here.
This Friday’s conference represents a significant date in the Supreme Court’s schedule: Based on the schedule prescribed by the court’s rules, it is the last conference at which a cert petition can be granted and the case heard during the court’s April sitting. Because it appears that sitting is mostly empty at the moment, this conference will be a critical one for filling up the court’s calendar.
Happily, the court has a lot to work with: There are a whopping 14 new relisted cases this week, although many of them involve the same or similar issues. Between the heavy caseload and the press of business, this update will have to be summary.
In the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972, Congress strengthened the religious protections in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act by requiring employers to accommodate their employees’ religious beliefs and practices unless doing so would impose “undue hardship” on the business. Five years later, the court held in Trans World Airlines v. Hardison that an employer suffers “undue hardship” if accommodating an employee’s religion would require “more than a de minimis cost.” That low threshold for finding “undue hardship” has been criticized over the years for offering little protection to religious observance. During the Trump administration, the court called for the views of the solicitor general in Patterson v. Walgreen Co., and the government recommended that Hardison be reconsidered and overruled in that case. While the court...
Federal authorities say a California vascular practice and its physician agree to pay more than $6.73 million to resolve allegations that unnecessary interventional procedures were billed to Medic...
