Court Decision

The O'Malley administration has joined the chorus calling upon Maryland's highest court to review a decision by the Court of Special Appeals that would render all but meaningless the extensive work local governments and citizens contribute to shaping comprehensive development plans. The state's request to file a supporting motion on behalf of the citizens group appealing the ruling, which was announced last week by state Planning Secretary Richard E. Hall, reflected both short-term and long-term concerns horrifying enough to keep an anti-sprawl advocate up all night.

LAST WEEK, the Supreme Court handed the Federal Communications Commission a big victory by ruling that the Telecommunications Act of 1996 gives it -- not the states -- general authority to set rules meant to open the $100 billion local telephone business to competition. In its ruling, which overturned a 1997 appeals court decision, the justices said the FCC has authority to determine guidelines for how much local companies can charge their new competitors for tapping into their networks. The court also approved FCC rules that outline how competitors can go about breaking into the local markets by, among other things, leasing elements of existing networks.

THE CALLER was a testy cuss, huffing, fuming and ranting about the National Rifle Association and gun control."If you and those nincompoops at the NRA ever get to know more about the law than the Supreme Court," the caller snarled, "then I'll listen to you."The implication was that the Supreme Court knows more about the Second Amendment than anybody else. The Supreme Court has never, the caller insisted, interpreted the Second Amendment to mean everyone is entitled to own firearms. The Supreme Court has spoken on this issue, the implication goes, so therefore the Supreme Court is right.

WASHINGTON -- In a precedent-setting case bound for the U.S. Supreme Court, the Wisconsin Supreme Court upheld yesterday the use of public money to pay for parochial school tuition for low-income children.The decision came in a closely watched Milwaukee school-voucher case. Advocates of parental choice in education have pushed the case in hopes of achieving a landmark Supreme Court endorsement of a taxpayer-financed private alternative to public schools.The Wisconsin court divided 4-2 in upholding the school-aid law, saying it did not violate the constitutionally required separation of church and state because its purpose was not religious.

ON THE SAME DAY the Supreme Court held that a sitting president can be sued for actions outside the scope of his official duties, it heard arguments on whether a sitting Congress can cede some of its constitutional powers of the purse to the chief executive. At issue is the line-item-veto law passed last year in the first great show of cooperation between President Clinton and the Republican-controlled Congress.The legislation presents grave constitutional -- and practical -- questions that ought to be settled quickly to avoid complicating spending and tax legislation now under consideration.

WASHINGTON -- Baltimore city ordinances restricting cigarette and liquor billboards that may be seen by minors survived a new constitutional challenge in a split decision by a federal appeals court yesterday.In upholding the city's limits on cigarette advertising, the xTC appeals court also gave the Clinton administration a victory in its effort to stop the marketing of tobacco to minors. The administration had supported the Baltimore anti-tobacco measure, seeing the case as a broad test of such restrictions.

THE CONSTITUTION is in a peculiar state of flux. First, in a flurry of flag-waving fervor, just in time for the July 4 recess, the House hurriedly passed an anti-flag-burning amendment designed to overturn a 1989 Supreme Court decision.Then, the Supreme Court reversed itself in two new 5-to-4 decisions that are anathema to liberals, outlawing race-based redistricting in Georgia and forbidding a Virginia state university to discriminate against student publications that are religious in content.

On the 40th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's Brown vs. Board of Education decision, the nation might well ponder the paradox presented by the historic ruling aimed at ending racial segregation in the nation's public schools. As The Sun's Lyle Denniston noted in a Perspective article Sunday, Brown struck down the 58-year-old doctrine of "separate but equal" in education and heralded the end of America's version of apartheid. At the same time, however, its promise of a nation indivisible is not yet fulfilled.

The Supreme Court recently turned down an opportunity to assert that there is a constitutional right to burn a cross, a la the Ku Klux Klan. It had ruled in the past that symbolic speech -- burning a flag, burning a cross, etc. -- is an exercise of the freedom of speech guaranteed by the First Amendment.But by its inaction last month the court left standing the convictions of two Illinois white men who burned a cross to intimidate white neighbors who had entertained black friends. They had been charged under an anti-arson law.Other similar cases are pending in the federal appellate system, and the Supreme Court may be planning to use one of them to make a fuller statement about this issue.

WASHINGTON -- Giving conservative Christians solace in their effort to put God back into the public schools, the Supreme Court cleared the way yesterday for student-led prayers at graduation exercises and for religious programs in school buildings at night and on weekends.In a separate decision strongly favoring the police, the court gave officers new authority to use a frisk for weapons to check for illegal drugs, too. That ruling authorized broader "sense of touch" searches, without a warrant, while patting down a suspect's clothing.

