Recommended readings from the latest legal news:

• Columbia defends affirmative action | UPI
• AMA: Supreme Court Decision Reduces Confusion Surrounding Laws Regulating Health Insurers | PRNewswire
• Supreme Court Takes on Hollywood Copying Case | AP
• House approves increase in ceiling on federal deposit insurance | AP
• Spanish PM faces legal action for supporting Iraq war | AFP
• Iraq violated international law with mines in mosque: rights group | AP
• Proposals on EU constitution raise concern | Financial Times
• Ashcroft Outlines Successes in War on Terror | VOA
• Drug courts: viable alternative to jail | UPI
• Peruvian Lawmakers Approve More Charges Against Ex-President Fujimori | AP
• Iraqi POWs will get day in court, but which court? | Reuters
• Senate Republicans lose fourth attempt to break filibuster on judicial nominee | AP
• Bush administration wants military exemptions to environmental laws | AP
• PM says soldiers covered by Geneva Conventions | CTV
• China to Publish Article on US Human Rights Record in 2002 | People's Daily
• AIDS Legislation Making Progress in US Congress | VOA
• Illegal to hand PoWs to US, claim ministers | AP
• U.S. Urges Serbia to Arrest War Crimes Suspects | Reuter

See JURIST's Legal News for updates.

A fourth US Senate cloture vote to limit debate on the nomination of Miguel Estrada to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals failed Tuesday afternoon by a margin of 55-44. Get the official roll-call breakdown from the US Senate website.

Recommended readings from the latest legal news:

• Lawmakers Split on Smallpox Compensation | Newsday
• Panel Bans Trade in Conflict Diamonds | AP
• Tyco sues former chief financial officer | AP
• N. Korea rights abuses under U.N. scrutiny | UPI
• Supreme Court Says States Can Force HMOs to Open Doctor Networks | AP
• Diocese in San Bernardino, Calif., Asks Boston to Pay Lawsuit Damages | AP
• Court to Hear Microsoft Bid to Reverse Java Ruling | Reuters
• Command post found at hospital during PoW rescue | CBC
• Two Kuwaitis Say They Confessed Under Duress to Providing Weapons to Man Who Allegedly Shot Americans | AP
• Feds toughen light truck fuel standards | UPI
• Energy Legislation Would Ease Rules on Weapons-Grade Uranium Exports | AP

See JURIST's Legal News for updates.

The US State Department has posted the transcript of an interview with Lorne Craner, Assistant US Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, on the State Department Human Rights Reports, the 2002 edition of which was released March 31.

Duke Law School's Scott Silliman, director of the Center for Law, Ethics and National Security, and a retired colonel in the U.S. Air Force, discussed the "rules of engagement" and the role of lawyers in guiding the decisions of the US military on Tuesday's edition of The Connection, a public affairs program produced by WBUR Boston public radio. Listen to the broadcast .

From United States Central Command Wednesday:

Elements of the I Marine Expeditionary Force located two Al Samoud II missiles during ground operations Monday on a farm near Al Hillah in central Iraq. The Al Samoud II missile violates U.N. resolution 687 with a flight range exceeding 150 km.

Read the full CENTCOM press release.

The US Senate website indicates that yet another cloture vote on the nomination of Miguel Estrada to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals is scheduled for 2 PM ET this afternoon.

The US Supreme Court Court Wednesday handed down a unanimous ruling in Kentucky Association of Health Plans, Inc. v. Miller, holding that Kentucky's "Any Willing Provider" health insurance statutes saying, inter alia, that "A health insurer shall not discriminate against any provider who is located within the geographical coverage area of the health benefit plan and who is willing to meet the terms and conditions for participation established by the health insurer..." are not pre-empted by terms of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), which pre-empts all state laws "insofar as they … relate to any employee benefit plan," 29 U.S.C. § 1144(a), but saves from pre-emption state "law[s] … which regulat[e] insurance … ," s.1144(b)(2)(A). Justice Scalia wrote the Opinion. For background, see HMOs watching 'any willing provider' case in courts, from the January 31, 2003 edition of the Tampa Bay Business Journal.

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton delivered the inaugural Elizabeth Blume-Silverstein Lecture at Rutgers School of Law-Newark on March 30, speaking on the theme "Women in the Law, Affirmative Action and the Judicial Selection Process." Recorded video of the lecture is now online from Rutgers.

Vanderbilt University Law School dean Kent Syverud spoke out in favor of race-based admissions Tuesday as lawyers argued the University of Michigan law school's affirmative action admissions case before the US Supreme Court.... The Oakland Tribune reports that three dozen students from UC Berkeley School of Law joined other law students demonstrating for affirmative action outside the Supreme Court building....

Recommended readings from the latest legal news:

• On Affirmative Action, High Court Seeks Nuance | New York Times
• O'Connor Questions Foes of U-Michigan Policy | Washington Post
• Los Angeles' Roman Catholic Archdiocese Argues Against Release of Priest Files | AP
• White House Request To Restrict Clinton Pardon Data Upheld | Washington Post
• Viability of WWII-era rules of war questioned | Boston Globe
• Soldier Says He's Conscientious Objector | AP
• Andersen Appeals Obstruction of Justice Verdict | AccountingWEB
• US court rules treaty allows Canada to serve subpoenas on Florida residents | Canadian Press
• U.S. Tries to Block Access to Witness for Terror Trial | Washington Post
• US Authorizes Detention of Iraqi Civilians | Washington Post
• Serbia Cracks Down on Criminal Gangs | VOA
• Calls for Iraq TV bombing inquiry | Guardian
• Belgium softens war crimes law | BBC

See JURIST's Legal News for updates.

On April 2, 1970, the Governor of Massachusetts signed into law an anti-Vietnam War bill providing that no inhabitant of Massachusetts inducted into or serving in the armed forces "shall be required to serve" abroad in an armed hostility that had not been declared a war by Congress under Article I, Section 8, clause 11 of the United States Constitution. Supporters of the legislation hoped that the US Supreme Court would seize on the obvious conflict that the bill created between state and federal law and would rule on the constitutionality of the Vietnam War itself, but the Court refused to exercise original jurisdiction, forcing the case into the lower federal courts. See Anthony D'Amato, Massachusetts In The Federal Courts: The Constitutionality Of The Vietnam War[PDF], 4 Journal of Law Reform (1970).