Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, May 24, 1994 TAG: 9405240082
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
The court unanimously threw out a challenge by Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., to the planned closing of a shipyard in his home state.
Federal law gives judges no authority to intervene, the court said. The administration had argued that letting judges step in would make it impossible to quickly trim the military.
A decision in Specter's favor could have led to a flood of lawsuits over the government's decisions since 1991 to shut down 164 military installations and realign 93 others. Additional base closings were ordered in 1989.
The federal base-closing law does not bar the president from approving closing recommendations even if they were procedurally flawed, Chief Justice William Rehnquist wrote for the court.
Specter expressed disappointment in the ruling.
"There is just no reason why the courts of America should not review this kind of evidence of fraud, deception and cheating and lying by the Department of the Navy," he told reporters in Philadelphia.
In other action Monday, the court:
Ruled 5-4 in an Ohio case that nurses who direct less-skilled employees as part of their duties are "supervisors" and therefore not protected by federal labor law.
Agreed to decide in a Tennessee case whether an employer that illegally fires someone may escape liability if it later finds a lawful basis for its action.
Let stand a ruling that allowed a Minnesota man to be kept off a jury because he is a Jehovah's Witness. Last month, the high court said people cannot be excluded from juries because of their sex.
Left intact an $11.5 million wrongful-death award against white supremacist Tom Metzger and his son for inciting skinheads to beat a black man to death in Oregon.
Agreed to decide whether Amtrak can bar political advertisements in its train stations. An artist wants to rent a billboard in New York's Penn Station to criticize the Coors beer company.
Ruled 6-3 in a case from Maryland that federal defendants generally cannot seek to avoid stiff career-offender sentences by challenging the validity of earlier convictions.
by CNB