state bans against it.
Second in order of interest is President Obama’s Affordable Healthcare Act, seeing Supreme Court attention for the second time, since it was upheld in a 5-4 ruling in 2012. This time it faces danger because of four words, “established by the state” that calls into question whether 6.4 million participants in the 34 states that did not create their own marketplaces should get Obamacare benefits.
As for the other considerations the Supreme Court is facing, there are such perennial issues as pollution laws, this time with the court deciding on how coal and oil power plants reduce emissions of mercury and other pollutants. The Environmental Protection Agency must establish the $10 billion annual cost they wish to impose is justified.
Other perennial problems the court faces lately include housing discrimination laws. This is the third time in recent years they’ve weighed in on the matter, addressing how the Fair Housing Act of 1968, which legislates that housing practices that govern sales, rentals, zoning, and lending, should not discriminate against minorities. In today’s case, housing industry opponents are claiming the law was made to ban intentional discrimination only.
And again, death penalty laws are a matter of interest. As the lethal injection barbiturates used in death penalty deaths is in short supply, prisons have moved on to using midazolam. This, as part of three drugs used in several states, is said to fail to prevent pain and suffering during the execution. The court will decide if they should be used.
And finally, the court will decide who will draw up congressional district maps every 10 years – nonpartisan commissions or state legislatures. The commissions would take away from politicians any interested influence on how they are drawn up. The Arizona state Legislature’s Republican majority is arguing that the Constitution gives this power to state legislatures.