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Originally Posted by pwalker8
Actually they pass on cases all the time when they are not ready to address a specific situation. You have internalize this case way, way more than the Supreme Court ever does. For them it's about overarching legal issues, i.e. addressing anti-trust, not about if they think that Cote was correct or not, or if they dislike Apple or not. For the most part, they accept cases when they want to make a statement and decline cases when they don't want to make a statement.
The Supreme Court declining to hear a case is a blank slate. They never say why they decided not to hear this or any other case. So you are simply projecting your view on an empty screen. There are many different possibilities. They may simply view the case as moot since for all practical purposes it is (Even if Apple won, that wouldn't change anything in the ebook market place). There may simply not be enough judges who are interested in addressing anti-trust at this time. There were a series of interviews with the various Supreme Court justices that use to be on Audible that are quite interesting with regard to how the Supreme Court works. If I recall correctly a couple (I specifically remember Scalia) talked about why they decide to pick cases in general terms. You should listen to them.
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Of course SCOTUS is all about legal issues, and they don’t make it personal. Not sure why you think I said otherwise. However, I don’t know how you can say opinions about whether a lower court judge got a decision right or wrong is not a legal issue. That certainly is and forms the heart of many SCOTUS decisions.
Why is SCOTUS “not ready to address” a specific case? Let’s look at some of the possible reasons.
1) Not enough justices feel that there are substantive merits to the plaintiff’s arguments, and the lower courts got it right.
2) There was some procedural error in the case.
3) The case doesn’t touch on important enough issues, and so they have nothing to say (or, as you put it, they “don’t want to make a statement”).
Regarding #3, I don’t believe this fits the Apple case, where you have one of the world’s top companies involved in an important anti-trust matter with large potential repercussions for the economy. It is a high-profile case for these reasons. At any rate, if the justices felt the lower courts got this wrong because of Leegin -- as you and many Apple defenders kept asserting -- then that would likely negate #3 being the reason for denying cert, as Leegin was a very major anti-trust case.
Regarding #2, this is highly unlikely. Apple retained some of the best lawyers in the country, and they likely dotted all their i’s and crossed all their t’s.
The most likely conclusion, then, is #1. And while it might be difficult to say for sure that is the reason, for all intents and purposes,
that is how the case will be viewed – that Cote did get it right and Apple is guilty. Moreover, going forward, it is very likely quotes from both Cote and Livingston in this case will be used to support other similar decisions in other circuits, not just in the 2nd.
This decision is a blank slate to you because you, like many of Apple’s staunch defenders, refuse to admit Apple did any wrong, and you don’t want to see it any other way. You are projecting a “blank slate” on a case in which it is generally viewed as a big LOSS for Apple.
I can find many articles about this decision to deny cert using the words “lost” and “loser” to describe Apple. This includes one on the SCOTUS blog. You want me to list some of them?
Of course, if someone lost, there has to be a winner, right? And the winners here are the DOJ, the attorney generals of the states that filed suit – and Cote and Livingston!
You are also wrong when you say SCOTUS never explains why they won’t grant cert. They often do, writing either a dissenting or concurring opinion about the decision. These are formal and official writings that go into the court record. There was an interesting article in the Yale Law Journal about Justice Sotomayor’s frequent certiorari-stage writings. You should read it.