Browning Law News Blog

  One of the building blocks of our democracy is that there are, in theory, three branches of our government that are supposed to operate independently of each other: the executive (President), legislative (House and Senate), and the judicial (US Supreme Court and other federal courts).  Senate Democrats have just pursued legislation to set a binding ethics code for the U.S. Supreme Court, following accusations by those legislators that some conservative justices had not disclosed some trips and real estate transactions.  This would give Congress the power to hold hearings concerning justices of the Supreme Court.  As the court is known to be divided between the majority conservatives and the minority liberal justices, this would give Democrats the power to hold hearings and attempt the ouster of those conservative justices with whom they disagree.   With the conservative majority in power at this time, liberal democrats have been debating how to change tha...

  On August 9, 1969, three years after being named Monrovia High School's Homecoming Princess,  Leslie Van Houten, a 19-year-old follower of Charles Manson, assisted in stabbing Rosemary LaBianca to death, as part of the notorious Tate-LaBianca murders that occurred on that night.  Evidence was that she was under the influence of LSD at the time and a cult follower of Charles Manson, who died in prison for having directed his followers to commit the murders of Sharon Tate and Mr. and Mrs. LaBianca.  For Van Houten's role in the murder, she was convicted on March 29,1971, and sentenced to death. As the only female on California's death row at the time, special quarters were built for her to await the carrying out of her sentence.   In 1972, Van Houten's death sentence was commuted to life in prison. In 1977, she was given a re-trial for the reason that her defense attorney died while her case was being tried.  This trial resulted in a hung jury, and the...

  Title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 governs student loans.  The Act authorizes the Secretary of Education to cancel or reduce loans in certain limited circumstances, including certain public servants, those who die or are disabled, bankrupt, or borrow from a school that closes, fails to pay lenders, or falsely certifies its borrowers. The Biden Administration sought to use a later act, a law enacted just over a year after the 9/11 Trade Center bombing, to allow it to cancel approximately $430 billion in student loan debt.  The Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act of 2003 (HEROES Act) allowed the Secretary of Education to waive or modify the student loan provisions of Title IV “as the Secretary deems necessary in connection with a war or other military operation or national emergency.” However, the Secretary may issue such waivers or modifications only “as may be necessary to ensure” that such financial aid recipients are not placed in a worse ...

  The U.S. Supreme Court considered the admissions practices of two of the oldest institutions of higher education in the United States: Harvard and the University of North Carolina.   Each receives tens of thousands of applications for admission each year, but only a small fraction of that number can be admitted. The admissions process is very selective.    The schools screen applicants by grades, letters of recommendation, extracurricular activities, school support and personal characteristics.   After doing so, the applicant’s race is considered. For Harvard, one goal of the admissions process is to ensure there is no drop-off in the number of minority admissions from the prior class. That is affirmative action in a nutshell, and it is practiced throughout the United States.  Harvard has admitted that race “is a determinative tip” for a significant number of blacks and Hispanics admitted. The Plaintiff in this case is an advocacy group, “Students f...

  303 Creative LLC v. Elenis A heterosexual woman, Lorie Smith, sued the state of Colorado to enjoin it from forcing her to create websites celebrating gay marriages.  A Colorado statute prohibits all “public accommodations” from discriminating on various bases, including sexual orientation.  Colorado defines “public accommodation to encompass virtually every business dealing with the public, including  web designers. Ms. Smith stated she was happy to work with gays.  She was happy to create websites and creative graphics for them.  However, she refused to produce content that actively promoted or celebrated a gay lifestyle.  That, she said, violated her rights under our First Amendment to the Constitution. The US District Court in Colorado disagreed with her, so she appealed to the 10 th Circuit Court of Appeals.  That body also disagreed with her. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides: “Congress shall make no law respecting an e...