Why Obama Keeps Losing at the Supreme Court

June 7 (Bloomberg) -- In cases before the Supreme Courtlast year, President Barack Obama’s Justice Department relied onoutlandish legal theories that pushed a constitutionalinterpretation of extreme federal power. That posture led tounanimous losses in three very different areas of law: religiousliberty (Hosanna-Tabor Church v. EEOC), criminal procedure (U.S.v. Jones) and property rights (Sackett v. EPA).

A year later, as the Court prepares to rule on affirmativeaction, the Voting Rights Act and gay marriage, theadministration’s track record hasn’t improved. Notwithstandingthe technical win on the health-care law, which was onlyachieved thanks to Chief Justice John Roberts’s controversialdecision to rewrite it, the government has continued to sufferunanimous defeats. Not all its cases are losers, to be sure, butthis administration’s pursuit of expansive authority tends tolose big.