{"id":463,"date":"2026-07-30T14:42:48","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T14:42:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americanservicereview.com\/?p=463"},"modified":"2026-07-30T14:42:48","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T14:42:48","slug":"completing-the-picture-of-the-courts-criminal-law-term","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americanservicereview.com\/?p=463","title":{"rendered":"Completing the picture of the court\u2019s criminal law term"},"content":{"rendered":"
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As a resource for court observers interested in criminal law, this column completes (together with my prior column) my listing of criminal law and related cases decided by the court this term. Below you will find a list of 19 merits cases the court decided this term that I think are broadly related to criminal law topics \u2013 as well as six more criminal law summary dispositions. A full listing of all the criminal law merits cases decided in a term allows readers to look at the entire forest in addition to single trees.<\/p>\n

Read more How a seemingly unexciting case on retirement plans could have massive consequences<\/a><\/p>\n

The 16 pure criminal law cases discussed in my last column, plus the 19 additional \u201crelated\u201d cases listed below and the six summary dispositions totals 41 criminal law and related decisions issued by the court this term. This constitutes a whopping 60% of the 68 merits cases that the court lists as \u201cOpinions of the Court – 2025\u201d on its website. Don\u2019t let anyone tell you that the Supreme Court does not do much criminal law work. They do.<\/p>\n

Sidenote on the structure of the Supreme Court\u2019s website<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is worth briefly examining here, not just for readers trying to find their way around that website, but also to note the confusion between the undifferentiated mass of justices\u2019 writings that the media and public see, versus what the court thinks are clear divisions between their opinions.<\/p>\n

The Supreme Court\u2019s website is complex, and impossible to figure out unless you spend minutes (hours?) clicking around on it. Seven main topics are listed across the top. These headings yield a total of 44 different subheadings once you click on them. Spend a summer afternoon on this, and you\u2019ll soon be sleeping among the daisies.<\/p>\n

For official writings, the court\u2019s website divides the justices\u2019 opinions into two subheadings. One is captioned \u201cOpinions of the Court,\u201d consisting primarily of the justices\u2019 precedential legal views in cases after full briefing and oral argument. Here the court also lists \u201csummary\u201d dispositions, that is, decisions issued without full briefing or oral argument based on the petition for certiorari (review) papers alone. And then there is a separate subcategory, titled \u201cOpinions Relating to Orders.\u201d The latter category addresses what has become known as the \u201cinterim\u201d or \u201cemergency\u201d or \u201cshadow\u201d docket \u2013 my strong-but-unpopular view is that we should just use the court\u2019s own term and call this the \u201corders\u201d docket. This part of the court\u2019s website includes opinions issued upon the denial or granting of stays (emergency or otherwise) \u2013 but it also<\/em> includes opinions that a justice or justices might write to dissent from the denial of a petition for certiorari.<\/p>\n

This two-part division of justices\u2019 writings does not perfectly match the way court observers tend to think about what the court does. What a justice says about a legal issue is important, no matter where the court decides to publish it. And when hard copies of the court\u2019s work are finally published in thick volumes, these are labeled the U.S. Reports. The justices used to say that the \u201copinions\u201d decisions are forceful legal precedents, while those on the \u201corders\u201d docket are not. But that division appears to have broken down. And any interested court observer needs to examine both places to have a full understanding of what the justices are officially saying.<\/p>\n

Now that that\u2019s clear (smile), here are some further thoughts, and additional lists, summarizing this term\u2019s criminal law writings published as \u201cOpinions of the Court.\u201d<\/p>\n

Further thoughts about the 16 pure criminal law decisions<\/strong><\/p>\n

In my July 15 column, I wrote about the 16 pure criminal law cases decided by the court this term after full briefing and oral argument. That\u2019s almost 30% of the court\u2019s merits docket. Eleven of the 16 were decided in favor of a criminal defendant or the defense\u2019s view. And this takes work: the 16 pure criminal law cases alone totaled 624 pages of writing (I added them up). My prior column offered some immediate thoughts about these \u201cpure\u201d cases; below are a few additional ones. (I recently spoke about the court\u2019s criminal work on The Dispatch\u2019s \u201cAdvisory Opinions\u201d podcast.)<\/p>\n