Volume 450 — United States Reports

This is a list of all the United States Supreme Court cases from volume 450 of the United States Reports:

Held: A Florida statute repealing an earlier statute and reducing the amount of "gain time" for good conduct and obedience to prison rules deducted from a… Held: A Florida statute repealing an earlier statute and reducing the amount of "gain time" for good conduct and obedience to prison rules deducted from a convicted prisoner's sentence is unconstitutional as an ex post facto law as applied to petitioner, whose crime was committed before the statute's enactment. Pp. 28-36.

Held : Louisiana violated the Double Jeopardy Clause by prosecuting petitioner a second time for first-degree murder after the judge at the first trial granted petitioner's motion for new trial on the ground that the evidence was legally insufficient to support the jury's guilty verdict. This case is controlled by Burks v.

Board of Governors, FRS v. Investment Company Institute, 450 U.S. 46 (1981), was a decision by the United States Supreme Court, which held that the amendment to Regulation Y does not exceed the Board's statutory authority.

Petitioners, representing a class of present and former black employees and job applicants, sought injunctive and declaratory relief and damages in an action under 42 U.S.C. § 1981 and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, alleging that respondent employer and unions had engaged in racially discriminatory employment practices.

After an on-the-record hearing before an Administrative Law Judge and review by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in which the preponderance-of-the-evidence standard of proof was employed,… Held: In adjudicatory proceedings before the SEC, § 7(c) of the Administrative Procedure Act applies.

Rules of the Democratic Party of the United States (National Party) provide that only those who are willing to affiliate publicly with the Democratic Party may participate in the process of selecting delegates to the Party's National Convention. Wisconsin election laws allow voters to participate in its Democratic Presidential candidate preference primary without regard to party affiliation and without requiring a public declaration of party preference.

Respondent mines cement rock and manufactures it into Portland cement. Section 611(a) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 allows respondent, as a miner, to deduct from its taxable income a percentage of its gross income from mining as a recoupment of capital investment in the depleting mineral. Because respondent, as an integrated miner-manufacturer, has no actual gross income from mining, it must base its depletion deduction upon a constructive gross income from mining.

Diamond v. Diehr, 450 U.S. 175 (1981), was a United States Supreme Court decision which held that controlling the execution of a physical process, by running a computer program did not preclude patentability of the invention as a whole. The high court reiterated its earlier holdings that mathematical formulas in the abstract could not be patented, but it held that the mere presence of a software element did not make an otherwise patent-eligible machine or process patent ineligible. Diehr was the third member of a trilogy of Supreme Court decisions on the patent-eligibility of computer software related inventions.

The Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program, which is part of the Social Security Act, provides a subsistence allowance to needy aged, blind, and disabled persons.

Texas Department of Community Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248 (1981), is a United States labor law case of the United States Supreme Court.

Wood v. Georgia, 450 U.S. 261 (1981), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the court declined to issue a firm holding because the equal-protection claim at issue was not properly raised. Instead, the court observed that the defendants' lawyer had a divided loyalties issue because he was retained by the defendants' employer and facts indicating potential conflict were known to trial judge. The court said the trial judge should have inquired further and remanded to make that inquiry as a potential violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. One thing to take from this decision is that the defendants did not need to prove that they were prejudiced by the divided loyalties issue to have their case remanded.

Carter v. Kentucky was a case in which the U.S. Supreme Court held that trial judges in criminal proceedings must, upon proper request of the defendant, inform the jury of his right against self-incrimination, and that its execution may not be used against him.

The Interstate Commerce Act authorizes the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to regulate interstate rail carriers' abandonment of railroad lines, including branch lines. Under the Act, no such carrier may abandon a line unless it first obtains a certificate from the ICC that the present or future public convenience and necessity permit such an abandonment.

Petitioners, who were involved in an agreement to import marihuana and then to distribute it domestically, were convicted on separate counts of conspiracy to import marihuana, in violation of 21… Held: Congress intended to permit the imposition of consecutive sentences for violations of §§ 846 and 963 even though such violations arose from a single agreement or conspiracy having dual objectives. Pp. 336-343.

