SUPREME COURT TERM TO FOCUS ON FOURTH AMENDMENT

The Supreme Court opens its 2000-2001 term today with a low-profile agenda
lacking the drama of the past five years, when justices declared 26 acts of
Congress unconstitutional and ruled on such divisive social issues as
partial-birth abortion, public prayer and assisted suicide.

Many cases among the 46 appeals already accepted for full review focus on
local government powers, with Fourth Amendment search-and-seizure law the
most recurrent theme. Those cases involve police matters that affect
ordinary people, including:

• Handcuffing and arresting Texas mother Gail Atwater for a seat-belt
violation punishable by a maximum $50 fine, leaving her 4-year-old son and
6-year-old daughter in the care of a passer-by.

• Using high-tech military "thermal imaging" devices to detect a home
marijuana farm cultivated under hot lights.

• Giving police a city hospital's warrantless urinalyses of pregnant women
who test positive for cocaine, under a law intended to protect fetal
development.

• Letting police dogs sniff for narcotics around cars stopped for document
checks at Indianapolis roadblocks.

• Police refusing to let an Illinois man enter his trailer home in an
effort to prevent him from tampering with possible evidence inside before
officers could obtain a search warrant.

The U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against authorities in the
Indiana and Illinois cases, calling the use of police dogs a wholesale
invasion of privacy. Federal appeals courts in three other circuits ruled
that police acted properly in the seat-belt, thermal-imaging and
cocaine-mom cases.

Justices hear arguments in the police-dog case tomorrow at 10 a.m., and the
cocaine-mom case at the same time on Wednesday.

"In both of those cases, the test may come down to whether the purpose of
the program was reasonable," said Washington lawyer Theodore Olson during
his annual analysis of the docket for reporters.

The American Civil Liberties Union pointedly opposes the official viewpoint
in all five search-and-seizure cases, including referring positive cocaine
tests to the police.

"The implicit assumption in the 4th Circuit opinion that women have a
diminished expectation of privacy solely because of their pregnancy is
precisely the sort of paternalistic stereotype that the Supreme Court has
long since rejected," said Steven Shapiro, the ACLU's national litigation
director.

Among other issues on which the ACLU took sides is the First Amendment
right involved in banning disclosure to news media of material obtained by
eavesdropping on a cell-phone conversation. The case being heard by the
court involves a Pennsylvania radio talk-show host's use of tapes
discussing a union battle, but the decision will govern a separate appeal
stemming from a December 1996 Republican leadership conference call about
the House Ethics Committee probe of then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

The term's overall headline quotient was dimmed considerably by last week's
decision to put off the Microsoft antitrust case until an appeals court can
review it. This morning, a court order will be issued denying most of the
1,748 other appeals considered at a Sept. 25 conference.

Among those appeals is a challenge by 31 House members to President
Clinton's constitutional authority to order U.S. forces into air-combat
operations with NATO troops in Kosovo. The constitutional background of
that case involves issues left unchallenged when President Harry S. Truman
sent U.S. troops to fight under the U.N. flag in Korea.

A major dispute about restrictions that Congress placed on Legal Services
Corp. lawyers is set for argument at 11 a.m. Wednesday, pitting the
controversial LSC against Congress in a case brought in the name of Carmen
Velazquez, 56, a grandmother who was represented by a lawyer in a Bronx
legal-aid program receiving LSC funds. Mrs. Velazquez claimed that New
York's welfare-to-work program ignored her medical disability.

The court will decide if Congress interfered with First Amendment rights by
banning the use of LSC funds to attack laws or regulations governing
welfare systems.

"For Congress to bar lawyers from arguing the validity of laws on behalf of
their clients is unprecedented in this nation," said Amanda Cooper of the
Brennan Center for Justice, which represents Mrs. Velazquez at the high court.

A major battle over air-quality regulations between the Environmental
Protection Agency and American Trucking Associations produced two cases
coupled for argument in an unusual two-hour session on Nov. 7.

The ATA challenged Section 109 of the 1970 Clean Air Act Amendments, in
which Congress delegated to the EPA the authority to impose a two-tiered
standard to regulate ozone emissions, without factoring in costs to
industry. The primary test is public health, but a secondary standard
allows limits "to protect the public welfare."

"There is not one Chamber [of Commerce] member that is not affected by
these rules. We'd like to see some restrictions on the EPA's unbridled
authority," said Robin Conrad of the Chamber's National Litigation Center.

"ATA and its supporters mistakenly argue that . . . EPA must consider
non-health factors in setting [standards]," Solicitor General Seth P.
Waxman said in his brief to the high court, suggesting the industry instead
lobby Congress to change the law. "Congress concluded that [standards must
be set] on the basis of what is necessary to protect public health and
public welfare."