Supreme Court of the United States, 1982

The Court affirmed the judgment holding that Massachusetts General Laws § 16C violates the Establishment Clause because it delegates to churches discretionary governmental authority to veto liquor-license applications within 500 feet of the churches.

The Court held that New York may prohibit the knowing promotion and distribution of visual depictions of children engaged in specified sexual conduct, even when the material is not legally obscene.

The Court held that Nebraska ground water is an article of commerce and therefore subject to dormant Commerce Clause scrutiny. Although Nebraska could require permits and impose evenhanded conservation conditions on interstate transfers, its reciprocity requirement was an impermissible barrier because it was not…

The Supreme Court held that the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments forbid imposing the death penalty on a defendant who aids and abets a robbery during which murder is committed by others, where the defendant did not himself kill, attempt to kill, or intend that a killing or the use of lethal force occur.

The Supreme Court reversed the Michigan Court of Appeals, holding that a warrantless search of an impounded automobile is valid when police have probable cause to believe contraband is present, even absent exigent circumstances, and that the scope of such an inventory search may include areas such as the air vents.

The Court held that a district court's refusal to dismiss an indictment based on alleged prosecutorial vindictiveness is not immediately appealable under the collateral-order exception to the final-judgment rule.

Holding that the Education of the Handicapped Act's 'free appropriate public education' requirement is satisfied when a State provides personalized instruction with sufficient support services to permit a handicapped child to benefit educationally -- with a mainstreamed child's IEP needing only to be reasonably…

The Court held that the denial of a motion to dismiss an indictment on prosecutorial-vindictiveness grounds is not immediately appealable under the final-judgment rule or the collateral-order exception.

The Court held that a private creditor's participation with state officials in a prejudgment attachment procedure can constitute state action and action under color of state law for purposes of 42 U.S.C. § 1983.

The Supreme Court held that a privately operated school for maladjusted adolescents, although deriving over 90% (up to 99%) of its operating budget from public funds and subject to extensive state regulation, did not act under color of state law when it discharged a vocational counselor and five teachers; their 42…

The Court held that senior Presidential aides are not categorically entitled to absolute immunity from civil-damages suits merely because of their positions. Instead, executive officials performing discretionary functions generally receive qualified immunity unless their conduct violated clearly established statutory…

The Court held that the Medicaid statute required Massachusetts to apply the statutory income limit to medically needy recipients, even when that limit left some Social Security recipients with less income for nonmedical needs than SSI recipients.

The Court held that Sumitomo Shoji America, Inc. is a U.S. corporation, not a Japanese company, and therefore Article VIII(l) of the U.S.-Japan Friendship, Commerce and Navigation Treaty does not shield it from Title VII liability.

The Supreme Court held that Texas's statute denying free public education to undocumented children violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because the classification is not substantially related to a legitimate state interest. The Court affirmed the Fifth Circuit's judgment.

The Court held that a private Title VII plaintiff may not maintain an across-the-board class action merely by alleging that the employer discriminated against members of the plaintiff's national-origin group.

The Supreme Court held that a federal district court may impose a Rule 37(b)(2)(A) sanction that finds personal jurisdiction over a non‑compliant party, and that such a sanction does not violate the Due Process Clause. The Court affirmed the Third Circuit’s judgment that the district court did not abuse its discretion.

The Supreme Court held that the Double Jeopardy Clause bars retrial after a defendant's first trial ends in a mistrial granted on his own motion only where the conduct giving rise to the motion was intended to provoke the defendant into moving for a mistrial; prosecutorial 'overreaching' or 'harassment' short of such…

The Court affirmed the Sixth Circuit, holding that Kentucky's statutory scheme of posting a summons on a tenant's apartment door does not satisfy the Fourteenth Amendment due process requirement for notice in forcible entry and detainer actions.

The Court affirmed the Sixth Circuit, holding that Kentucky's statute permitting service of eviction notices by posting on apartment doors does not satisfy the Fourteenth Amendment due process requirement of notice reasonably calculated to inform tenants of pending proceedings.

The Supreme Court held that 28 U.S.C. § 1738 requires federal courts to give state court judgments the same preclusive effect those judgments receive in the rendering State's courts, and that Title VII contains no express or implied repeal of that command.

The Supreme Court held that a district court's finding on whether a seniority system was adopted or maintained with an intent to discriminate under Title VII § 703(h) is a pure question of fact subject to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 52(a)'s clearly-erroneous standard, rejecting the Fifth Circuit's practice of…

The Supreme Court held that the Federal Water Pollution Control Act does not require a district court to enjoin immediately every discharge of pollutants made without an NPDES permit; the Act leaves district courts their traditional equitable discretion to order the relief necessary to secure prompt compliance, which…

The Court held that a prisoner challenging a procedurally defaulted trial error through 28 U.S.C. § 2255 must satisfy the more demanding cause-and-actual-prejudice standard rather than the plain-error standard used on direct appeal.

The Court reversed the Sixth Circuit's grants of federal habeas relief to three Ohio prisoners who challenged jury instructions placing the burden of proving self-defense on the defendant.

The Court held that New York’s statutory requirement that parental‑rights termination be proved by a “fair preponderance of the evidence” violates the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause; the State must require at least clear and convincing evidence.

The Court held that neither the federally insured certificate of deposit nor the privately negotiated profit-sharing agreement was a security covered by the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws.

The Court held that a federal district court must dismiss a state prisoner’s habeas petition when it contains both exhausted and unexhausted claims. The rule was adopted because requiring total exhaustion promotes comity, gives state courts the first opportunity to correct constitutional errors, and reduces piecemeal…

The Court held that timely filing of a discrimination charge with the EEOC is not a jurisdictional prerequisite to a Title VII suit, but instead operates like a statute of limitations subject to waiver, estoppel, and equitable tolling.

The Court held that Illinois could not extinguish Logan's state-created employment-discrimination claim because a state agency failed, for reasons beyond Logan's control, to convene a required factfinding conference within the statutory period.

The Court reversed the grant of federal habeas relief, holding that due process does not require a new trial whenever a juror is placed in a potentially compromising situation. A post-trial hearing providing an opportunity to prove actual bias was constitutionally sufficient, and the state trial judge's findings were…

The Supreme Court held that Oklahoma's sentencing scheme violated the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments by refusing to consider certain mitigating evidence, reversed the death sentence and remanded for resentencing, and declined to decide whether the death penalty may be imposed on a 16‑year‑old offender.

The Court held that the respondents lacked Article III standing to challenge the transfer of surplus federal property to a religious college. They could not sue as taxpayers because the transfer was an executive action under the Property Clause rather than congressional taxing or spending, and they alleged no concrete…

The Supreme Court, per curiam, reversed the Ninth Circuit's affirmance of the dismissal of a pro se Arizona prisoner's civil rights complaint alleging he was placed in solitary confinement without notice of charges or a hearing. Because federal courts must construe pro se pleadings liberally under Haines v.