We have no president who has appointed more than two justices on the current court, but we have Leonard who's responsible for three.

It's really short-sighted when people say, hey, treat religion like everything else.

That's not what most religious people and religious communities want.

The First Amendment and corollary provisions in state constitutions treat religion especially.

Hi, and welcome to Amicus Slate's podcast about the U.S. Supreme Court.

I'm Dahlia Lithwick.

I cover the courts in the law for Slate.

And this past Monday, after a 14-month vacancy, Judge Neil Gorsuch was sworn in as the junior justice of the highest court in the land.

I, Neil M. Gorsuch, you solemnly swear that I will administer justice without respect to persons.

But I'll administer justice without respect to persons.

And do equal right to the poor and to the rich.

And do equal right to the poor and the rich.

And that I will faithfully and impartially discharge.

One of the lessons of the Gorsuch confirmation and the Merrick Garland blockade is that movement

conservatism is in its ascendancy.

One of the key groups channeling the energy of that movement is the Federalist Society,

and later on in the show, we're going to speak with Jeffrey Tubin about the man at the helm of that group.

But first, we turn to the last arguments of this term, which will take place in April this month, with the new Justice Gorsuch on the bench.

Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, V. Comer, is sometimes described as a fight over

something that is itself kind of silly, the repurposed rubber stuff that covers hard playground

surfaces, so the small children don't bunk their heads when they're coming down the slides.

But the playground surface stuff in this case actually carries pretty high stakes. So high, in fact,

...