I Fought the Law

Stripped

They couldn't get past the stem cell research veto, but it's nice to see the House has managed to get down on some jurisdictional stripping. It probably won't pass the Senate, so they say, but if it does the constitutionality of the bill is kind of up in the air. There are a handful of geeky Fed Courts cases about this, but I don't believe the courts have taken on jurisdiction stripping recently in any meaningful way. As my Fed Courts professor said, a showdown on this issue has been avoided mainly because Congress, regardless of the degree and direction of its ideological slant, has generally been trusted not to open up this can of worms. Although a friend pointed out this morning that there have been at least two Supreme Court cases in the past few years where the Court dodged the issue, so apparantly Congress has been dallying in this field after all.

In other legal stripping news, the Third Circuit just held that lapdancing in bars is not protected by the First Amendment. Sounds like the New Jersey Division of Alcoholic Beverage Control could use some lobbying.

Posted by hb at July 20, 2006 08:50 AM