[silence] what happened ins the shocking, its tragic, for those affected and their families, it is devastating. Its hard to imagine their pain. I hope they will know that we are praying for them now, hope they will find strength of the lovingkindness around the in these hours of darkness andnding pain. I hope they will see her country standing by their side today,gu Many Americans are still in shock and people have begun to wonder why someone will do something this terrible. Investigators will continuebu their dedicated work in search of answers, what is clear is this is a moment for National Morning for prayer. Just a moment ago, President Trump letter country in observing a moment of silence. As you noted this morning, we are grateful for the courageous efforts of the First Responders. They put their lives on the lines to save others. They do so with selflessness that reminds us of the courage and mercy the remains possible within each of us. Times of terrible grief, the same is true of the National Spirit of compassion that shine through country the moments when it is needed most. Fe whether running up to donate blood or signing up to donate their time, our fellow are americans are there to offer what they can when others are it need. We think these americans and lawenforcement and First Responders for everything they have done. We thank them for their efforts to continue. We send our condolences toou, everyone affected by this terrible tragedy. Ns for my remarks in the federao communication measure want to t say a few words about the awful events in las vegas. T our hearts are with the family affected with the tragedy in the city of las vegas. Would you send them our best wishes in our prayers. But, we can do more than Center Thoughts and prayers to the grieving, can do more than think the First Responders, we can do more than lower the flake to halfmast. We can take a stand against gun violence bypassing common sensej gun safety laws. Otherwise this just becomes a ritual mass murder, morning, and moving on. Lets stop this awful ritual. Lets stop the violence. Lets do something about it. Today is a day of mourning forhe las vegas and for america. My heart goes out to those touched by the ruthless and currently shooting last night. One of the victims was lisa romero, the secretary at a high school in gallup, new mexico. Her students are well as ms. Lisa and she was adored by everyone at the school. Ell her loss will be deeply felt. I send my condolences and a prayers to her family as well as her School Family and everyone. I want to recognize the true bravery of First Responders, the police, the firefighters the emts, some of whom risked their lives to save others. There are heroes in america, we saw them in action last evening. Las vegas, nevada and new mexico share along kinship. Nevada is a sister western state. Many people have family and las vegas and new mexicans are reeling from this tragedy. As westerners and americans we must come together to support the victims, think of First Responders, focus resources and policy on preventing future massacres. Washington journal, live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up on tuesday morning, darren soto will discuss his recent trip to puerto rico President Trumps upcoming visit on tuesday. Then were live in charleston West Virginia for the 50 capital store. Mitch carmichael will join us for the top issues facing West Virginia including the economy no. Crisis. Watch at 7 00 a. M. Eastern on tuesday morning. Join the discussion. The new Supreme Court term began today. Heres an update on some of the cases before the court from washington journal. Where t s 8 00 a. M. And a live look outside the u. S. Supreme court were todays the first day of the new term. Lawrence hurley is at our table to tell us about it. Hes a correspondent. Thank you for being here. The Trump Administration is in the spotlight as the u. S. Top chord return. This is the first full term since the administration came in january. Theyve had some time to adjust their legal positions and some of these big cases toward the t court including the very first case of the term, where the Obama Administration sided with employees in the Trump Administration switched. This is a case about whether workers could be prevented from grouping together from filing false claims with their employer. This has a big repercussions for workers. It would make it harder for workers to bring these claims, at least thats what the lawyers say. With the court being the court maybe likely to side with the company at this case the Trump Administration change could help with that. How many cases will the couru take up this term . Usually 70 or so cases, they havent taken more up yet but they have taken up some big ones the be here in the next few months. And the number nine there back to nine fulltime with Justice Gorsuch an there. What does that mean moving forward . This is his first full term on the court, here a couple months in the spring so there will be a lot of attention on what hes like and how heha his racts what kind of votes he takes. The courtroom has a conservative so trity can which we had for a year where there were only eight justices with the 44 split between liberals and conservatives. Hone num the four numbers is on the bottom of the screen, talking about the opening days of the Supreme Court some of the cases, republicans can call in. So, they start today and how long does the Supreme Court last . It goes to the end of june but there hearing oral arguments until april and then they get busy writing their opinions. Ruth Bader Ginsburg called this term nothing short of