This case asks whether the State of New Mexico’s actions enabling pollution from oil and gas extraction, and its failure to control that pollution, violate the New Mexico Constitution’s Pollution Control Clause, Inherent Rights Clause, Due Process Clause, and Equal Protection Clause. The ACLU's State Supreme Court Initiative, joined by the ACLU of New Mexico and the Brennan Center of Justice, filed an amicus brief urging the New Mexico Supreme Court to answer those questions by retiring its “interstitial approach” to state constitutional interpretation—which looks first to federal doctrine when interpreting state constitutional provisions that arguably have U.S. Constitutional analogues—and instead interpret the New Mexico Constitution holistically and independently. This independent approach, we explain, will ensure that New Mexicans can enjoy—and enforce—the rights guaranteed to them in their unique founding document.

This case asks whether government officials who intentionally violate the law are immune from damages suits under a state statute governing such suits, and if so, whether the statute itself violates the Open Courts Clause of the Utah Constitution. Utah’s Open Courts Clause, like similar provisions in thirty-nine other states across the country, protects an individual’s right to seek judicial remedies for wrongs committed against them. It therefore serves as an important tool that does not exist in the U.S. Constitution to hold government actors accountable.

This case raises the question whether New Mexico courts should retire their current, federal-centric approach to interpreting the New Mexico Constitution—a method known as the “interstitial approach”—and embrace an independent approach that would allow them to more readily diverge from federal courts in light of New Mexico’s own law, history, and values. The Court’s decision could have major implications for New Mexicans’ ability to vindicate their state constitutional rights. The ACLU's State Supreme Court Initiative, alongside the ACLU of New Mexico and the Brennan Center for Justice, tendered an amicus brief to the New Mexico Supreme Court.

This case asks whether Kentucky’s legislature can legally favor some unions by giving them preferential treatment and disfavor others. A recent law does just that: SB 7 prohibits public employers from allowing their employees to use payroll deductions for union dues yet expressly exempts law enforcement and fire protection unions from this prohibition. Two state circuit courts and the Court of Appeals have held that this law violates the Kentucky Constitution’s equal protection guarantee. The State now appeals to the Kentucky Supreme Court. The Court’s decision has important implications for equal protection, free speech, and labor rights in Kentucky.