Options for Biden’s Supreme Court Reform Commission

MICHAEL C. DORF

Cornell law professor Michael C. Dorf explores several options that Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden should consider if he wins the election and fulfills his proposal of convening a bipartisan commission of constitutional scholars to study and recommend court reforms. Dorf discusses the benefits and limitations of each option and describes how Congress and a President Biden could implement meaningful court reform that could withstand review by the Supreme Court itself.

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United States v. Reyes-Torres

Docket: 18-2170

Opinion Date: October 27, 2020

Judge: Sandra Lea Lynch

Areas of Law: Criminal Law

The First Circuit affirmed Defendant's sentence of forty-two months' imprisonment for illegal possession of a machine gun, holding that the sentence was both procedurally and substantively reasonable. On appeal, Defendant argued that the district court erroneously applied a four-level enhancement to his total offense level for possession of a firearm in connection with another felony of drug possession pursuant to U.S.S.G. 2K2.1(b)(6). Specifically, Defendant argued that possession of a firearm in connection with mere drug possession for personal use was insufficient to apply the enhancement. The First Circuit affirmed, holding (1) Defendant was clearly in possession of the firearm in furtherance of drug trafficking under this Court's case law, and therefore, the evidence was sufficient to justify an enhanced sentence for that reason; and (2) Defendant's sentence was substantively reasonable.