Exxon v. Baker (5–3 that $2.5 billion was too high a damage award): After the Exxon Valdez oil spill, Exxon paid $3 billion in cleanup fees and fines. Alaskan fishermen brought this case for compensatory damages due to their lost revenue from the damaged fishing areas. They also asked for punitive damages. The jury awarded $287 million in compensatory damages to some of the fishermen (some others had already settled their claims), and it assessed $5,000 in punitive damages against captain Hazelwood and $5 billion against Exxon (an appeals court later halved the amount awarded to Exxon, to $2.5 billion). Exxon made three arguments in this case: that it should not face punitive damages for Hazelwood’s actions, that these kinds of events were regulated by the Clean Water Act and no other damages were appropriate, and that the damages award was too large. Justice Alito sat out the case, and the Justices split 4–4 on the question of whether Exxon can be fined for Hazelwood’s actions, so the 9th Circuit’s decision that Exxon can be held responsible stands. The Court found 8-0 that the Clean Water Act does not prohibit this kind of action. Finally, the Court found 5-3 that the damage award was excessive. Justice Souter, writing for the majority, went through a long historical analysis and found that an appropriate ratio of punitive damages to compensatory damages in maritime cases is 1:1.. Justices Souter, Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy, and Thomas agreed on this point. Justices Stevens and Ginsburg each wrote separately to say that they thought Congress should decide the question of punitive damages in the maritime field, and until then the $2.5 billion award should be left standing. Justice Breyer wrote separately to say that he thought the excessiveness of the recklessness here was enough to justify the award.
Kennedy v. Louisiana (5–4 that death penalty is unconstitutional in cases of child rape): Kennedy raped his 8-year-old stepdaughter. He was sentenced to death. He brought suit, claiming the death penalty for child rape violated the 8th Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. In announcing the opinion, Justice Kennedy said that the 8th Amendment must be interpreted “not by the standards that prevailed when the 8th Amendment was adopted” but by evolving standards of decency. Noting the Court’s prior decisions of Roper v. Simmons (2005, invalidating the death penalty for minors), Atkins v. Virginia (2002, invalidating the death penalty for mentally retarded), and Coker v. Georgia (1977, invalidating the death penalty for adult rape), Justice Kennedy summarized the legal situation in the states: 6 U.S. states allow the death penalty for child rape, while 44 states and the federal government do not allow it. There has been no execution for child or adult rape since 1964. Finally, there are only 2 people on death row in the United States for crimes other than homicide (the petitioner is one of them). In comparison, there were 5,702 child rapes in 2005, almost twice as many as homicides, so that number of people would be opened to the death penalty if the law were upheld. Justice Kennedy, joined by Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer, voted to invalidate the law. Justice Alito, joined by Justices Roberts, Scalia, and Thomas, dissented, arguing that the Coker case led states to believe laws like this would be struck down and dissuaded them from passing them, and thus their scarcity is not reflective of a real consensus of opinion. Notably, Justice Alito did not spend much time discussing whether it is proper to examine the 8th Amendment under “standards that prevailed when the 8th Amendment was adopted,” yet Justices Scalia and Thomas joined his opinion in full without writing separate opinions.
Giles v. California (6–3 out-of-court statements by a murder victim are not necessarily allowed as evidence in the murder trial): Giles shot and killed his girlfriend. At trial, he argued self defense. To rebut that claim, the prosecution sought to bring into evidence statements the girlfriend had made about prior violence against her by Giles. Giles argued that the 6th Amendment gave him a right to cross examine her, but since she couldn’t be cross examined the statements couldn’t be used. California said that it was Giles’s fault that she was unavailable, so he had no right to complain. The Supreme Court, in an opinion by Justice Scalia, found that the 6th Amendment right to confrontation did not have an exception for cases like there; there is an exception if someone makes a witness unavailable intentionally so that the person cannot testify, but California’s argument against Giles was broader than that. Justices Scalia, Roberts, Souter, Thomas, Ginsburg, and Alito joined that opinion, arguing based on historical cases that an exception to the confrontation clause does not exist. Justice Thomas wrote separately to argue that statements to a police officer (like these were) should be admissible anyway, but he joined the majority because he agreed that Giles’s actions were not reasons to make the statements admissible. Justice Alito wrote separately, making an argument similar to Justice Thomas’s. Justice Souter, joined by Justice Ginsburg, wrote separately to say that they were not convinced by historical cases but by the need to avoid the circularity of having a court find that a defendant killed a victim in order to have evidence admitted in the defendant’s murder trial; if the court finds that the defendant killed, what question is left for the jury? Justice Breyer, joined by Justices Stevens and Kennedy, dissented, arguing that historical cases found that an exception applies and the evidence should be admitted.
Plains Commerce Bank v. Long Family Land (9–0 saying Indian Tribal Courts can’t hear cases over non-indians selling reservation land to non-indians): The bank owned some land on an indian reservation (sale of indian land was allowed for a short time by Congress). It sold that land to a non-indian. The Longs had previously leased that land with an option to buy, and they claimed the terms offered to the new buyers were better than the ones they had gotten. They brought their claim before an indian Tribal Court. Tribal Courts generally do not have jurisdiction over non-indians, and the only exceptions are when the case involves a consensual relationship involving an indian (such as a lease or contract) and when the case deals with reservation land and would dramatically affect the tribe. In this case, Justice Roberts wrote for the Court, the Tribal Court was hearing a case about a non-indian bank selling non-indian-owned land to a non-indian, so the Tribal Court had no jurisdiction. He said the Longs are free to pursue their discrimination claims in federal court. The decision of the Court was unanimous, but 4 Justices (Ginsburg, Stevens, Souter, Breyer) would have let the non-indian keep the land while still allowing the Tribal Court to fine the bank $750,000 for the discrimination.
The Court announced that it will release the remaining opinions from this term tomorrow, Thursday, June 26.

