Cartwright 1
Taylor Cartwright
December 1, 2016
PAR 104
Professor Jensvold
Project 4: Arizona v. United States (641 F.3d 339 )
1.
Case Summary:
On April 23, 2010, the Arizona State Legislature passed S.B. 1070; Then Governor Jan
Brewer signed the bill into law. On July 6, 2010, the United States Justice Department went on to
attempt to stop the enforcement of S.B. 1070 by taking it to federal district court before the law
could take effect. These are the sections the Justice Department had seen as preemptive: §5(C)
because it made it a misdemeanor for an illegal alien to engage or look for work in the State. §6
authorized state and local officers to arrest without a warrant if “the officer had probable cause
to believe the illegal alien has committed any public offense that would make them removable
from the U.S.”; and §2(B) required officers conducting a stop, detention, or arrest to make ef-
forts, in some situations, to verify the person’s immigration status. On July 28, 2010, Judge
Susan R. Bolton blocked key portions of SB 1070. An appeal of the US District Court's ruling
was filed on July 29, 2010 (one day later). On November 1, 2010, the United States Court of Ap-
peals for the 9th Circuit heard arguments on the case. The three-judge panel was made up
of
Judges Paez, Bea, and Noonan. On April 11, 2011, the Ninth Circuit three-judge panel upheld the
district court's ban on parts of the law taking effect. In May of 2011, Governor Jan Brewer an-
nounced that Arizona would appeal directly to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Supreme Court an-
nounced in December 2011 that it would grant certiorari and review Arizona's S.B. 1070 law;
arguments began on April 25, 2012. On June 25, 2012, the Supreme Court struck down three of
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the four provisions of S.B. 1070. The three provisions that were struck down were: 1. The re-
quirement that legal immigrants need to carry registration documents at all times; 2. Allowing
state police to arrest any individual for suspicion of being an illegal immigrant; and 3. Making it
a crime for an illegal immigrant to search for a job or to have one in the state. The majority opin-
ion of the Supreme Court was written by Justice Kennedy and was joined by Chief Justice
Roberts, Justice Ginsburg, Justice Breyer, and Justice Sotomayor. All of the justices also agreed
to uphold the section of the law allowing Arizona State police to investigate immigration status
of an individual who was stopped, detained, or arrested lawfully, if there were a reasonable sus-
picion that the individual was in the country illegally. Justice Scalia dissented and said that he
