How Mike Huckabee and Robert Bork Could Help Center Neil Gorsuch

SHERRY F. COLB

Cornell law professor Sherry F. Colb analyzes an unusual comment by former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee that a government restriction on the size of people’s Thanksgiving gathering would violate the Fourth Amendment’s guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizures. Colb describes a similar statement (in a different context) by conservative Supreme Court nominee Robert H. Bork during his (unsuccessful) confirmation hearings in 1987 and observes from that pattern a possibility that even as unenumerated rights are eroded, the Court might be creative in identifying a source of privacy rights elsewhere in the Constitution.

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Steele v. Harris

Citation: 2020-Ohio-5480

Opinion Date: December 2, 2020

Judge: Per Curiam

Areas of Law: Criminal Law

The Supreme Court affirmed the order of the court of appeals dismissing Appellant's petition for a writ of habeas corpus, holding that Appellant failed to state a claim cognizable in habeas corpus. Appellant, an inmate at the Trumbull Correctional Institution, filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus alleging that his transfer from juvenile court to adult court was void and that, therefore, his resulting convictions were also void. The court of appeals held that Appellant's conviction was barred by res judicata. Further, the court rejected Appellant's claim on the merits. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that, based on this Court's decision in Smith v. May, 148 N.E.3d 542, Appellant failed to state a claim cognizable in habeas corpus.

West v. Bode

Citation: 2020-Ohio-5473

Opinion Date: December 2, 2020

Judge: Judith L. French

Areas of Law: Energy, Oil & Gas Law

The Supreme Court held that there is no irreconcilable conflict between the general provisions of the Ohio Marketable Title Act, Ohio Rev. Code 5301.47 et seq., as applied to severed mineral interests, and the Ohio Dormant Mineral Act, Ohio Rev. Code 5301.56. Appellants claimed they were the owners of a portion of a severed royalty interest in oil and gas underlying about sixty-six acres of land in Monroe County. Appellees filed this action for a declaratory judgment that the Marketable Title Act had extinguished the severed royalty interest and had vested that previously severed interest in Appellees. Appellants argued that the Dormant Mineral Act supersedes and controls over the original Marketable Title Act due to a conflict between the two acts. The trial court declared Appellants the owners of a 1/16 royalty interest, holding that the Dormant Mineral Act irreconcilably conflicts with the general provisions of the Marketable Title Act and that the more specific Dormant Mineral Act controls. The court of appeals reversed. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that there is no irreconcilable conflict between the two acts, and therefore, they are applied as independent, alternative statutory mechanisms that may be used to reunite severed mineral interests with the surface property subject to those interests.

In re R.B.

Citation: 2020-Ohio-5476

Opinion Date: December 2, 2020

Judge: DeWine

Areas of Law: Juvenile Law

The Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the court of appeals concluding that the juvenile court lacked jurisdiction to adjudicate R.B. delinquent, holding that the timing requirements of Ohio Rev. Code 2152.84 are not jurisdictional. The juvenile court adjudicated R.B. delinquent, classified him as a sex offender, and imposed a disposition that included probation. After a second sex-offender-classification hearing the juvenile court kept R.B.'s classification the same. R.B. appealed, arguing that the juvenile court was required to hold the review hearing and and issue its decision on the precise day his disposition ended and because the juvenile court did not do so, it lost jurisdiction to continue his classification. The Supreme Court disagreed, holding (1) the language "upon completion of the disposition" found in section 2152.84(A)(1) requires only that the court's review take place within a "reasonable time" of the juvenile's completion of his disposition; and (2) section 2151.23(A)(15) vests the juvenile court with jurisdiction to carry out its requirements under the classification statutes, independent of whether the delinquent child has reached the age of twenty-one.

State ex rel. AWMS Water Solutions, LLC v. Mertz

Citation: 2020-Ohio-5482

Opinion Date: December 2, 2020

Judge: Fischer

Areas of Law: Real Estate & Property Law

The Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the court of appeals granting summary judgment for the State and denying Appellant's petition for a writ of mandamus to compel the State to initiate property-appropriation proceedings in this regulatory-takings case, holding that genuine issues of material fact remained regarding whether Appellant had suffered a total or partial taking. Appellant alleged that it had suffered a taking of its property when the Ohio Department of Natural Resources' Division of Oil and Gas Resources Management suspended Appellant's operation of one of its two saltwater-injection wells. The Division suspended the well's operation due to concerns that the well had induced two earthquakes in its vicinity. The court of appeals granted summary judgment for the State, determining that Appellant had suffered neither a total nor a partial governmental taking. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that genuine issues of material fact precluded summary judgment.