5-4

Jackson, Mississippi out here with the supervillian-level attitude towards public goods - "if I have to share, then no one can have it." If you're not a 5-4 Premium member, you're not hearing every episode! To get exclusive Premium-only episodes, discounts on merch, access to our Slack community, and more, join at fivefourpod.com/support. 5 to 4 is presented by Prologue Projects. R...

Just to refresh your memory - bribery is when you write "bribe in exchange for your vote" on the memo line of a check, OR when you sign a contract saying you are doing bribes and then drop a pillowcase full of cash off at someone's office while multiple DOJ officials are watching.   A billionaire ferrying a public official around on his private jet and super yacht, while he sits on the...

The tension is palpable with the count tied at 3-2 … the defendant steps up to the plate and … OH! Swing and a miss! That's the third strike for our defendant which means the Court is going home with the win and the defendant is going to jail forever!  Tax payers will also move down in the standings; they'll be footing the bill for senseless incarceration for 25 years to life. The 8th Amen...

Well if intimidating minority voters, issuing memos in support of school segregation, and moving into a neighborhood that bars Jews from owning homes there makes you a segregationist … …then William Rehnquist was a segregationist.  A man who served as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Until 2005. The same year Gorillaz released "Feel Good Inc." The year Wedding Crashers came out. It'...

This episode contains discussions about the right to die, end of life matters, and suicide, which may be uncomfortable for some listeners. If you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of suicide, please seek help immediately. Resources and support for those in need can be found at the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988lifeline.org, or by dialing 988. Please take care while liste...

We're back with another episode of Rhiannon's movement lawyering series! In this episode, Rhiannon talks with Palestine Legal's senior staff attorney Radhika Sainath and staff attorney Dylan Saba about their mission to protect Palestinian activists from harassment, and the power of intersectional liberation movements. The full version of this premium episode is currently available excl...

Breaking news! It's not just the Supreme Court that sucks - it's ALSO the executive and legislative branches!  This week we're sharing Michael's appearance on Bloc Party, talking about how oral arguments went down in the SCOTUS cases that could make or break Biden’s student loan cancellation initiative.  Eleni Schirmer from the Debt Collective also joins in, to cringe at Roberts’ l...

What does a military contractor have in common with Justice Antonin Scalia? They both manufacture things! The contractor manufactures helicopters with faulty escape hatches. Scalia manufactures, out of whole cloth, new laws about who can be held liable for deaths. Neither of them care if you live or die, as long as the designs are to spec! 5 to 4 is presented by Prologue Projects. Rachel Ward is o...

Recorded live at Stateside at the Paramount! Join us as we skewer Texas judges (not literally!), teach a robot to argue before the Supreme Court, and answer the question that has haunted this podcast from the very beginning: Who IS Leon Neyfakh? The full version of this premium episode is available exclusively to our subscribers. To join, visit https://www.fivefourpod.com/support. 5 to 4 is presen...

This week, 5-4 invites you to check out an episode of Unreformed: the Story of the Alabama Industrial School for Negro Children, hosted by friend-of-the-pod Josie Duffy Rice. In 1968, police arrested five Black girls dressed in oversized military fatigues in Montgomery. The girls were runaways, escaping from a state-run reform school called the Alabama Industrial School for Negro Children in Mount...

It's not easy being a kid. Especially when the state thinks you don't have any constitutional rights. Thank goodness for this week's case, In re Gault, where the Court decides you can have a little rights, as a treat. If you're not a 5-4 Premium member, you're not hearing every episode! To get exclusive Premium-only episodes, discounts on merch, access to our Slack community, a...

You know and hate qualified immunity, which allows cops to get away with murder. Now meet prosecutorial immunity, the judge-made doctrine that allows prosecutors to get away with the death penalty. Prosecutorial immunity shields prosecutors from the consequences of their actions - whether it's putting witnesses they know are lying on the stand, withholding exculpatory evidence, or retaliating...

What is the greater crime? Missing a recording and pushing an episode back by a week … or using the full power of the state to prosecute a man for something he did not do, confining him in solitary as he awaits execution, and then appealing the remedy that he is awarded when exculpatory evidence (that the prosecution probably hid from the defense) resurfaces? Anyway, here's an encore of Connic...

