Oof just finishing up listening to the Trump tariffs oral arguments & Justice Alito is unbearably insufferable.

Woke up in the mountain time zone, traveled home to teach in the pacific time zone, and now en route to the central time zone. Lots of traveling this time of year, but I had a blast speaking at ASU yesterday & am excited to head to the annual Con Law Colloquium at Loyola Chicago. ✈️✍️📖

Great day for many reasons, including getting this in the mail! With @jacobdcharles.bsky.social.

Wow had not seen this before. Walsh’s piece aged quite well on the diagnosis axis, quite poorly on the hypocrisy one.

I COULD SMELL THE ONIONS AND MUSTARD 💀💀

Oof, SCOTUS gonna intervene fast. Can’t say you are relying on mystical things like “trial testimony,” which get approximately 0.0 percent respect from this Court

👀

13th amendment says, whatttttttt

Tell me you’ve never shopped for groceries without telling me you’ve never shopped for groceries

This is a fantastically reported story, illuminating the sad state of affairs in the NC judiciary. The threat below is an ironic manifestation of the whole thrust of the piece: officials’ willingness to jettison longstanding norms in the pursuit of power, all without concern for the lasting harm.

It’s coincidentally also for the people of the age who look at this post & go, “hey, I resemble that remark.”

NEW: In Rahimi, the Supreme Court said the 2nd Am lets govt disarm those found to be a credible threat, but left open whether other kinds of restraining orders permit disarmament under fed law. Yesterday, the 9th Cir said yes they do, at least on the facts here. cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/op...

Good example for those teaching legal ethics & particularly ABA Model Rule 3.3's requirement of candor to the tribunal. Lawyers are ethically required to "correct a false statement of material fact or law previously made to the tribunal by the lawyer."

Among the many disturbing things about the Callais oral args on the Voting Rights Act, I was struck by the seeming agreement that partisan gerrymandering is fine & a legit state interest—all bc Rucho said it was non-justiciable. But non-justiciable doesn’t mean it’s ok or consistent w/ the Const!

That's a lot of judges joining one opinion (which is really a dissent, though not styled as such).

🧵 The Supreme Court’s decision to hear another Second Amendment case this term is significant. Along w/ Wolford on Hawaii’s law concerning guns on private property, the justices will review, in US v. Hemani, whether the Const’n permits disarming drug users: www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/24...

🧵 The Supreme Court’s decision to hear another Second Amendment case this term is significant. Along w/ Wolford on Hawaii’s law concerning guns on private property, the justices will review, in US v. Hemani, whether the Const’n permits disarming drug users: www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/24...

Justice Thomas writes separately to argue that additur is constitutionally required in this instance.

This is the thing that really gets me. Call yourself a politician, say you're doing what you need for your party, or even for the causes you think are important, but don't stand up there and lie brazenly & persistently and then claim the mantle of faith.

The fact that the majority found a standard that turns on "honest judgment" satisfied here exceeds all the possible bounds of credulity.

NEW: Last week, the 2d Cir created a split w/ the 9th Cir by rejecting a 2nd Am challenge to NY's law requiring background checks for ammunition purchases, holding that the law doesn't sufficiently implicate Bruen's plain-text prong to require analyzing historical trad'n. ag.ny.gov/sites/defaul...

Welp, this is the *second* Second Amendment case the Supreme Court will hear this term—after previously ruling on only 4 major cases about the scope of the amendment in its 234 year existence.

This is a must read piece! ⬇️⬇️

If I had explain American history in one sentence, I could do worse than "John Brown was hung for treason, but Robert E. Lee was not."

I just know Alito is hopping mad at ICE’s treatment of people with sincerely held religious beliefs that conflict with the prevailing government position. Right?

The en banc appeal is from a dist ct ruling that NJ's ban on assault rifles & large magazines doesn't violate the 2A. As @mikesacks.bsky.social and @jacobdcharles.bsky.social have posted, it has national significance because it could create a circuit split. www2.ca3.uscourts.gov/OralArgSumma... 3/5

THERE ARE VERY VERY EASY WAYS TO WRITE AN OPINION THAT *SAYS* WHAT YOU ARE DOING *AND ALSO SAYS* THAT YOU ARE NOT FINALLY RESOLVING THE ISSUE

Similar petitions keep cropping up. The Court is gonna have to confront this question sooner or later. They seem to be choosing “later,” for now. But they can’t avoid it forever (unless every circuit keeps upholding the laws, I suppose).

