Samuel Becket’s iconic play Waiting for Godot is seen as being a part of the “Theatre of the Absurd” movement. No doubt patent holders, landowners, and those regulated by the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board must be thinking that the U.S. Supreme Court has embraced the movement as well, given how absurdly long they and everyone else are having to wait for some of the more significant decisions of the October 2009 term. We’ve been keeping score of how long that wait has been here, and are updating it today given that the Court issued four opinions today, none of which include those on our scorecard. The Justices now have 20 undecided cases remaining on the docket, and are poised to release more this Thursday. One signficant free enterprise-oriented grant of certiorari today in Matrixx Initiatives, Inc. v. Siracusano, involving a SEC Rule 10b-5 lawsuit and the issue of non-disclosure of “adverse events.”
1. Bilski v. Kappos, patentability of non-physical inventions: 217 days
2. Stop the Beach Renourishment Inc. v. Florida DEP, judicial takings of private property: 194 days
3. Free Enterprise Fund v. PCAOB, SOX, public accounting oversight, and separation of powers: 189 days
4. Black v. U.S.; Weyhrauch v. U.S., federal honest services fraud statute: 188 days