As the Supreme Court winds down for the holiday break, one thing that has not slowed is the flow of litigation arising from the COVID-19 pandemic. In November and December, the court handled seven emergency requests for relief related to COVID-19, six involving challenges by religious institutions to state crowd-restriction orders and one involving exposure of prisoners to the coronavirus. All of the cases followed a now-familiar procedural pattern. Like the many other pandemic-related cases that reached the Supreme Court in 2020 , these latest cases were handled on the so-called shadow docket — the growing category of emergency appeals that are decided without the full-dress treatment of thorough briefing and oral argument. Despite the truncated consideration, the justices have had quite a lot to say in these cases. In three of the seven cases decided in November and December, the justices produced 51 pages of opinions. Add that number to the 45 pages produced in COVID-related prison and religion cases from May through October, and the total is just short of 100 pages, a substantial body of work that has taken place on the shadow docket. In addition to the religion and prison cases, the court since mid-October […]
