Volume 478 — United States Reports

This is a list of all United States Supreme Court cases from volume 478 of the United States Reports:

Thornburg v. Gingles, 478 U.S. 30 (1986), was a United States Supreme Court case in which a unanimous Court found that "the legacy of official discrimination ... acted in concert with the multimember districting scheme to impair the ability of "cohesive groups of black voters to participate equally in the political process and to elect candidates of their choice." The ruling resulted in the invalidation of districts in the North Carolina General Assembly and led to more single-member districts in state legislatures.

Davis v. Bandemer, 478 U.S. 109 (1986), is a case in which the United States Supreme Court held that claims of partisan gerrymandering were justiciable, but failed to agree on a clear standard for the judicial review of the class of claims of a political nature to which such cases belong. The decision was later limited with respect to many of the elements directly involving issues of redistricting and political gerrymandering, but was somewhat broadened with respect to less significant ancillary procedural issues. Democrats had won 51.9% of the votes, but only 43/100 seats. Democrats sued on basis of one man, one vote, however, California Democrats supported the Indiana GOP's plan.

Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (1986), was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court that upheld, in a 5–4 ruling, the constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law criminalizing oral and anal sex in private between consenting adults, in this case with respect to homosexual sodomy, though the law did not differentiate between homosexual and heterosexual sodomy. It was overturned in Lawrence v. Texas (2003), though the statute had already been struck down by the Georgia Supreme Court in 1998. The majority opinion, by Justice Byron White, reasoned that the U.S. Constitution did not confer "a fundamental right to engage in homosexual sodomy". A concurring opinion by Chief Justice Warren E.

The International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling (ICRW) included a Schedule regulating whale harvesting practices of member nations (including the United States and Japan) and setting… Held: The political question doctrine does not bar judicial resolution of the instant controversy. The courts have the authority to construe international treaties and executive agreements and to interpret congressional legislation.

Federal school land grants to Mississippi in the early 19th century did not apply to lands in northern Mississippi that were held by the Chickasaw Indian Nation, an area that came to be the northern… Held: Petitioners' trust claims are barred by the Eleventh Amendment, even if petitioners' characterization of the legal wrong as being a breach of a continuing obligation to comply with the trust obligations is accepted.

After petitioner Library of Congress had rejected respondent black employee's complaints alleging job-related racial discrimination, respondent's counsel pursued administrative relief and settlement… Held: The no-interest rule applies here so as to preclude the award of increased compensation to respondent's counsel for the delay in receiving payment for his services. Pp. 314-323.

Posadas de Puerto Rico Associates v. Tourism Co. of Puerto Rico, 478 U.S. 328 (1986), was a 1986 appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States to determine whether Puerto Rico's Games of Chance Act of 1948 is in legal compliance with the United States Constitution, specifically as regards freedom of speech, equal protection and due process. In a 5–4 decision, the Supreme Court held that the Puerto Rico government (law) could restrict advertisement for casino gambling from being targeted to residents, even if the activity itself was legal and advertisement to tourists was permitted. The U.S.

Petitioner was charged in an Illinois Circuit Court with committing the crimes of unlawful restraint and deviate sexual assault, and the State filed a petition to have him declared a sexually… Held: Proceedings under the Act are not "criminal" within the meaning of the Fifth Amendment's guarantee against compulsory self-incrimination. The Act's aim is to provide treatment, not punishment, for persons adjudged sexually dangerous.

Bazemore v. Friday, 478 U.S. 385 (1986), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that a regression analysis does not have to account for every possible factor that could influence salary in order to be considered as evidence of discrimination.

In 1975, the District Court found petitioner union and petitioner apprenticeship committee of the union guilty of violating Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by discriminating against… Held: The judgment is affirmed. 753 F.2d 1172, affirmed.

The Vanguards, an organization of black and Hispanic firefighters employed by respondent city of Cleveland, filed a class action in… Held: Section 706(g) of Title VII does not preclude entry of a consent decree, such as was entered in this case, that may benefit individuals who were not the actual victims of the defendant's discriminatory practices; whether or not § 706(g) precludes a court from imposing certain forms of race-conscious relief after trial, it does not…

Section 304(d) of the Clean Air Act provides that "in any action" to enforce the Act the court "may award costs of litigation (including reasonable attorney and expert witness… Held: Section 304(d) authorizes attorney's fees for time spent by counsel in Phases II and IX. The fact that the work done by counsel in those phases did not occur in the context of traditional judicial litigation does not preclude an award of reasonable attorney's fees under § 304(d) for that work.

Respondent was charged with the murder of two persons arising from the same incident. Held: The harmless-error standard of Chapman v.

This litigation arose from serious accidents that occurred in the reservoirs of federal flood control projects in Arkansas and Louisiana. Held: Section 702c bars recovery against the Government in these cases. Pp. 604-612. (a) On its face, § 702c's language covers the accidents at issue. The ordinary meaning of the word "damage" covers injury to both property and person and cannot be considered ambiguous in that it might refer only to damage to property.

A Michigan statute makes an employee ineligible for unemployment compensation if he has provided "financing," by means other than the payment of regular union dues, for a strike that causes his… Held: The "financing" disqualification from receiving unemployment compensation, as construed by the Michigan Supreme Court, is not preempted by federal law.

In 1973, petitioners purchased interests in a limited partnership organized by the individual respondent who, together with a corporation (also a respondent) of which he was the president and sole… Held: inter alia, that the remedy of rescission was proper under § 12(2) and entered judgment for petitioners in the amount of the consideration paid for their limited partnership units, together with prejudgment interest.

Bethel School District v. Fraser, 478 U.S. 675 (1986), is a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in which the Court upheld the suspension of a high school student who delivered a sexually suggestive speech at a school assembly. The case involved free speech in public schools.

Arcara v. Cloud Books, Inc., 478 U.S. 697 (1986), was a United States Supreme Court case about the First Amendment and whether freedom of speech was violated by shutting down a bookstore because of illicit sexual activities occurring there. The Court held that the closure was aimed at non-expressive activity and its incidental burden on speech was not subject to any First Amendment scrutiny.

Bowsher v. Synar, 478 U.S. 714 (1986), was a United States Supreme Court case that struck down the Gramm–Rudman–Hollings Act as an unconstitutional usurpation of executive power by Congress because the law empowered Congress to terminate the United States Comptroller General for certain specified reasons, including "inefficiency, 'neglect of duty,' or 'malfeasance.'" The named defendant in the original case was Comptroller General Charles Arthur Bowsher and the constitutional challenge was brought forth by Oklahoma Congressman Mike Synar.

When petitioner University of Tennessee informed respondent, a black employee, that he would be discharged for inadequate work performance and misconduct on the job, he requested an administrative… Held: Title 28 U.S.C. § 1738 is not applicable to the unreviewed state administrative factfinding at issue here. However, federal common-law rules of preclusion have been frequently fashioned in the absence of a governing statute.

Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc. v. Thompson, 478 U.S. 804 (1986), was a United States Supreme Court decision involving the original jurisdiction of the federal district courts under 28 U.S.C. § 1331 (federal question jurisdiction).

Commodity Futures Trading Commission v. Schor, 478 U.S. 833 (1986), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held an administrative agency may, in some cases, exert jurisdiction over state-law counterclaims.

Held: however, that petitioners had committed a fatal error in drafting their appellate briefs. They had limited their challenge to the statute, and had neglected explicitly to challenge the state-prescribed instructions and verdict sheet, which tracked the statutory language.