guantanamo cases where you re getting pretty conservative decisions from the court of appeals. they might stand for a quote which would be pleasing to conservatives, not so pleasing to liberals. jenna: a lot to watch. thank you very much for working us through this, stuart taylor, thank you very much, we appreciate it. as always, we want to hear from you, your thoughts on some of the big news stories we re covering, happening now is on that case, do you think the west borough baptist church, the one from kansas, should be allowed to hold the antigay demonstrations at the funerals of fallen troops? it s a big decision for free speech. log on, go to happening now to cast your vote. we ll check out the results a little later on happening now . jon: police in colorado now launch ago new round of interviews, searching for new clues regarding the death of jonbenet ramsay, she was just six years old when she was killed 14 years
jobs. the fbi is not indicating they believe this one was. jenna: interesting to watch. phil, thank you very much, phil keating live in florida, thank you. all right. jon: a day of firs firsts at the u.s. supreme court, the first day of the fall session begins today. also the first day for the newest justice, elena kagan. and for the first time ever, the highest court in the land will include three women, but analysts say kagan could be sidelined because of her previous work with the court. james rosen, live at the u.s. supreme court, he has more for us. why will justice kagan be less of a presence in her first term 1234. jon, good afternoon. justice kagan has agreed to withdraw or recruise herself from 25 of the 53 cases that the supreme court has already agreed to hear this term and we expect to see more cases added to the docket. during her confirmation hearings this past summer, kagan told the senate she would not participate inthy case in which she was, quote, substantially
involved as u.s. solicitor general. in that position, to which she was nominated by president obama, it was kagan who decided which case the united states government would argue before the supreme court, thus, these recusals are aimed at disspelling any potential conflicts of interest. now, this means that many cases this term will be heard by only eight justices, leaving open the strong possibility that there will be ties in the rulings of 4-4. in such cases the opinion of the lower court is affirmed and no new precedent is set. we spoke with one former staff lawyer of the solicitor general s office to see how the justices themselves approached those situations. the court does not want to waste not only the party s time but their own time in doing everything just to have a 4-4 decision, but nothing in the law will have changed. so i do think those eight are going to try to get together and come up with decisions. justice kagan had to leave the bench quietly when the second case ca
laura ingle outside the courthouse with the latest. reporter: we ve got the judge who has just finished instructing the jury on the 17 counts against steven haze. six of those are capital felony counts. he went over what is called charging the jury, instructing them on how to deal with all of those charges, if found guilty on the capital felony ones it could bring him the death penalty in this case. hayes has admitted to killing the mother, jennifer hawk petit after sexually assaulting her but denies lighting the fire in the house that led to the death of her two daughters. steven hayes younger accomplice is accused of sexually assaulting 11-year-old makayla and leaving her tied up to her bed before gasoline was poured over by the the girls and the fire was set. the other suspect is expected to go on trial next year. dr. william petit told jurors
controversial court are heard even if they re argued at the beginning, and in two of these cases, one we re talking about will be argued two days from now, there will be dissents, concurring opinions, controversial cnny controversy inside the court and unless i m wrong about that, unless it s unanimous that delays it and it usually runs up until they retire for the summer in june. jenna: the fact that elaine kpwra kagan might not be ekwhraeupb kagan might be might not be part of the case social security there, and the court is divided among party lines, we could see ties in these situations talk us through that. we only have 30 seconds but talk us about that. in any case where there s only eight justices sitting you could get a 4-4 tie. the effect of that is, whatever the lower court decided from which the appeal is coming, that stands as the law of the case and it could have an important impact here, for example, there are