momentous. Ou what is she saying . Shoes doing the reporters ata favor. Ter but she said it will be momentous shes talking about the status about redistricting of the electoral districts. Is at gill versus woodford . S. Were listing some of the key cases and then on the top we have this redistricting case, what are the arguments. To what extent lawmakers can draw the districts in order to maximize their party number of seats that they can get. Brings up the question of whether that can be a constitutional violation which the court never decided or if they did real there was restrictions on what states could do in their it was a hugem impact. Our first callers from alabama, hello. Good morning, a lot of peopls dont seem to follow the reality of what donald trump presents. He has his mega crowd, he thinks hes a populist and will help the average labor union in this country. Nothing could be further from the truth. Ng to be the friend of laboring and union people. While in this case this gentleman has just renchingsed were seeing trump with his appointments and his continued omise to appoint similar corporate labor lawyer type judges to the Supreme Court, hes doing what Ronald Reagan started back in the 08s. Hes perpt corporate labor lawyer type tax cutting the destruction of private and public unions. These were the stallwart bedrock way that middle income, socalled middle class americans could maintain a level of income, a level of dream. Rt of american tax cutte and were going to see them knock it down, were going to continue to see this destruction of american unions, which are a good thing. They will villainized donald trump and his cronies have villainized the concept of unions. I would like this man to address a little bit of the struction of the unions in america. Guest whats interesting there are two big cases this term that the court has taken that could address worker rights. The case we talked about already about the ability to bring class claims. Theres also another case they took up last week well be hearing later in the term about Public Sector upeions and whether or not they can take fees from nonmembers to pay towards collective bargain even if they dont want to be a th at the moment element half the states allow the unions to do this and its an important wayit they influence events. So if the court rules against workers or unions, roughly speaking, in both cases, it would be a major setback for them. One of the other major cases is called master piece cake shore. A religious liberty case. A fascinating case. Its about a Christian Baker in colorado who is asked to make a wedding cake for a gay couple, and he refused to do so based on his religious beliefs. The gay couple then complain and the states the Civil Rights Commission sanked the baker for discriminating against the couple. The question is whether the a baker has actually a free speech right, it has kind of a religious overtone, the caseo comes down to free speech, which is the bakers free speech, saying because making a cake is a form of creative expression that is kind of like writing a song or a poem or Something Like that, that he should be able to have a say in what he says and that if he doesnt want agree with the thing that he is being asked to do, he shouldnt have to do it. We have utah senator mike lee who clerked for Justice Alito and he talked about this case. Heres a look. I view this as a compelled escape case. The bakery owner was being asked to do something expressive condt engage in expressionsive conduct. The cake baker was not unwilling in any respect to do business with samesex couples. What he didnt want to do was to use his expressive talents to make a specialty cake in this circumstance. He would have been happy to selh one off the shelf. Wasnt inclined to participate in the wedding by putting his expressive talents to work for a unique way in this case inch that respect, think this case is more properly viewed as something involving compelled speech. There are, as you know,ing highenned standards that applynd when the government is trying to compel someone to engage in speech or to express themselves against their own will. Lawrence hurley, compelled speech case. Exactly. About the free speech, the lawyers of the bakers say its about hit free speech rights. Ee this lawyers for the gay couple say that a ruling in favor of the bake were be what they call a license to discriminate because it would allow people to circumvent antidiscrimination laws. You wrote the colorado baker case likely to be heard by justices in december, will force Justice Kennedy to balance the strong support for gay rights, authored the 2015 ruling legalizing samesex marriage nationwide with his advocacy for religious rights and free speech. Justice kennedy is the swing vote on the court in a lot of these big casesment a conservative on the conservative wing but sometimes sides withg the liberals as he did in the gay marriage decision he wrote. D this really kind of cuts him down the middle. He does support and is well known for supporting gay rights and a huge part of his legacy but a big advocate for spree speech rights and religious rights. So has to find a way to rule in this case that he is comfortable with and whatever he decides isi what is going to happen. Hell be the fifth vote and the other justices have to go along if witness. Dave is calling from ohio. Independent caller. What would you like too say or ask about spree Supreme Courts new term. Caller id like to bridge u one point. Why are all of the Supreme Court justices part of the ivy league, every from harvard or prince store ore cornell or whatever. Why dont be have