From the publisher’s website:

The Roberts Court, seven years old, sits at the center of a constitutional maelstrom. Through four landmark decisions, Marcia Coyle, one of the most prestigious experts on the Supreme Court, reveals the fault lines in the conservative-dominated Court led by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr.

Seven minutes after President Obama put his signature to a landmark national health care insurance program, a lawyer in the office of Florida GOP attorney general Bill McCollum hit a computer key, sparking a legal challenge to the new law that would eventually reach the nation’s highest court. Health care is only the most visible and recent front in a battle over the meaning and scope of the U.S. Constitution. The battleground is the United States Supreme Court, and one of the most skilled, insightful, and trenchant of its observers takes us close up to watch it in action.

Marcia Coyle’s brilliant inside account of the High Court captures four landmark decisions—concerning health care, money in elections, guns at home, and race in schools. Coyle examines how those cases began—the personalities and conflicts that catapulted them onto the national scene—and how they ultimately exposed the great divides among the justices, such as the originalists versus the pragmatists on guns and the Second Amendment, and corporate speech versus human speech in the controversial Citizens United campaign case. Most dramatically, her analysis shows how dedicated conservative lawyers and groups are strategizing to find cases and crafting them to bring up the judicial road to the Supreme Court with an eye on a receptive conservative majority.

The Roberts Court offers a ringside seat at the struggle to lay down the law of the land.

For more new titles at Tarlton, browse the latest arrivals.

The cases granted review were Mount Holly, N.J. v. Mount Holly Gardens Citizens in Action Inc. (11-1507), Air Wisconsin Airlines Corp. v. Hoeper (12-315), Ray Haluch Gravel Co. v. Central Pension Fund of the International Union of Operating Engineers and Participating Employers (12-992), and Law v. Siegel (12-5196).

The Addams Family original TV series, 1964-1966

Created originally as cartoon characters by Charles Addams, and making their debut in The New Yorker magazine, the Addams Family is anything but typical, taking delight in the macabre while unaware that others find them bizarre or frightening.  True pop culture icons, their ghoulish charm has persisted through decades of television episodes, films, book, video games, and even a musical.

- from Wikipedia article

Tarlton has all 64 half-hour episodes of the original series, in a three-volume DVD set.  Viewing suggestion: Take a cue from the Addams Family and avoid the sweltering sun this summer by checking out some DVDs to enjoy indoors.   

Tarlton’s Law in Popular Culture collection (LPOP) is always growing with the addition of new titles, including feature films and television series on DVD. We’re spreading the word by featuring selected titles here on our blog. LPOP videos and DVDs are exclusively available to the UT law school community, i.e. students, staff and faculty, for three day loan. Enjoy!

If you follow our blog, you might remember that a few months ago we wrote about a couple interesting cases that were before the Supreme Court.

First, we wrote about the dispute between Texas and Oklahoma in Tarrant Regional Water District v. Herrmann. To recap, that case concerned the rights to use water from the Red River water basin. In 1978, Texas and Oklahoma, along with Arkansas and Louisiana, entered into an agreement that regulated how each state could draw water from the river. As its need for water grew, especially with the expansion of the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, Texas needed an increasingly large amount of water. So, it argued that, under the terms of the agreement, it could draw water that was physically within Oklahoma, and still be within its rights.

The Supreme Court, however, roundly disagreed with the Lone Star State. In a unanimous opinion written by Justice Sotomayor, the Court addressed — and dismantled —  all of Texas’s arguments for why it should be entitled to this water.

Still, perhaps it’s not a total loss. At least UT got a shout out from Justice Sotomayor: “As an important geographic feature of this region, the Red River has lent its name to a valley, a Civil War Campaign, and a famed college football rivalry between the Longhorns of Texas [Hook 'em!] and the Sooners of Oklahoma” (slip op., at 2) (emphasis and school pride added).

Second, we also wrote about a case concerning the patentability of human genes. In the case Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Myriad held patents on the location and sequence of the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes, which are genetic mutations that increase the risk of breast and ovarian cancer. In its claims for these patents, Myriad asserted a right to the “isolated DNA coding” for these genes. This would give them the exclusive right to test whether someone carries these genes. The Association argued that these patents were invalid because, under patent law, “products of nature” cannot be patented. And genes are clearly “products of nature.”

In another unanimous decision, Justice Thomas mostly agreed with the Association. The Court wrote that it has held for many years that laws of nature/products of nature are the basic building blocks of science and cannot be patented. Here, Myriad only identified certain genes; it did not create the genes. Certainly it took a lot of work to do so, “extensive effort alone is insufficient” to obtain a patent (slip op., at 14.). Accordingly, the Court struck down Myriad’s patents.

At the same time, however, the court wrote that synthesized DNA called complementary DNA (cDNA) is not a product of nature and could be patented.

One final note: remember that if you want to find any of the most recent slip opinions from the U.S. Supreme Court, check the Court’s website. And if you want to read a live blog about the decisions as they come out, check out SCOTUSblog.

(Justice Scalia joined the majority opinion in Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics except with regards to one section and filed a short concurring opinion to explain his position.)

Appropriately enough, Tarlton recently added to its collection Father, Son, and Constitution: How Justice Tom Clark and Attorney General Ramsey Clark Shaped American Democracy by Alexander Wohl. This book has an unusual tale to tell: U.S. Supreme Court Justice Tom Clark, a UT Law alum whose papers are housed at Tarlton, resigned his seat on the Court in 1967 so that his son Ramsey could serve as Attorney General without a conflict of interest.

Of course, not all fathers and their children look out for each other so well. Fathers of Conscience: Mixed-Race Inheritance in the Antebellum South by Bernie D. Jones challenges assumptions about what family means. This work uses legal decisions regarding contested wills to provide a window into the relations between white male planters and their mixed race children to whom they had tried to leave property.

The subject of fatherhood has also been the subject of more entertaining fare, such as the 1979 movie Kramer vs. Kramer. This now classic film stars Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep as divorcing parents who go to court to contest custody over their son. The ending offers a moving testament to the bond between father and child.

All in all, there are many diverting choices and much food for thought. Happy Father’s Day!