SCOTUS returns to the bench today

From Law.com:

From the moment it returns to the bench today, the Supreme Court will be embarking on a schedule that almost guarantees it will make controversial headlines in the midst of the 2008 presidential campaign.

At times in its history, the high court has deliberately stepped back from the limelight in presidential election years. But for all its talk of judicial modesty, the current Court seems to be ignoring the political calendar and saying, "Bring it on."

The Court's high-profile year begins at 10 a.m. Monday with consideration of Baze v. Rees, a challenge to the lethal-injection formula used in most executions.

The pace continues Wednesday with arguments in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, which could affect the 2008 election directly by either upholding or striking down voter identification laws -- laws that critics say will suppress Democratic voter turnout.

Then in March the high court takes up District of Columbia v. Heller to decide the hottest-potato question in constitutional law: the meaning of the Second Amendment's right to "keep and bear arms."

And sometime soon after that, most likely, it will rule on the legal rights of Guantanamo detainees in Boumediene v. Bush, a case it first declined to review, then added to its docket.

And sometime soon after that, most likely, it will rule on the legal rights of Guantanamo detainees in Boumediene v. Bush, a case it first declined to review, then added to its docket.

All this is happening under the stewardship of Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., who said during his 2005 confirmation hearings, "I don't think the courts should have a dominant role in society." The Constitution’s Framers, Roberts continued, "would not have sat around and said, 'Let's take all the hard issues and give them over to the judges.' That would have been the furthest thing from their mind."