United States Supreme Court Certiorari Granted

Opinions Filed in June 2018

Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corporation v. Wall-Street.com, LLC

Whether “registration of [a] copyright claim has been made” within the meaning of § 411(a) when the copyright holder delivers the required application, deposit, and fee to the Copyright Office, as the Fifth and Ninth Circuits have held, or only once the Copyright Office acts on that application, as the Tenth and, in the decision below, the Eleventh Circuit have held.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Copyright

Franchise Tax Board of the State of California v. Gilbert P. Hyatt

Whether Nevada v. Hall, 440 U.S. 410 (1979), which permits a sovereign State to be haled into another State’s courts without its consent, should be overruled.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Sovereign Immunity

Biestek v. Commissioner of Social Security

Whether a vocational expert’s testimony can constitute substantial evidence of “other work” available to an applicant for social security benefits on the basis of a disability, when the expert fails upon the applicant’s request to provide the underlying data on which that testimony is premised.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Disability Law

Dawson v. Steager

Whether Supreme Court precedent and the doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity bar states from exempting groups of state retirees from state income tax while discriminating against similarly situated federal retirees based on the source of their retirement income.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Tax Law

Helsinn Healthcare v. Teva Pharmaceuticals

Whether, under the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act, an inventor’s sale of an invention to a third party that is obligated to keep the invention confidential qualifies as prior art for purposes of determining the patentability of the invention.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Patents

Henry Schein, Inc. v. Archer and White Sales, Inc.

Whether the Federal Arbitration Act permits a court to decline to enforce an agreement delegating questions of arbitrability to an arbitrator if the court concludes the claim of arbitrability is “wholly groundless.”

Area(s) of Law:
  • Arbitration

Nutraceutical Corp. v. Lambert

Whether the Ninth Circuit erred by holding that equitable exceptions apply to mandatory claim-processing rules and excusing a party's failure to timely file a petition for permission to appeal, or a motion for reconsideration, within the Fed. R. Civ. P. 23(f) deadline.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Civil Procedure

Washington Dept. of Licensing v. Cougar Den, Inc.

Whether the Yakama Treaty of 1855 creates a right for tribal members to avoid state taxes on off-reservation commercial activities that make use of public highways.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Indian Law

Apple, Inc. v. Pepper

Whether consumers may sue for antitrust damages anyone who delivers goods to them, even where they seek damages based on prices set by third parties who would be the immediate victims of the alleged offense.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Corporations

Garza v. Idaho

Whether the "presumption of prejudice" recognized in Roe v. Flores-Oretega applies where a criminal defendant instructs his trial counsel to file a notice of appeal but trial counsel decides not to do so because the defendant's plea agreement included an appeal waiver?

Area(s) of Law:
  • Appellate Procedure

Lorenzo v. SEC

Whether an insufficient fraudulent statement claim can form the basis for fraudulent scheme claim under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and SEC Rule 10b-5(b).

Area(s) of Law:
  • Business Law

Sturgeon v. Frost

Whether the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA) prohibits the National Park Service (NPS) from exercising regulatory control over State, Native Corporation, and private land physically located within the boundaries of the National Park System in Alaska.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Property Law

Timbs v. Indiana

Whether the Eighth Amendment’s Excessive Fines Clause is incorporated against the States under the Fourteenth Amendment.

Area(s) of Law:
  • Constitutional Law

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