Mr. Chief Justice, may it please the court.

I'm John Carlo Canoparo.

I'm Zach Smith.

And welcome to SCOTUS 101, where we break down what's happening at the Supreme Court, what the justices are up to, and other things related to our favorite branch of government.

Welcome to a special Christmas and holiday episode of SCOTUS 101.

After today, we'll be on break until the court resumes hearing oral arguments the week of January 11.

Before we head into the break, though, there are two cases that we want to mention.

Zach, tell us about those.

They're Robinson Kevin at all, the Murphy Governor of New Jersey at all, and High Plains two cases that we want to mention. Zach, tell us about those. The Robinson, Kevin,

at all, the Murphy, Governor of New Jersey, at all, and High Plains Harvest Church v. Paulus,

governor of Colorado, both of which involved those states' COVID-19 attendance restrictions

on churches and other houses of worship. This past week, in both of these cases, the court vacated lower court

orders and directed them to reconsider those opinions in light of its recent decision in Roman

Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. New York, where, as you'll recall, the court prevented

Governor Andrew Cuomo from enforcing his COVID-19 restrictions which treated houses

of worship worse than other comparable secular institutions. There was no recorded dissent

in the New Jersey case, but Justice Kagan, joined by Justices Breyer and Sotomayor, did issue

a brief dissent in the Colorado case, indicating that in their view

the case was moot because Colorado had rescinded its restrictions. This echoed the descending

view in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn case, where Governor Cuomo had also lifted the

restrictions prior to that decision, though like here, he remained free to re-implement

them at any time. Interestingly, unlike that case, the chief justice did not dissent here.

...