Supreme Court Wrap Ups (On Air Commentary)

The last several days have been a whirlwind of on air interviews about the Supreme Court's end-of-term decisions: Obamacare subsidies, same-sex marriage, lethal injection, etc.
Plus, at the state level, New York Court of Appeals Judge Susan Read announced her early retirement for the state's high court.

For anyone interested, here are links to a few of the interviews:

Fred Dicker: Live from the State Capitol! (6/30/15)
New York State STOPS...to hear Fred Dicker!
TUESDAY: ALBANY LAW SCHOOL PROF. VIN BONVENTRE: MY TAKE ON THE IMPORTANT ROUND OF NEW U.S. SUPREME COURT DECISIONS.
Link: www.talk1300.com/CMT/podcast/LiveFromtheStateCapitolJune302015.mp3 (@ 29:00 -49:00 mins) 

Fred Dicker: Live from the State Capitol! (7/31/15)
New York State STOPS...to hear Fred Dicker!
WEDNESDAY: ALBANY LAW SCHOOL PROF. VIN BONVENTRE PART II: A CONTINUING DISCUSSION ON THE U.S. SUPREME COURT'S FINAL DECISIONS, PLUS THE SIGNIFICANCE OF COA'S ASSOCIATE JUDGE SUSAN READ'S DECISION TO RETIRE.
Link: www.talk1300.com/CMT/podcast/LiveFromtheStateCapitolJuly12015.mp3 
(@ 29:30 - 49 mins) 

The John Gomez Show, LI News Radio (6/29/15)Gomez with Professor BonventreLink: https://soundcloud.com/jvcbroadcasting/gomez-with-professor-bonventre?in=jvcbroadcasting/sets/the-john-gomez-show-on-li-news

Capital Tonight (6/29/15)

Monday was the last day of the Supreme Court's term for this year, and while their two blockbuster decisions came last week the judges did weigh in on some big issues, including the death penalty and redistricting. Albany Law professer and New York Court Watcher blogger Vin Bonventre joined us to talk more about these issues.
Link: http://www.twcnews.com/nys/capital-region/capital-tonight-interviews/2015/06/29/vin-bonventre-062915.html#

Capital Tonight (6/29/15)

The US Supreme Court delivered a huge victory to President Obama today, upholding a key part of the Affordable Care Act.  That decision means millions of Americans across the country who enrolled through state health exchanges will not lose their insurance. Vin Bonventre from Albany Law School joined us to discuss.
Link: http://www.twcnews.com/nys/capital-region/capital-tonight-interviews/2015/06/25/vin-bonventre.html

Obamacare Subsidies Decision: Recap (part 2: the video)

As an appendix to the Recap on the immediately preceding post from earlier today, here's an interview with Liz Benjamin on her Capital Tonight.

Liz questions me about the Obamacare subsidies decision and about the housing discrimination case the Court decided the same day. She then turns to the recently announced retirement of New York Court of Appeals Judge Susan Read, and the dramatic change in the high court over the course of a few years--with Governor Andrew Cuomo being able to remake its entire membership.

Here's the link:

The US Supreme Court delivered a huge victory to President Obama today, upholding a key part of the Affordable Care Act.  That decision means millions of Americans across the country who enrolled through state health exchanges will not lose their insurance. Vin Bonventre from Albany Law School joined us to discuss.

Link:  http://www.twcnews.com/nys/capital-region/capital-tonight-interviews/2015/06/25/vin-bonventre.html

(Part 3) NY Court of Appeals: Criminal Leaves Still Up & Still Uneven

[Dateline: Back home.

But now I'm beset with some dreadful winter illness. I suppose it's payback for 2 weeks in the glorious Sonoran Desert sun of Arizona. Nevertheless, onward with the final installment on this CLA series.]

As many readers are aware, the decision for New York's highest court to hear an appeal in a criminal case is made by a single Judge. Criminal Leave Applications (CLA's) are assigned randomly and equally among the Judges. The decision to grant or deny each application rests solely with the Judge to whom it has thus been assigned.

With that in mind, take a look:

(click graphs to enlarge)

GRAPH 1

Yes, those are the average number of CLA grants by Judges Robert Smith and Susan Read, respectively, over the last 2 years. The highest and lowest granters on the Court today.