Held: Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 68—which provides that if a plaintiff rejects a defendant's formal settlement offer "to allow… Held: Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 68—which provides that if a plaintiff rejects a defendant's formal settlement offer "to allow judgment to be taken against him," and if "the judgment finally obtained by the offeree is not more favorable than the offer," the plaintiff "must pay the costs incurred after the making of the offer"—does not…

H. L. v. Matheson, 450 U.S. 398 (1981), was a United States Supreme Court abortion rights case, according to which a state may require a doctor to inform a teenaged girl's parents before performing an abortion or face criminal penalty.

Kirchberg v. Feenstra, 450 U.S. 455 (1981), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held a Louisiana Head and Master law, which gave sole control of marital property to the husband and indicated the husband's dominance over the wife in the marriage, unconstitutional.

Michael M. v. Superior Court of Sonoma County, 450 U.S. 464 (1981), was a United States Supreme Court case over the issue of gender bias in statutory rape laws. The petitioner argued that the statutory rape law discriminated based on gender and was unconstitutional. The court ruled that this differentiation passes intermediate scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause because it serves an important state goal, stating that sexual intercourse entails a higher risk for women than men. Thus, the court found the law justified.

Under an Illinois statute, real property owners who contest their property taxes are required first to exhaust their available administrative remedy and, if unsuccessful, are then afforded a legal remedy requiring the payment of the taxes under protest and a subsequent state-court challenge. The customary delay from the time of payment until the receipt of refund upon successful protest is two years, and the refund is not accompanied by a payment of interest.

Montana v. United States, 450 U.S. 544 (1981), was a Supreme Court case that addressed two issues: (1) Whether the title of the Big Horn Riverbed rested with the United States, in trust for the Crow Tribe or passed to the State of Montana upon becoming a state and (2) Whether Crow Tribe retained the power to regulate hunting and fishing on tribal lands owned in fee-simple by a non-tribal member. First, the Court held that Montana held title to the Big Horn Riverbed because the Equal Footing Doctrine required the United States to pass title to the newly incorporated State. Second, the Court held that Crow Tribe lacked the power to regulate nonmember hunting and fishing on fee-simple land owned by nonmembers, but within the bounds of its reservation.

Sections 309(a) and 310(d) of the Communications Act of 1934 (Act) empower the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to grant an application for renewal or transfer of a radio broadcast license only if it determines that "the public interest, convenience, and necessity" will be served thereby.

Appellant owns land in appellee city that when purchased as a possible site for a nuclear power plant was mostly zoned for industrial or agricultural use. The city rezoned parts of the property, reducing the acreage for industrial use, and also established an open-space plan that included appellant's property and proposed that the city acquire the property to preserve it as a parkland.

Kassel v. Consolidated Freightways Corp., 450 U.S. 662 (1981), was a United States Supreme Court case involving the application of the Dormant Commerce Clause to an Iowa state statute restricting the length of tractor-trailers.

Thomas v. Review Board of the Indiana Employment Security Division, 450 U.S. 707 (1981), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that Indiana's denial of unemployment compensation benefits to petitioner violated his First Amendment right to free exercise of religion.

Petitioner truckdrivers are not paid for the time spent conducting a required pre-trip safety inspection of respondent employer motor carrier's trucks and transporting trucks that fail such inspection to the employer's on-premises repair facility. Petitioners' union submitted a wage claim for petitioners' pretrip inspection and transportation time to a joint grievance committee pursuant to its collective-bargaining agreement with petitioners' employer.

Section 1(a) of the Davis-Bacon Act provides that advertised specifications for federal construction contracts in excess of $2,000 "shall contain" a provision stating the minimum wages to be paid laborers and mechanics, which wages must be based on those the Secretary of Labor determines to be prevailing in the locality, and further provides that every contract based on such specifications "shall contain" a stipulation that the contractor will pay wages not less than those…

Held: “misinformation provided by a Government official combined with a showing of misconduct (even if it does not rise to the level of a violation of a legally binding rule) should be sufficient to require estoppel.” Ibid. In summarizing its holding, the majority stated that the Government may be estopped “where (a) a procedural not a substantive requirement is involved and (b) an internal procedural manual or guide or…