Recorded live at Harvard Law School's Corporate Capture of the Legal System conference, we're talking about Jones Day. The law firm jumps into bed with all manner of villains with the justification that "everyone deserves representation." But as David Enrich, business investigations editor at The New York Times writes in his new book “Servants of the Damned: Giant Law Firms, Donald...

In this case from 1944 the Court decides that arresting someone on "suspicion of being Japanese" and putting them in a concentration camp is not racially motivated. And while we're at it, don't call it a "concentration camp," that makes the justices feel icky. 5 to 4 is presented by Prologue Projects. Rachel Ward is our producer. Leon Neyfakh and Andrew Parsons provide edit...

Here at 5-4 HQ we get a lot of questions. And while we can't answer the ones from our parents, about what we're doing with our lives, we CAN answer your questions about the law. The full version of this premium episode is available exclusively to our subscribers. To join, visit https://www.fivefourpod.com/support. 5 to 4 is presented by Prologue Projects. Rachel Ward is our producer. Leon...

Don't get it twisted: "the point" whizzing high over the heads of Supreme Court justices is a tradition as old as the Court itself. This case, where the Court holds that it cannot declare discriminatory voter registration unconstitutional because that would "legitimize it," proves our case. Tickets are selling fast for our Austin live show on Friday, February 24th! Get yours he...

The dictionary defines "quid pro quo" as "when a businessman walks up to a Congressman in the Capitol and hands him a check with the words 'bribe for doing a favor for me' written on the memo line." Nothing else constitutes bribery. It is so ordered. We've got an upcoming premium episode answering your questions. If you're dying to know something about the Court, th...

This week, 5-4 invites you to check out an episode of If Books Could Kill, featuring Michael Hobbes, of Maintenance Phase , and 5-4 's own Peter. If Books Could Kill deconstructs the airport bestsellers that captured our hearts and ruined our minds. From The Game to Freakonomics , if an idea is bad enough, someone has written a book about it, and Peter and Michael are here to rip it to shreds....

We spend the better part of the year bumming you out about the many ways the law fails to actually provide justice. Thankfully, there are organizations that provide mutual aid and support to right some of the wrongs committed by our judiciary. Here are some of our favorite orgs that are offering healing, advocacy and care, to build the future that we want. https://reprolegaldefensefund.org/ https:...

For some strange reason, there aren't many thrillers about the Supreme Court. The Pelican Brief remedies this obvious oversight by Hollywood. If you'd like to option 5-4 for film and television, we're all ears. If you're not a 5-4 Premium member, you're not hearing every episode! To get exclusive Premium-only episodes, discounts on merch, access to our Slack community, and more...

Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor is undoubtedly one of our faves. But "no robes, no masters" still applies. The full version of this premium episode is available exclusively to our Patreon supporters. To join, visit  www.patreon.com/fivefourpod . 5 to 4 is presented by Prologue Projects. Rachel Ward is our producer. Leon Neyfakh and Andrew Parsons provide editorial support. Our production...

This episode contains graphic depictions of an execution. Please take care while listening. If you're not a 5-4 Premium member, you're not hearing every episode! To get exclusive Premium-only episodes, discounts on merch, access to our Slack community, and more, join at fivefourpod.com/support. 5 to 4 is presented by Prologue Projects. Rachel Ward is our producer. Leon Neyfakh and Andrew P...

The Fourth Amendment protects you from unreasonable search and seizure by the government. Unless the government wants to unreasonably search and/or seize. In that case, the Supreme Court says "go for it babes!" If you're not a 5-4 Premium member, you're not hearing every episode! To get exclusive Premium-only episodes, discounts on merch, access to our Slack community, and more, jo...

The full version of this episode is available now to our 5-4 Premium supporters. To join, visit www.fivefourpod.com/support 5 to 4 is presented by Prologue Projects. Rachel Ward is our producer. Leon Neyfakh and Andrew Parsons provide editorial support. Our production manager is Percia Verlin, and our assistant producer is Arlene Arevalo. Our website was designed by Peter Murphy. Our artwork is by...