Visible frustration concerning increased oil prices was displayed by Senators at a meeting of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship. To prepare for the winter, the committee met to discuss the effect of increasing oil prices on the cost of home heating oil.
Senator Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) presented statistics showing the rising cost of home heating oil in Maine. According to Snowe, the price of home heating oil has increased 135 percent in her state while income has only increased 17 percent. Snowe projects that Mainers will have to spend $5,000 to heat their homes with a per capita income of $33,000. Snowe said that many “could freeze to death,” adding that many throughout the United States will be unable to afford to heat their homes during the winter months.
Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.) said one can attribute the rising price of home heating oil to the rising cost of crude oil. In reference to the White House, Kerry stated that a stronger administration would be doing more to assist Americans. He also said he finds it shocking that Americans continue to waste energy by using electricity when it is not needed after 30 years of gas shocks and efforts to counteract global warming.
Deputy Assistant Energy Secretary for Petroleum Reserves David Johnson said in his testimony that the price of home heating oil can be lowered by increasing domestic production of oil by drilling on continental shelves and in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve (ANWR.) Kerry told Johnson that oil from the ANWR would only lower American gas prices two cents per gallon at full production and that the United States only has three percent of global oil reserves. Kerry continued, saying the United States’ oil supply is not large enough to lower international prices and that the rhetoric employed by Johnson and others has “worn short.”

Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) talks about the Energy Technologies Perspective 2008 report published by the International Energy Agency, saying that the best quote published was said by him. Domenici says that he has never been more frightened for America’s future than he is right now, and urges Congress to remove the ban on off shore drilling. The editorial says that the energy problem is so enormous that it requires bipartisan partnership and that Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) should be Domenici’s bipartisan twin. (1:10)

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Correspondent S. Dawn Jones is covering Amnesty International’s exhibit of a replica of a Guantanamo Bay Prison Cell. Correspondent Meredith Mackenzie is attending an energy forum with Republican Whip Roy Blunt (Mo.) and Rep. Bob Latta (R-Ohio). Legal Affairs correspondent Jay Goodman Tamboli will cover the Supreme Court.
In the House, the Washington Bureau will cover a full House Committee hearing on China’s security developments, a hearing on the national security issues involved with climate change, and a roundtable on diversity. In the Senate, the Bureau will cover a hearing on satisfying energy needs while addressing climate change. Also, the Bureau will cover a hearing on U.S.-Pakistan relations, a discussion of gas price predictions, a hearing on home heating oil prices, and a hearing on the relationship between gas prices and the economy. The Bureau will attend think-tank discussions on Iraq and globalization, a briefing with Senator Barack Obama’s (D-Ill.) campaign manager David Plouffe, and a news conference on the expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit.

Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) says that the U.S. should have been seriously pursuing development of low carbon energy technologies. He says that the U.S. has failed to sustain the support the was needed for many promising technologies that could have decreased the dependence on fossil fuels. (0:57)

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The Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources held a hearing on the challenges to meeting future energy needs and to developing the technologies for meeting increased global energy demand. Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) said that the United States is at a crossroads and now has an opportunity to develop the technologies to break the world’s dependence on fossil fuels. He explained that the final message of the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) report, the goal of reaching a fifty percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, is attainable by 2050.
Ranking Member Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) said that the U.S. is facing two big problems at the same time: increased carbon dioxide emissions and a growing energy dependence. Domenici explained the difficulty to agree on what options Congress should pursue in order to achieve the goal of a more energy efficient nation. He said that there are many “inconvenient truths” that the U.S. must contend with today, including the effort required to reduce domestic carbon dioxide emissions, which if not done correctly will be very costly. Also, Domenici said that no matter how successful the country is in limiting its carbon dioxide emissions, oil will remain an essential part of the “domestic energy mix.”
Neil Hirst, the Director for Energy Technology and Research and Development at IEA, gave a very detailed report on new scenarios and strategies for a more sustainable energy future. Hirst explained that a global goal should be to have carbon dioxide levels in 2050 remain equal to what they are today in 2008. This would require a huge carbon dioxide reduction; the amount of carbon dioxide reduced would have to be greater than current carbon dioxide emissions. Hirst said that the U.S. is facing an urgent challenge which needs a global solution. He also said that a global technology revolution is needed to transform how the world uses its energy.
Raymond Orbach, the Director of the Energy Department’s Office of Science, said that the U.S. needs to focus on the way nature provides fuel “so that we can follow suit.” He explained the country’s growing capability to direct and control matter down to molecular, atomic, and quantum levels. This increasing ability to control the fundamental, nanoscale building blocks of both biological and non-biological matter “holds out a promise” of eventually transforming the way the world will generate, store, transmit, and use energy.

Acting Chairman Walter Lukken of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) says that the volume on futures exchanges has increased 8,000 percent since the CFTC began to function 33 years ago while staffing levels have decreased by 12 percent and that additional staffing is necessary to implement new initiatives. (0:56)

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Rep. Tim Holden (R-Pa.) asks Acting Chairman Walter Lukken of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) if the CFTC has analyzed claims concerning what percentage of oil prices are due to speculation. Lukken responds that the CFTC’s economic staff does not know which economic models are being used in these studies and that nobody at the CFTC has found information supports these statements. (0:48)

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Dr. Adbul Jabbar Sabit, the Attorney General of Afghanistan spoke about the rule of law and its presence in Afghanistan. He said rule of law is a problem in Afghanistan and in the last 20 months he visited 18 provinces and made around 370 arrests. He said the arrests were mainly high-ranking officials, like deputy governors and chief financial officers of the provinces.
He said one of the main problems with the rule of law in Afghanistan is that the court system, which is completely independent, is full of corruption. As a result, he said, a fair percent of the perpetrators were acquitted and those that were convicted received much less severe sentences than their crimes called for.
He said that in a lot of provinces not all citizens are equal, for example, some of the governors are really warlords and perpetrate criminal action in their provinces. Sadit said that these warlord governors are too powerful for the government to restrain and therefore above the law.

The House Committee on Agriculture met to discuss the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and its role in monitoring oil prices. Rep. Jeff Moran (R-Kan.) said that speculation is a component of high oil prices but that speculation is being used as a scapegoat and preventing Congress from addressing other important issues.
Walter Lukken, acting chairman of the CFTC, said that the CFTC launched an investigation in December 2007 to monitor the oil prices, realizing that enforcement and regulation is imperative to the industry. According to Lukken, the CFTC has found that the cost of oil properly reflects supply and demand, adding that the CFTC is unable to find evidence supporting claims that speculation is driving up prices at the pump. Lukken said he welcomes evidence showing why oil prices should be lower than they currently are.
Lukken also said that the CFTC is able to monitor a complex market despite being understaffed. He stated that the CFTC has asked for $27 million dollars in order to increase its staff to historical levels. Lukken told the committee that the CFTC has seen an 8,000 percent increase in activity and will be unable to sustain itself without additional employees.
Lukken expressed support for the Farm Bill, saying that the CFTC is working to comply with it and asking Congress to allow its implementation before revising it. Lukken also said he is confident that the Farm Bill has closed the “Enron Loophole,” a loophole that allows for exchanges made electronically to circumvent US regulation.