RGVRC Affiliate Scholar @jacobdcharles.bsky.social provides an excellent overview of this case in our April '22 blog 👇 rockinst.org/blog/missour...

Earlier this summer, I presented Textualism Step Zero at the Harvard-Yale-Stanford Junior Faculty Forum I begin with a confession of my failures and say something about a failure in textualism-hey, and this is different for me-even a way to fix that for textualism! papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Important rundown on the new Second Amendment case the Court will hear this term ⬇️⬇️ firearmslaw.duke.edu/2025/10/what...

The fact that there are *multiple* law professors falling over themselves to be Trump’s Carl Schmitt ought to firmly dispel the notion that the academy systematically excludes conservatives from its ranks.

🚨The Supreme Court just granted review in a new Seocnd Amendment case out of Hawaii, asking whether the state can flip the property default rule for carrying guns on private property. Here’s the petition: www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/24...

Our Center on the Structural Constitution, led by @crockeroncourts.bsky.social and Neil Siegel, has organized an amazing symposium with the Harvard Law Review on the politics and law of judicial review. And the best news is that you can attend online! harvardlawreview.org/judicial-rev...

Really fascinating piece that further demonstrates the courts’—& especially the 5th Circuit’s—Second Amendment exceptionalism

Hadn't noticed this before in Kavanaugh's Vasquez-Perdomo concurrence, but...is this not suggesting that the President, like Congress, possesses lawmaking power over immigration?

Holy smokes - never seen that kind of epigraph-like note on an opinion before!

Important 2A cases to watch as we await the orders list from the Supreme Court's Long Conference. firearmslaw.duke.edu/2025/09/a-se...

Took about 20 years. And I never thought a book about enslavers using deputization to give themselves policing power would be relevant to our times. But we are where we are. My book, White Power: Policing American Slavery, is now available for preorder. a.co/d/29c7EIP

Charles on Equity, CASA, and History and Tradition, buff.ly/BvqSHQ1 - Jacob D. Charles (Pepperdine University - Rick J. Caruso School of Law) has posted Equity’s Bruen Moment: Trump v. CASA and Lessons for the Future of History & Tradition (77 Fla. L. Rev. __ (forthcoming 2025)) on SSRN.

Great to see the pieces from SMU L Rev's 2024 symposium on the 2nd Am now live! My paper draws out lessons from the Court's 1987 decision in US v. Salerno for 2A doctrine--both its disfavoring of facial challenges *&* its focus on the very interests Bruen rejects. scholar.smu.edu/smulr/vol78/...

I confess I’m surprised to see dismissal instead of a commendation for this kind of behavior, but it’s a welcome (if new, perhaps) response to unwarranted violence. ICE Officer ‘Relieved of His Duties’ After Pushing Woman to Floor www.nytimes.com/2025/09/26/n...

Now this sounds like a neat paper!

Just in time for the grant in Slaughter, my latest with @andreascoseriakatz.bsky.social and @janemanners.bsky.social out in the @umichlaw.bsky.social Journal of Law Reform! repository.law.umich.edu/cgi/viewcont...

Just in case you wondered whether the Supreme Court simply calling balls and strikes has been construed as permission to do ever more deranged things. Ah well, the Court must continue to mete out impartial justice, blind to the consequences in the political arena.

It's really something that the conservative justices can, with a straight face, chastise lower courts for "defying" shadow docket rulings & at the same time let the Administration literally defy centuries old unanimous Supreme Court precedent, all before bothering to overrule it.

That's a conservative panel for the Second Circuit. Judge Bianco, a Trump appointee, wrote the opinion. No chance the court rehears it.

NEW: The 2d Cir upholds NY's public carrying licensing law against Second Amendment challenge, incl. the gun ban in Times Square & on subways, & the prohibition on carrying guns openly. In so doing, it clarifies that silence alone isn't enough to doom today's laws. cases.justia.com/federal/appe...

Just went you think you've seen all the *really out there* Second Amendment ideas out there, you run across one in quite another realm: "Heavy Touch Reporting Requirements Infringe On The Corporate Right To Bear Digital Arms" www.compliancelawjournal.com/compliancela...

Really enjoying this fascinating symposium at @dukelaw.bsky.social on historical facts & constitutional law, incl. this great panel w/ @kmtani.bsky.social, Christen Hammock Jones & Darrell Miller about choices in the compilation of historical records.