Buried amidst yesterday’s Supreme Court news was yet another unanimous summary reversal (in Lopez v. Smith) of a Ninth Circuit ruling in a case presenting a simple application of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA). Under AEDPA, when a state prisoner claims that a state court misapplied federal law, a federal court may grant habeas relief only if the state court’s decision was “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States.” With manifest exasperation, the per curiam opinion of the Court states that the Court has “emphasized, time and again” what the statutory text makes clear: a federal court of appeals may not rely on its own precedent to conclude that a principle of law is “clearly established.”

In case you’re keeping score at home, the author of the Ninth Circuit opinion was not Stephen Reinhardt this time but was instead Sidney Thomas (joined by Obama appointee Andrew Hurwitz and Bush 43 district judge Ralph Beistline). As you may recall, Thomas, a Wyoming Montana native, was trotted out as a supposed moderate candidate for the Stevens vacancy that Elena Kagan ended up filling. I documented at the time that, country roots notwithstanding, he’s just Reinhardt dressed up in a cowboy hat.