So, does it make a difference? Specifically, a difference which Judge is assigned a particular CLA? Is there a greater chance that an application will be granted if it is assigned to some Judges rather than to others?

To put it bluntly, is the success of a CLA as much about the luck of the draw as it is about intrinsic merit? Is it simply much luckier to have a CLA assigned to some Judges and not others? Does the fate of a criminal case depend upon which Judge is assigned the application?

Well, for years there's been as much grumbling about that as about the dwindling number of CLA's being granted. As we have seen in previous posts, however, CLA grants have increased dramatically under Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman.

And yet, there remains the question--no, let's not mince words--the real problem about the luck of the draw. That is, the difference among the Judges in granting CLA's. The difference in their willingness to grant applications assigned to them.

Let's take another look at some of the numbers we've been dealing with in this series.

Roberts, Scalia & Kennedy - Lippman, Graffeo & Read (Part 3 of Supremes vs NY Court of Appeals: Judicial Output [with Charts!])

In the last 2 posts, we compared the judicial opinion outputs of Chief Justice Roberts and New York's Chief Judge Lippman, and then of Justices Scalia & Kennedy and Judges Graffeo & Read. Now let's combine those in a few charts just to make it easy to see where we are thus far in this series.
[In the next post we'll get to some additional Justices and Judges.]

First, let's look at total opinions--i.e., the sum of majority + concurring + dissenting opinions authored by each Justice and Judge. And specifically, for this series, we're looking at the immediately preceding year at the Supreme Court and the New York Court of Appeals, from summer break 2012 to summer break 2013.

CHART 1

(click to enlarge)

As is clear from Chart 1, and has been clear from the charts in the previous posts, the total judicial output of the New York Judges is significantly greater than that of the Supreme Court Justices. Justice Scalia's output is an exception to the general pattern. The total number of opinions he authored is considerably greater than that of his two colleagues included here, and greater than that of New York's Judge Read.

Let's look inside these figures. Let's start with the number of majority opinions within these totals.

CHART 2

Again, the output of the Court of Appeals Judges is much greater than that of the Justices. Indeed, each of the three New York Judges considered thus far authored at least twice as many majority opinions--i.e., controlling opinions for the Court as a whole--than did any of the three Justices. Judge Graffeo, for the starkest example, wrote nearly 3 times as many majority opinions as did Chief Justice Roberts or Justices Scalia or Kennedy.

Scalia & Kennedy - Graffeo & Read (Part 2 of Supremes vs NY Court of Appeals: Judicial Output [with Charts!])

In the last post, we compared the judicial output of Chief Justice Roberts with that of New York's Chief Judge Lippman. We saw that Lippman authored nearly twice as many judicial opinions as Roberts did last year (Aug. 2012 thru July 2013). That included more than twice as many majority opinions, and more than twice as many dissents as well.

Let's now take a look at the judicial output of the next two most senior members of each court. On the U.S. Supreme Court, that would be Justices Antonin Scala and Anthony Kennedy. On the New York Court of Appeals, that would be Judges Victoria Graffeo and Susan Read.

Let's first look at the total opinions written by each of them last year.

CHART 1

(click to enlarge)

The picture is a bit less straightforward than it was when we juxtaposed Roberts' and Lippman's records. The total number of judicial opinions by New York Judges Graffeo and Read, combined, is significantly higher than that of the Justices Scalia and Kennedy combined--48 as compared to 39.

But while New York's Judge Graffeo authored the most opinions of the four, Justice Scalia came next. He wrote more total opinions than did Judge Read, as well as more than his colleague Justice Kennedy. The latter wrote the fewest of all. He authored significantly fewer opinions than did either Scalia or Read, and only half as many as Graffeo.

Let's look inside these total opinion numbers. What about looking just at opinions written for the majority. [Actually, opinions written for the Court, including the unanimous ones.]

CHART 2

As the chart shows, when considering only those opinions that garnered the support of the majority of the Court--from a bare majority to unanimous--the picture is clearer. The two New York Court of Appeals Judges each authored many more majority opinions than either of the two Justices. Judge Graffeo wrote nearly three times as many majorities as did Scalia or Kennedy. Judge Read wrote twice as many as they did.