The 20-year-old SCOTUSblog is precisely what it sounds like a blog that covers the Supreme Court. Its readers, including lawyers, reporters, and TV anchors, depend on its coverage of high-stakes cases.
Denniston has a hard pass from the Supreme Court through WBUR in Boston, and his staff rushes to the office when the court hands down an opinion, such as the healthcare ruling.
Citations
Every time the Supreme Court makes a significant decision, thousands follow along at SCOTUSblog. The 20-year-old blog is devoted to comprehensive coverage of the Supreme Court. Attorneys, reporters, and TV anchors read SCOTUSblog to get the latest news about the court’s rulings. The site also covers the cases from the certiorari stage through the merits stage and provides live blogs as the court announces its opinions. SCOTUSblog has become a mainstay in the world of politics and law.
In recent years, the SCOTUSblog has come under fire from some conservatives and some members of Congress. The site’s founder, Tom Goldstein, has accused critics of “shooting the messenger.” Despite these criticisms, SCOTUSblog remains a popular source of information about the Supreme Court. The blog is free to use and offers a variety of features, including a search feature, a glossary, and a timeline.
The blog is a valuable resource for students interested in the Supreme Court and Constitutional issues. However, the site’s content is written at a high level, so it may be difficult for students to understand without teacher guidance. Teachers can help students understand the Supreme Court better by presenting background information on constitutional issues and terms before reading SCOTUSblog.
SCOTUSblog is often cited in court opinions by judges and lawyers. These citations raise questions about the law of evidence, the ethics of the judiciary, and litigants’ constitutional and procedural rights. The authorities also raise concerns about the reliability of online sources and the need for more reliable and permanent archival copies. The nineteenth edition of the Bluebook includes rules for citing blogs, but the rules are not specific about locating a particular post. In addition, twenty-eight of the eighty-five opinions analyzed in this study do not include the date of the cited blog post.
The site’s founder, Tom Goldstein, is a lawyer who litigates cases before the Supreme Court. His wife, Amy Howe, works as a reporter for SCOTUSblog. The couple has separated the website from their law firm through various firewalls. Goldstein has applied for a press credential from the Supreme Court but has not received it yet. SCOTUSblog will lose guaranteed access to the pressroom and preferred seating at oral arguments if he does not receive a pass.
References
Whether for research, fact-checking, or as sources of precedent, law students and lawyers increasingly turn to blogs and social media for their legal work. The judiciary is also taking note of these new, non-traditional sources and incorporating them into their opinions. In some cases, a blog may provide the only source of information on an emerging issue. However, various issues surrounding the use of these blogs have yet to be fully addressed.
For example, judges have varying opinions about how blogs should be cited and preserved. The nineteenth edition of the Bluebook contains a provision that requires citations to online resources to include a link to the archived version of the help. This is an important step, but it is not enough. Blog posts are constantly changing, and it is challenging to keep track of changes. The result is that a court’s citation to a blog post could become obsolete if the blogger updates the post without including an indication of the change.
Furthermore, many scholarly authors have noted that bloggers often edit their posts at will without regard to the post’s original language. For example, Douglas Berman’s Sentencing Law & Policy Blog has been cited in several opinions and is a critical resource on federal sentencing. However, Berman often updates his posts with different text that appears to be part of the original post.
As the use of these new, non-traditional sources grows, courts need to examine their citation policies and practices. This collection of Supreme Court citation networks from the 2014 Term allows exploring these topics. The group also includes links to CourtListener network visualizations and SCOTUSBlog entries.
Quotes
SCOTUSblog is a legal blog that tracks the Supreme Court. It posts case information as soon as the Court releases it and often has more detailed information than other sources. It also hosts symposiums with leading experts on the cases before the Court. The blog is read by lawyers and law professors who follow the court closely.
The blog’s citations are sometimes tricky to follow because they do not follow the Bluebook style of citing. For example, SCOTUSblog does not always italicize the “v.” in “versus” inside the citation. This is common in lower courts but not the Supreme Court. In addition, the blog citations often include the post’s day, month, and year. This can make it difficult for researchers to find the original post.
Judges’ case citations reveal much about their dispositions and can provide valuable insight into the Court’s reasoning. For this reason, empirical scholars have spent much time and energy analyzing judges’ case citations. Using these analyses, we can learn much about the justices’ perspectives on the cases they review and their relationships with each other.
One of the most important factors we can discern from case citations is how the justices interact with their audience. The justices may cite articles to communicate with other judges or academic audiences, and they may cite them to develop or support their positions on the case.
It is also possible that the justices cite articles to inform the public about the Supreme Court’s decisions. Some of the justices’ citations in oral arguments may also be intended to convey their view of the case’s impact on the country.
The justices cited an average of three journal articles in each case in the past two terms. In addition, they tended to mention most journal articles with certain types of opinions. For instance, Thomas cited most journal articles in his dissent in Carpenter. The justices also tended to cite articles from elite law journals more frequently than other journals, but they did not limit themselves to these journals.
Footnotes
When a Supreme Court decision is cited, it should contain a footnote with all the information needed to find the source. This includes the author, title, and page numbers. The footnote should also include the date of publication, if available. This is important because many sources are updated often. For example, if a blog post is cited in a case, it may be rewritten later to reflect new information. If the latest version is not included in the footnote, it won’t be easy to find.
The Internet has revolutionized how people communicate, including in law. This has created a new type of legal source that is referred to as a “blog.” A blog is an online journal updated frequently with current news, research, and commentary. It is a valuable tool for legal scholars and practitioners to disseminate their work to a broad audience quickly. It is also an invaluable tool for judges to analyze complex issues. For example, Douglas Berman’s Sentencing Law & Policy blog was an essential resource for judges interpreting the Blakely and Booker decisions.
Justices frequently cite academic articles in their opinions. These citations provide clues about the justices’ views on particular issues and their relationships with the legal academy. Empirical scholars have studied these citations for years and found exciting patterns.
For instance, the justices cite articles from elite law schools’ law reviews more than other journals. This is understandable because the top-ranked journals compete with one another for the best authors and students. However, it is equally significant that some journals outside these elite law schools receive multiple citations from the justices.
While many scholars have studied the impact of traditional print sources on the legal system, fewer studies have focused on blogs. The question of how to cite a blog is an essential issue because it has implications for the future of the law. If a judge cites a blog, and the blog disappears or is updated without noting the change, it could lead to inconsistencies in the law.