State Case Database
Search State Court Report's database of significant state supreme court decisions and pending cases. Download decisions and briefs for cases that develop state constitutional law. This is a selected database and does not include every state supreme court case. See methodology and "How to Use the State Case Database" for more information.
This database is updated monthly, although individual cases may be updated more frequently. Last updated comprehensively with cases decided through March 2025.
Featured Cases
State of Washington v. Gator's Custom Guns
Washington Supreme Court reversed a lower court and upheld the state's ban on selling or manufacturing magazines that hold more than ten rounds of ammunition. The majority held that large-capacity magazines are “not” arms within the scope of the state or federal constitutional right to bear arms, and the ability to purchase them is not "necessary to the realization of the core right to possess a firearm in self-defense."
LeMieux v. Evers
The Wisconsin Supreme Court held, in a divided decision, that the governor did not exceed his partial veto authority under the state constitution when he altered digits, words, and punctuation in a budget bill to extend a school funding increase from 2 to 402 years.
Griffin v. State Board of Elections
A candidate for a seat on the North Carolina Supreme Court, who lost by over 700 votes, claims that the state board of elections followed an incorrect process for registering voters and seeks to invalidate more than 60,000 votes.
Dupuis v. Roman Catholic Bishop of Portland
Held that a law that revived claims based on sex acts toward minors that were previously time-barred impairs a defendant's vested right to be free from a claim once its statute of limitations has expired, finding that a prohibition on laws reviving expired claims "runs as a theme" throughout the text of Maine's Constitution.
State v. Francisco Edgar Tirado
Held that North Carolina's "cruel or unusual" punishment clause — construed consistently with a separate state constitutional provision specifying the types of punishment laws may impose, without limitations based on age — would provide less protection against life-without-parole sentences for juveniles than the Eighth Amendment, so must be interpreted in lockstep with the federal "cruel and unusual" punishment clause.
Cherokee Nation v. U.S. Department of the Interior
Held that the governor possesses constitutional and statutory authority to represent the state’s interests in litigation involving tribal gaming contracts, including to choose the counsel who will represent his position. The governor was a named defendant in his official capacity in the underlying litigation, and the state attorney general sought to assume control of defending the state’s interests over the objection of the governor, who had already employed separate counsel to represent the state.
Montanans Against Irresponsible Densification v. State
Reversed lower court's preliminary injunction against state laws requiring municipalities to allow multi-unit dwellings in single-family zoned areas, finding that the state constitutional right to acquire and protect property is subject to the state's police power and that the "possibility" of constitutional harm is insufficient to support an injunction.
Texas v. Margaret Daley Carpenter
Texas’s attorney general sued a New York doctor for mailing abortion-including drugs to a woman in Texas, claiming she practiced medicine in Texas without a Texas license and improperly aided an abortion. After the doctor did not respond to the complaint, a Texas trial court issued a default judgment enjoining her from prescribing abortion-inducing drugs to state residents and imposing $100,000 in civil penalties, as sought by the attorney general.
Smith v. BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee
Held that an insurance company’s termination of an at-will employee for petitioning legislators about Covid-19 vaccine requirements did not fall within a “violates clear public policy” exception to at-will employment. Because the right to petition in the TN Constitution only constrains the government, not private parties, a private employer does not violate “public policy” by terminating an employee for exercising that right.
In re L.E.S.
Will consider whether a "would have been married" test created by an intermediate appellate court to determine whether a woman, who had children with a same-sex partner at a time when the state's same-sex marriage ban was in effect, has parental rights over the children, violates separation of powers principles and the state constitution's ban on retrocative laws by effectively rewriting state statutes that do not recognize common-law marriage and define parenthood in the case of artificial insemination.
Cuomo v. New York State Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government
Ruled that state ethics commission does not violate separation of powers principles, finding that the legislature shares with the governor power to appoint and remove state officers under New York's constitution and the commission "provides an additional ethics enforcement mechanism narrowly targeted to the problems inherent in the Executive Branch’s self-regulation."
Access Independent Health Services v. Wrigley
Will consider whether trial court erred in striking down near-total abortion ban on bases that the law violates a woman's fundamental right to obtain an abortion pre-viability and the exceptions are unconstitutionally vague. The North Dakota Supreme Court previously refused to stay the trial court ruling, finding at that juncture that the state had not shown it was likely to prevail on appeal.
Vet Voice Foundation v. Hobbs
Washington Supreme Court held requirement that election workers verify voter signatures on mail ballots, when coupled with the state’s recently expanded process for notifying voters and providing an opportunity to cure when a signature mismatch is identified, does not facially violate the state constitution’s free and equal elections, privileges and immunities, or due process clause.
