The United States Supreme Court Building in Washington, D.C. The building’s prominent feature is its massive portico, supported by tall Corinthian columns. Above the columns, the triangular pediment displays intricate sculptures, with large steps leading up to the entrance. The foreground features a wide marble plaza with symmetrical patterns. The soft lighting suggests it is early morning or late afternoon.
Photo by Mark Fischer via Flickr.
Liliana Stinson ’27
Contributing Writer
The Supreme Court of the United States is more political than ever. In just its most recent term, the Court has — led by a 6-to-3 conservative majority — overturned a major precedent for administrative agencies, granted broad immunity to the office of the president and drawn criticisms for the alleged corruption taking place among its Justices.
It is in this context that the Roberts Court — the name for the Supreme Court led by current Chief Justice John Roberts — began its October Term on Monday, Oct. 7, during which the Court will hear cases on topics including capital punishment, gender-affirming care bans, firearm regulations, flavored vapes and the administrative state.
To preview this term, legal scholar and Mount Holyoke College President Danielle Holley gave an interview to Mount Holyoke News with her analysis. She explained that while this is a less high-profile term — at least compared to the Court’s recent terms — the Supreme Court’s agenda remains deeply ideological. “I think the work of the Trump-Roberts Court will be very significant this year, and in fact, maybe more dangerous in terms like this because there’s less attention [on it],” Holley said. More than anything else, Holley said, the docket is indicative of “extreme activism on the right.”
“It’s almost like the conservative legislatures and litigants are teeing [cases] up and … the Supreme Court is … knocking out whatever comes to them,” Holley said.
One of the Supreme Court’s most notable cases this term was heard on Oct. 9: Glossip v. Oklahoma, a case regarding capital punishment. The independent publication SCOTUSblog describes the case as asking “whether due process of law requires reversal where a capital conviction is so infected with errors that the state no longer seeks to defend it.”
This case comes not even two weeks after the Supreme Court refused to block the execution of Marcellus Williams, who was executed despite evidence of his innocence and testimony that the prosecuting attorney excluded at least one juror due to their race, which is illegal.
These two cases are striking in their similarity. Richard Glossip has spent 26 years on death row for the murder of Barry Van Treese, the owner of the Oklahoma City motel that Glossip managed. However, following Glossip’s conviction, it came to light that he did not receive a fair trial, to the point where the Oklahoma Attorney General has stated “the record … does not support that he is guilty of first degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt.” Yet, Glossip may very well be executed by the state of Oklahoma if the Supreme Court does not intervene.
However, as Holley explained, “Glossip v. Oklahoma is a substantive due process case [and] this court is not a fan of substantive due process,” limiting the likelihood that the Court will step in and ensure Glossip receives his due process. “It sounds so outrageous and visceral,” Holley said. “You could know that the person’s innocent. They’re innocent to the point where the state refuses to continue to represent that they’re guilty, and yet, they’re still being executed.”
Given the recent attention and activism that the death penalty has garnered, Holley said that “it’s so important to vote for governor, it’s so important to vote for state legislators, because [the death penalty] can be solved on the state level … if people are activists around human rights, it’s hard not to be an activist around the death penalty, and we need to see more activism.”
Garland v. Vanderstock was heard on Oct. 8, a case which questions whether “ghost guns” — untraceable guns that can be assembled via kits — can be regulated as firearms by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
This case is notable in two primary areas. The first, Holley explained, is how it serves the Court’s agenda regarding the Second Amendment, “which is expanding the Second Amendment to the point where, basically, there is almost no tolerated regulation of firearms.”
The case is also notable because of how the justices will interpret Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, a landmark Supreme Court decision last term which overturned the Chevron doctrine, or the ability for administrative agencies to interpret their own statutes.
As Holley noted, without the Chevron doctrine, this case’s central question is almost “is the ATF going to be allowed to interpret its own statute?” As such, “this will be an interesting case to see how the Supreme Court uses their new ‘Loper Bright test’ to determine how much power agencies really have,” Holley said.
There are many other cases this term which will prove just how far the Justices will interpret Loper Bright, including City and County of San Francisco v. Environmental Protection Agency, a case regarding the EPA’s ability to regulate pollution; and Food and Drug Administration v. Wages and White Lion Investments, a case concerning the FDA’s decision to deny marketing authorization for flavored vapes and e-cigarettes made by Triton Distribution.
Perhaps the most consequential case of this term, however, will be United States v. Skrmetti: a case which challenges Tennessee’s ban on access to all gender affirming care for transgender minors.
The American Civil Liberties Union describes this case as a “landmark legal challenge,” as it will decide whether or not gender affirming care bans — which have been instituted in 24 states — are constitutional. Additionally, the ACLU reported that “U.S. v. Skrmetti will be a major test of how far the court is willing to stretch Dobbs to allow states to ban other health care. The court’s ruling could serve as a stepping stone towards further limiting access to abortion, IVF and birth control.”
Crucial to this case is the fact that the Tennessee law allows cisgender youth to receive hormone therapy, which blatantly violates the Equal Protections Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
However, despite the law’s discrimination based on both sex and gender identity, the Court has been engaged in what Holley called “the clear shrinkage of the meaning of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment,” so that it is only viewed “from the perspective of cisgender white men.”
Holley noted major decisions such as Dobbs vs. Jackson Women's Health Organization and Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard as cases that fall in line with that perspective. Accordingly, she continued, “I have a feeling that the Supreme Court is not going to recognize transgender affirming care as a fundamental right.”
“It’s dangerous, what they’re doing … and if [the Court] allows the Tennessee law to stand, we know there are other states who have passed these kinds of laws,” Holley said. “There’s a Florida law that bans health care for transgender minors and restricts it [for] transgender adults. … We could end up with 20 states that make it illegal to do any form of transgender affirming care.”
“The Supreme Court is going to do nothing but embolden people who want to participate in legalized discrimination of the kind we see here,” Holley said.
This is “another reason why people need to go vote,” Holley emphasized for the second time. “When we talk about elections, we unfortunately end up talking just about the top of the ticket and not the things that matter so much in everyday people’s lives, which we only start to notice when the Supreme Court all of a sudden is taking that rug out from under us.”
“Once your court doesn’t respect precedent, they’re essentially a rogue court. Along with [their] ethical problems, [the Court’s] refusal to respect precedent … will make them one of the most infamous collections of a Supreme Court we’ve ever had. … They’re going to go down in history in an extremely negative way, but I don't think they care about that,” Holley said. “I think they’re much more interested that they’ve been able to successfully push forth their ideological agenda. They’re not worried about history.”
Quill Nishi-Leonard ’27 contributed fact-checking.