Today brought another quiet orders list during the Court’s summer break.

The Court’s next scheduled conference begins on August 16, 2010.

In re The Honorable Sharon Keller, No. 10-0566

Today, Judge Sharon Keller filed a petition asking the Texas Supreme Court to vacate and expunge the “public warning” she was given by the State Commission on Judicial Conduct.

You can read an annotated copy of her petition for mandamus relief online. It outlines her basic theories, which are:

• the remedy imposed by the Commission was not among those listed in the Texas Constitution;

• any sanction required a vote of seven members, not six;

• some of the members of the Commission were not eligible to serve together because of requirements for geographic diversity; and

• that the Court should issue mandamus relief because there is no adequate appeal available to Judge Keller.

I’m sure more will be written about this case. But not by me tonight. (I have a short-deadline brief due tomorrow.)

In re Moose Oil & Gas Co., No. 08-40840 (5th Cir.) (per curiam)

Today, the Fifth Circuit certified a set of questions to the Texas Supreme Court about the construction of some oil & gas pooling agreements.

You can view the Fifth Circuit’s opinion and order certifying these questions (PDF). (Link now fixed!)

From within the governing contracts, the Fifth Circuit identifies this provision (which it calls the Royalty Provision) as “the language principally at issue here”:

“During the period of time Consenting Parties are entitled to receive Non-Consenting Party’s share of production, or the proceeds therefrom, Consenting Parties shall be responsible for the payment of all production, severance, excise, gathering and other taxes, and all royalty, overriding royalty and other burdens applicable to Non-Consenting Party’s share of production ….”

Barnes argues that Tawes, as a Consenting Party, is responsible for “all royalty” owed to her.

As with all respectable oil & gas cases, this one features its share of property transfers, side contracts, and payments disputes. It eventually took a detour through bankruptcy court and up to the Fifth Circuit, and now back to the Texas Supreme Court for a definitive construction of these oil & gas contracts under Texas law.

With that combination of messy facts, unsettled law, and procedural wrinkles, the only surprise is that it didn’t show up as the oil & gas question on this week’s Texas Bar Exam. (There’s always next year.)

The Court’s online calendar has now been updated to show argument sittings and conferences planned for the next term.

It shows the expected burst of conferences beginning in mid-August as the Court returns from its break. There are two-day conferences on August 16-17 and on August 23-24. We can expect a flurry of opinions on August 27, 2010, as the Court clears out what cases it can from the term that is ending.

Argument Sittings

Last week’s orders told us about the Court’s first two argument sittings (on Sept. 14-16, 2010 and Oct. 12-14, 2010), which have been assigned to the 18 pending cases that had accumulated during the late spring.

The calendar now shows the other argument dates expected for the year: Nov. 9-10, 2010; Dec. 7-9, 2010; Jan. 4-6, 2011; Feb. 1-3, 2011; and Mar. 1-3, 2011. If there are three arguments heard per day, that’s room for 42 more cases to be heard at oral argument next term.

Sixty oral arguments in a term does not sound like a high number, but this may just leave the Court room to expand the schedule as needed.¹ Continued…

1. Last year, the Court scheduled two separate three-day argument sittings for April 2010 but only filled one of them. This year, April is not included in the initial list. The Court can, of course, add argument sittings. [↩]

As expected, it was a quiet orders list today.

The Court’s next scheduled conference begins on August 16, 2010.

If you think sparring with a judge during oral argument is tough, try sparring with a judge in a gym, in a sport featuring spin kicks, and a referee that yells “fight!”

Justice David Medina’s biography notes that “in college he competed on the university’s karate . . . team.”.

He really wasn’t kidding.

Turns out, he recently participated in a match — with a law clerk. Tickets to the match were a featured item at the Court’s annual holiday charity auction.

Thanks to the power of YouTube, you can watch from the comfort and relative safety of your office.

• Preliminaries to the match and Round  1 (2:31)

• Round 2 (1:33)

• Round 3 and announcement of winner (2:33)

If you can’t decide whether to click on one of those links, you may want to read how the matches are scored:

Scoring: 1 point for punches or kicks to the body and punches to the head or face; 2 points for kicks to the head; jumps or spins add a point, so 3 points for spin kicks to the head (2 for spin kicks to the body).

As regular readers know, the Texas Supreme Court is on its summer break. The fall calendar is set, and the next conference of the Justices is not scheduled until mid-August.

With my SCOTXblog time, I’ve been working on a new project that I hope to launch by the end of the summer. Yes, it’s also related to the Texas Supreme Court; I will announce it on the blog when it’s ready.

Along the way, I’ve been learning a few programming tricks. With one of them, I’ve updated SCOTXblog so that its layout rearranges as you make your browser window narrower or wider.

But these improvements do not, unfortunately, show up in Internet Explorer. Read more about the new design

Earlier this year, the Marketing on Hold case (DocketDB) got some unusual attention when the Respondent (a putative class representative) filed a federal lawsuit, arguing that the time the Texas Supreme Court was taking to issue its decision violated constitutional rights.

Barely a week later, the Texas Supreme Court decided the case. Divided 5-3, the Court held that the plaintiff (who was an assignee of someone else’s claims) was not an adequate class representative.

The plaintiff filed a motion for rehearing and a demand that the Texas Supreme Justice who authored the majority opinion be recused. Both motions were denied in May.

Today, the federal district court resolved the federal case, dismissing it as moot now that the state court process is over.