"Islamic terrorists have constitutional rights," lamented one conservative blog, when the Supreme Court said Guantanamo inmates can challenge their detention in court. "These are enemy combatants," railed Sen. John McCain. The court, charged former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy of National Review, sided with foreigners "whose only connection with our body politic is their bloody jihad against Americans." The operating assumption here is that the prisoners are terrorists who were captured while fighting a vicious war against the United States.

The O'Malley administration has joined the chorus calling upon Maryland's highest court to review a decision by the Court of Special Appeals that would render all but meaningless the extensive work local governments and citizens contribute to shaping comprehensive development plans. The state's request to file a supporting motion on behalf of the citizens group appealing the ruling, which was announced last week by state Planning Secretary Richard E. Hall, reflected both short-term and long-term concerns horrifying enough to keep an anti-sprawl advocate up all night.

The next step in the proposed merger of Constellation Energy Group and FPL Group Inc. remains murky as attorneys for the companies continue to review a court decision that could hold up regulatory approval of the deal. The Maryland Court of Appeals earlier this month struck down legislation aimed at firing the Maryland Public Service Commission, but left in place a provision preventing the existing members from ruling on the merger. The court said it wasn't asked to address the matter, all but inviting the two energy companies or the PSC to file lawsuits challenging that portion of the legislation.

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration acknowledged yesterday that it was legally obligated to apply the Geneva Conventions to detainees being held at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere, reversing a position it has held tightly for more than four years. But it declared that the shift would not significantly change the way it treats captives. The declaration set off a heated debate in Congress, where several key members said that the administration must back away from its tough confinement tactics and drop its military commission system for putting detainees on trial, instead adopting procedures closer to the standard U.S. military justice system.

CHICAGO -- When it comes to partisan gerrymandering, the subject of a U.S. Supreme Court decision last week, two numbers are relevant. The first: five. That's how many of the 392 incumbent House members running in 2004 lost to non-incumbents. The second: zero. That's how much chance there is that the Supreme Court will stop this endless, insatiable and alarmingly successful effort to prevent voters from deciding elections. American democracy is beginning to resemble a Western movie set: authentic-looking storefronts with nothing behind them.

WASHINGTON -- Congress is moving quickly to begin writing legislation to allow the creation of military tribunals, reacting to a Supreme Court decision this week that repudiated the Bush administration's use of such tribunals to try Guantanamo detainees without authorization from Congress. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican, said he would introduce legislation on the tribunals after the July Fourth recess, which extends through next week. Minority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, has said he wants to work with the White House on crafting a bill.

A U.S. Supreme Court decision restricting the free-speech rights of public employees has effectively killed a veteran Howard County official's lawsuit against the Ehrlich administration for being fired without warning two years ago. The full implications of the court decision are still being studied, but it also could affect another widely reported case involving George Tarburton, a Maryland Transportation Authority Police officer facing dismissal after...

It appears to be the beginning of the end of Jose Padilla's odyssey. Mr. Padilla is the U.S. citizen whom the Defense Department has detained in the Charleston, S.C., Navy brig since June 2002, when President Bush designated him an "enemy combatant," accusing him of plotting to plant a radiological "dirty bomb" on American soil. He was not charged with a crime. On Dec. 21, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rebuked the government and emphatically rejected its arguments. The government contended that Mr. Padilla's Supreme Court appeal was moot because it had indicted him on terrorism conspiracy charges in Miami in November.

WASHINGTON - Angry over a recent Supreme Court decision, the House of Representatives began a legislative drive yesterday to roll back the power of local governments to seize homes and other private property for economic development projects. By a vote of 231-189, the House approved an amendment forbidding the Bush administration from spending money on projects that seize private property for business development. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, was among those who voted against the amendment, saying she opposes withholding federal dollars "for the enforcement of any decision of the Supreme Court, no matter how opposed I am to that decision."

Two journalists could be jailed as early as this week after the U.S. Supreme Court declined yesterday to hear their appeals of a ruling finding them in contempt of court for refusing to disclose their sources. The decision could have a chilling effect on both reporters who rely on confidential sources to do their jobs and sources who come forward with sensitive information only because their identities will be protected, journalists said yesterday. Matthew Cooper of Time magazine and Judith Miller of The New York Times were held in contempt of court last fall for refusing to tell a grand jury the source or sources who told them the identity of a covert CIA agent.