Deference to government powerSkepticism of government power
Opinions uphold federal priority for tax claims over state liens and mortgagees in equity receiverships in Texas and Emory, reflecting acceptance of federal government authority in insolvency matters. United States v. Texas ↗ United States v. Emory ↗
This case concerned the interpretation of a 1938 consent decree resolving a Sherman Act antitrust indictment against Chrysler Corporation and its affiliated finance company, which imposed restrictions on Chrysler's dealings with finance companies. Paragraph 12 of the decree provided that the affiliation ban would expire if no effective final divestiture order against General Motors was entered by January 1, 1941, a deadline that passed without such an order due to appeals in GM's criminal case and extensions in its civil case. The District Court addressed whether the condition for lifting the prohibition had been met and retained jurisdiction to modify the decree. The Supreme Court reviewed that order, holding based on the decree's explicit language requiring a final non-reviewable order by the deadline that the prohibition remained in effect.
The case concerned whether contracts between A.H. Belo Corp., a newspaper and radio publisher, and its non-mechanical employees violated the overtime requirements of the Fair Labor Standards Act. Under the contracts, employees received a guaranteed weekly wage with a specified basic hourly rate and overtime at one-and-a-half times that rate, but the structure meant no additional pay was due until hours far exceeded the statutory maximum. The Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division sued to enjoin the use of these agreements, arguing they failed to provide proper time-and-a-half compensation for overtime as required by the Act. The Supreme Court affirmed the lower courts' rulings in favor of the employer, holding that the contracts complied with the Act by clearly stating the basic and overtime rates while ensuring the weekly guarantee met or exceeded statutory minimums.
The case involved William Ward, a Black man indicted in Texas for the murder of a white man, who was convicted based primarily on a confession after two trials. Ward contended that the confession was obtained only after he was arrested without a warrant, transported across multiple counties over several days, held in distant jails, questioned persistently, and subjected to threats of mob violence along with alleged physical abuse. The Supreme Court held that the confession was the product of coercion and duress rather than being voluntary, violating the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and reversed the conviction. The Court reasoned that undisputed facts about the continuous interrogation, movement to strange locations, and references to mob threats demonstrated the confession was not freely given, and federal due process review was not barred by the state jury's findings on admissibility.
The case involved the Sioux Tribe's claim for compensation under a 1920 statute for approximately 5.5 million acres of land east of the Missouri River that had been added to the Great Sioux Reservation by three executive orders in 1875, purportedly to curb liquor trafficking, and then allegedly withdrawn or opened to settlement in 1879 and 1884. The Court of Claims rejected the claim, and the Supreme Court affirmed. The Court reasoned that the executive orders created only temporary administrative additions to the reservation without conveying compensable tribal title, as the lands remained part of the public domain and lacked the permanent character of treaty-based reservations; subsequent congressional acts, including the 1887 Allotment Act, did not retroactively recognize such an interest.
This case concerned a World War I-era yearly renewable term life insurance policy issued by the federal government under the War Risk Insurance Act. After the insured and the named beneficiary both died, the dispute centered on whether the insured's estate was entitled to the full aggregate amount of the remaining 184 monthly installments or only their discounted present value as of the beneficiary's death. The Supreme Court held that the estate was entitled only to the present-value lump sum under the World War Veterans Act of 1924, which altered prior law to eliminate interest by requiring payment of the discounted value rather than continued monthly installments. The Court reasoned that the 1924 statute and its 1925 amendment expressly directed computation of present value as of the beneficiary's death to effectuate Congress's intent to pay estates in a single interest-free sum, and that the 1925 amendment's language about the date of last payment under an existing award did not apply here. The judgment of the Court of Appeals was reversed and the case remanded to reinstate the District Court's award.
The case concerned whether a supplier of materials for the construction of a library building at Howard University could recover on a payment bond posted by the general contractor under the Miller Act. The contractor and its surety had argued that the project was not a "public work" of the United States, so no bond was required and the supplier had no right to sue. The Supreme Court held that the library qualified as a public work because Congress had specifically authorized and appropriated funds for it in 1931, the project was later approved and funded under Title II of the National Industrial Recovery Act, and it served the interests of the general public as defined in that statute. Accordingly, the Miller Act bond was properly required and the supplier was entitled to bring suit on it in the name of the United States.