Articles

Previewing the coming Supreme Court term tomorrow

September 21, 2015 | By TONY FRANCOIS

Tomorrow I will be attending Heritage Foundation’s annual Supreme Court Preview in Washington D.C. The event can also be seen online, from Noon to 1 pm Eastern. Pacific Legal Foundation is looking forward to a potentially big year at the Supreme Court of the United States. PLF has submitted three petitions for certiorari to the … ...

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Supreme Court will decide the reach of federal control over Alaska

November 24, 2015 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

The Supreme Court will soon decide how much control federal agencies can exercise over Alaska’s lands and waters. A California-sized chunk of the state sits within federal “conservation system units.” These conservation areas include national parks, wildlife refuges, preserves, and so on. Such areas are subject to special fede ...

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Supreme Court agrees to hear PLF "relevant parcel" case

January 15, 2016 | By JOHN GROEN

For almost 25 years since Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council, it has been well established that government agencies commit an unconstitutional taking when their regulations deprive a property owner’s land of “all economically viable use.” But when a property owner owns two or more adjacent legal parcels, courts have split on ...

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Scrap tires and school choice

January 19, 2016 | By ETHAN BLEVINS

The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a religious liberty case that may bear on the success of school choice across the country. The case doesn’t directly involve school choice. It’s about scrap tires and playgrounds. But its outcome may determine the extent to which states can use the excuse of church-state separation to bar religi ...

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PLF files opening brief at Supreme Court in Murr v. Wisconsin

April 11, 2016 | By JOHN GROEN

Pacific Legal Foundation today filed its Petitioners’ Brief on the Merits in this case pending before the Supreme Court of the United States. The Court granted review on January 15th, 2016, and oral argument will be held in early October. A specific oral argument date has not yet been set.  A copy of the Petition … ...

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PLF’s cert petition on water quality buffers draws support

June 10, 2016 | By TONY FRANCOIS

A month ago PLF asked the Supreme Court to hear Common Sense Alliance v. San Juan County, a case against an ordinance that unconstitutionally takes portions of shoreline properties as community storm water filters. The issue in the case is whether Supreme Court decisions that limit government power to demand property in return for a permit approv ...

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Who will Trump nominate to the Supreme Court?

November 28, 2016 | By TONY FRANCOIS

The short answer is, someone on his published list, first issued this past May and expanded in October. I wrote about why we should anticipate that Trump will stick to the list for his first Supreme Court nominee, this month in the Daily Journal. My bottom line to those on the left (and a few on … ...

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PLF applauds nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court

January 31, 2017 | By TONY FRANCOIS

Sacramento, CA and Washington, DC; January 31, 2017: Responding to today’s nomination announcement, Pacific Legal Foundation praised the qualifications and fitness of Judge Neil Gorsuch to serve on the Supreme Court of the United States. “Judge Gorsuch is superbly well qualified to serve on the Supreme Court and his prior opinions demon ...

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Supreme Court remands North Carolina bathroom case to Fourth Circuit

March 06, 2017 | By TONY FRANCOIS

Several weeks ago we blogged about our amicus brief to the Supreme Court in the widely followed North Carolina bathroom case, about whether federal law determines which bathrooms transgender students may use. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled that instead of determining whether the applicable statute and regulations had the asserted ef ...