a justice that is other than the ivy league . Thank you very much. Host what is the breakdown over justices in terms of college and wife do you think people think thats important . Guest i think it is true that the supreme Supreme Court s probably one of most elitist institutions in the country, ifm not the most, not just the justices but most of the law c clerks who come to the court every year, who are young recent law school graduates, nearly all come from the top law schools and there have been some complaints in the past that leads to a lack of diversity on the court in terms of the law clerks and the justices themselves, because a lot of them come from the same kind of ivory tower background. Some of the justice does make more of an effort thans to overcome that by hiring law clingers from different law schools, maybe not ones Everybody Knows about. Ve when it comes to the nomination of Supreme Court justices they tend to be from the ivy league schools. Host sever justices attend the socalled red mass. What this significance. Guest an event held every year at the catholicery ye religious held every year, and to celebrate the legal profession, and usually several of the justices attend. I think five of them went yesterday. I think also the u. S. Solicitor general, who is the main lawyer for the court for the Trump Administration, was also there. Host justice roberts,ic thomas, alito, bryer, and ken, and the solicitor general, and the note wes got about the homily that they debt with immigration, religious freedom and democracy, among other issues. We are talking with lawrence hurley, with thompson reuters, Supreme Court correspondent, take taking your questions and comments. Caller nothing that Supreme Court decides with gorsuch on the court should even be acknowledged because gorsuch is someone that only the republicans have decided to put on the court. The democrats have been put on the sideline so thats where we should stay. On the sideline, just watching. Thats my comment. Any reaction to that call sneer a reference to thee appointment of Justice Gorsuch, which was made possible because the Republican Controlled Senate refused to act on former president obamas nominee foror that same position, which was Appeals Court merritt garland the republicans held the seat until the election took place, and then when donald trump won he was able to appoint knee gorsuch and the republicans were able to appoint him because of of getting rid of the filibuster. Host caller from missouri. Its jim on the democratic liner hi, jim. Th caller good morning. It was always my belief that judges should blindly weigh right and wrong. How did we end up with politicized supremes where they are republicans or democrat andl should they not be all centrists . Ill hang up. Host lets hear what our guest has to say. Guest like with a lot of thingness the country, a lot of things have been politicized. Hard to keep even the judiciary out of politics and a lot of people also think that with the end of the filibuster, i was just talking about for judicial nominee, not just for Supreme Court but for lower courts which is a move that democrats made a few years ago, will lead to perhaps a more kind of ideologically divided judiciary. Host take us deeper to the case we touch on. We had a list on the screen, beginning with redistricting but the union dues case. Explain what wore going to see when the Court Finally takes that up. Guest this is a case that the court actually did take up the issue, the same issue they took up a couple years before, before Justice Scalia died, and looked like the court would rule against the unions after the oral argument and then Justice Scalia died and the a court couldnt decide the case so came out as 44, which means theres no actual ruling and no precedence. So this case gets. The the chance to decide that question, question they dontt need to beside to because asking to overturn a precedent from 40 years ago. If they do overturn the precedent that it will be massive blow to the unions because it will prevent them from being able to take these fees from nonmembers for collective bargaining activities. This is not about political spending which nonmembers can opt out but the ability to take the money for the collective bargaining activities which the unions say if they cant take the money, the worker who arent union member get a free right because the union is still representing them in negotiations, but theyre not having to pay towards it. Host i should ask, we spent the first hour of the program talking quite a bit about guns and the tragedy in las vegas where more than 50 people were killed and 200 injured by the gunman. At that one of the hotels on the strip. Any gun cases on the Court Colorado docket. Guest havent got one yet but quite possible they could. The supreme touter has a massive say in the gun rights debate when they choose to weigh in, if they do. Theres a couple of cases heading in this direction. One is from the district of columbia, about a gun regulation in d. C. And another case from maryland concerning a separate law, and Supreme Court has been reluctant to weigh in on gun rights since 2010, and 2008 as well, the big decision where they found that theres aner individual right to bear armsr under the constitution, and the second amendment. But since then they havent weighed in on what the scope of that is and these cases, if they were to reach the court, could give them an opportunity do that. Host explain Something Else for us because you recently read and the wade the news the court cancelled argentinaments scheduled for october 10th, the biggest case of the term, wh