Health care law looms over Supreme Court's new term

WASHINGTON -- The nine justices of the Supreme Court, who serve without seeking election, soon will have to decide whether to insert themselves into the center of the presidential campaign next year.

The high court begins its new term Monday, and President Barack Obama's health care overhaul, which affects almost everyone in the country, is squarely in its sights.

The Obama administration's request that the justices resolve whether the health care law is constitutional makes it more likely than not that they will deliver their verdict by June, just as Obama and his Republican opponent charge toward the fall campaign.

If as now expected the justices agree to review the law's constitutionality, those deliberations would certainly define the court's coming term. Their decision could rank as the court's most significant since the December 2000 ruling that effectively sealed George W. Bush's election as president.

Health care is only one of several issues that the court could hear that would make for a "fantastic Supreme Court term," said former acting solicitor general Neal Katyal, now in private practice at the Hogan Lovells law firm.

Other high-profile cases on the horizon concern immigration and affirmative action, hot-button issues at any time and only more so in an election year.

Less likely, though still with a chance to make it to the court this year, are cases involving gay marriage and the landmark Voting Rights Act that some Southern states argue has outlived its usefulness.

Decisions about whether to even to consider health care, affirmative action and immigration are a month off or more.

In the meantime, the justices will take up a First Amendment case looking at the regulation of television broadcasts as well as a couple of appeals involving the Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.

One of those cases is a digital age dispute over the government's power to track a suspect's movement using a GPS device without first getting a judge's approval.