A New Term of Supreme Chaos

Melissa Murray (0:00)

Strict Scrutiny is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Guess what, folks? It's back to school season. And this year, five million children across Texas are going to be greeted by, wait for it, the 10 commandments in their classrooms. Texas politicians passed a law requiring the 10 commandments to be displayed in every public school classroom, forcing their religion on every kid in those schools. 28 families in Texas, supported by Americans United for Separation of Church and State are taking the fight to the Supreme Court.

We need you to amplify their voices before the Supreme Court gets its hands on this case. They're going to go up, but we're going to fight to get them taken down.

That was Texas public school parent Ted Lowe. Ted and Rebecca Lowe are an interfaith couple. Ted is Jewish and Rebecca is Christian, and their kids are in Texas public schools. The story that they tell in this video is moving, and we hope that everyone hears it and shares it. Because there is a human cost to Christian nationalist policies like these Ten Commandments laws and the decisions that the Supreme Court hands down. You can visit au.org/10c to learn more about this case and how you can help join the fight to protect church-state separation.

Leah Litman (1:22)

Thank you.

SPEAKER_3 (1:23)

I think it's too beautiful, ladies like this, they're going to have the last word. She spoke, not elegantly, but with unmistakable clarity.

All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks.

Leah Litman (1:58)

Hello and welcome back to Strict Scrutiny, your podcast about the Supreme Court and the legal culture that surrounds it. We're your hosts. I'm Leah Litman.

Kate Shaw (2:05)

I'm Kate Shaw.

Melissa Murray (2:06)

And I'm Melissa Murray. And yes, folks, the band is back together. It is a new Supreme Court term, which means that we need to be operating on all cylinders to brace for what might be coming down the pike. So with all of the justices back to their regularly scheduled Scotus maxing, we have decided that we will respond in kind with a little Strict Scrutiny post-maxing.

Kate Shaw (2:31)

When you said firing on all cylinders, for some reason I was just brought to mind, somebody recently told me that our show reminds them of, do you guys ever listen to the NPR show Car Talk, the like brothers who would like just banter? Then she was like, no, no, I mean, because you have such great chemistry. I was like, okay, I think it was meant as a compliment.

Melissa Murray (2:46)

Anyway, I passed that along.

Leah Litman (2:47)

Little did they know, we were post-mogging and pod-mogging each other right before we started recording.

Kate Shaw (2:51)

Right before, but critically not in the actual publicly released version of the episode.

But yes, we are back together. We are very excited to be back together and we're not excited about the fact that we are staring down the barrel of a new Supreme Court term. But since we are, we thought we would provide some table setting, just some big picture thoughts about where we are and what we are looking for in the upcoming term. We are not going to really do a detailed rundown of particular cases, although we will reference some notable ones. But obviously, as we get closer to the arguments in those cases, we will do deep dives on all of those. After we do that table setting, we are going to bring you conversations with two people who can speak to the real effects of some of the legal matters that we will be discussing. So Melissa will talk with Errin Haines about attacks on the press and censorship. And Leah will speak to Mahmoud Khalil about immigration detention.

Okay, on to Scotus, its term starts next week, deep breaths. Who wants to start?

Leah Litman (3:41)

I volunteer as tribute.

Errin Haines (3:43)

I hate it.

Leah Litman (3:45)

I fucking hate it. And by it, I mean both, life of a showgirl encore and the state of the Supreme Court perpetual encore. The combination of the two have me really convinced that our society has gone so far, we just don't have a chance of turning back. But more on the latter, Scotus part, I have two big picture thoughts about where we are now. I'll start with the shorter one.

Kate Shaw (4:06)

We'll come back to a little Taylor later in the hour, waiting for Leah's full takes.

Melissa Murray (4:10)

This is very fucking dark, Leah. I rode here in a waymo and I feel like I already took my life into my own hands already today. This is not what I was expecting.