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Supreme Court

Does it walk and quack like a statute of limitations? Justices consider whether equitable tolling is available to veterans.

In Tuesday’s oral argument, the Supreme Court grappled with three main issues in Arellano v. McDonough, a case about retroactive disability benefits for veterans who failed to apply for those benefits within the one-year window prescribed by a federal statute. First, the court looked into whether 38 U.S.C. § 5110(b)(1) is a statute of limitations to determine whether the Irwin presumption, which allows for equitable tolling, applies. Second, if it is a statute of limitations, the court pondered … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Justices to consider California’s private-attorney-general exception to arbitration clause

The last few decades have witnessed the working out in several cases of a sustained disagreement between the Supreme Court and California legislators and judges. The Supreme Court has taken the view that the Federal Arbitration Act compels the enforcement, in state and federal courts, of pre-dispute arbitration agreements. Accordingly, the justices have rejected every effort to undermine the capacious application of those agreements to shift disputes between businesses and employees or customers from courts to arbitrators. California, acting … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Justices to consider obligation of retirement-plan sponsors to pare investment options

Monday’s argument in Hughes v. Northwestern University will give the justices yet another opportunity to explain the fiduciary obligation of the sponsors that control the defined-contribution plans on which so many of us depend for our retirement.

This case comes to the justices under ERISA, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1973. Responding to a shocking pattern of self-dealing and mismanagement in employee pension plans, the statute federalized a great deal of the law governing those plans. As … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Court will consider effort by North Carolina legislators to intervene to defend state voter-ID law

In a surprise pre-Thanksgiving order, the Supreme Court on Wednesday added one new case to its merits docket for the 2021-22 term. In Berger v. North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP, the justices will weigh in on an effort by Republican legislators in the state to intervene to defend the state’s voter-ID law.

The North Carolina chapter of the NAACP, along with several local chapters of the group, filed a lawsuit alleging that the law violates the … Read the rest