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Resuming our traditional “This Day in History” segment, we begin with
recollections of the catastrophic events of July 4, 2022—in which a young man,
using an assault weapon and a high-capacity magazine, fired 70 rounds of
ammunition into a crowd of Independence Day parade-goers in Highland Park,
causing the deaths of seven and injuries to many more. Pondering again the heath
care, Rule of Law, and societal-cultural crises that gun violence in America
continues to promote, a brief restatement of those experience-tested policy actions
that should be pursued in remedial response—in addition to the court-specific
things that followed the Illinois tragedy: Not only charging the shooter with
various criminal charges, including first-degree murder, but also alleging that his
father unlawfully signed his son’s application for the firearms several years earlier,
knowing of the shooter’s instability and threats of violence—and similarly seeking
damages against the weapon manufacturer, Smith & Wesson, for intentionally
marketing its products to youth through a campaign that glorifies military combat.
Then, in this second of a three-arc series of broadcasts on the meaning and import
of the most significant Supreme Court cases of this term, a brief review of four
major rulings of recent weeks—before turning to the landmark, geography-altering
decisions announced in the last days of this week. Those include: (1) A unanimous
order in an employee challenge to the Postal Service’s declination to accommodate
his religious commitment not to work on Sundays (not granting his request but
heightening the legal standard for review of it); (2) A split-decision ruling
overturning 40 years of judicial precedent and prohibiting public and private
universities nationwide from considering race in their reviews of the candidacies of
potential student enrollees; (3) A similarly divisive opinion invalidating the
President’s student loan forgiveness initiative for some 40 million potential
beneficiaries as inconsistent with the “major questions doctrine” (also explained in
the broadcast); and (4) A third no-less-controversial ruling in favor of a wedding
website provider who alleged a violation of her free speech rights in the potential
application to her business of a Colorado law prohibiting commercial
discrimination against same-sex couples, among other immutable characteristics.
In response to the questions and comments of many listeners, calling to express
concerns about and objections to these Supreme Court decisions, the broadcast
concludes with general observations about the implications of them for
contemporary America—and for the generations ahead. [Note: In the third series
in this arc, that “assessment of the term” discussion continues, revisiting the
meaning of these landmark opinions and several others announced just recently.]
