Supreme Court: recess appointments, protest buffer zones

What a morning at the Supreme Court. Unanimous free-speech ruling that Massachusetts went too far with a law creating a 35-foot zone banning protests on public streets outside abortion clinics. [McCullen v. Coakley, SCOTUSBlog case page] Unanimous 9-0 ruling rebuking the Obama administration’s broad claims of recess appointment power, though the Court split 5-4 on rationale. [NLRB v. Noel Canning et al, SCOTUSBlog case page]

This now makes about a dozen cases in which the Supreme Court has *unanimously* rejected Obama administration claims of broad government power. In case after case, the Department of Justice can’t even win the votes of the President’s own appointees, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor. This is an extraordinary rebuke.

2 Comments

  • Well, Justices Kagan and Sotomayor have some sense shame left in them. How else (e.g. being shameless) could someone with a straight face argue against the plain language of the Constitution (on the appointments) for example.

  • […] buffer zone statute “should have been upheld, not struck down” [Hoover Institution, earlier on McCullen v. Coakley, my related […]