The federal government’s chief appellate advocate has announced his plans to step down.

U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement, who has frequently argued on the government’s behalf before federal courts - including 49 appearances before the U.S. Supreme Court - will step down in early June, the Department of Justice announced yesterday.

“I will miss not only Paul’s superb advocacy on behalf of the United States, but also his wise counsel and keen legal analysis,” Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey in the Justice Department announcement.

A longtime conservative and former clerk of Justice Antonin Scalia, Clement developed a reputation for seeking the middle road in order to build consensus.

This year Clement drew fire for his stance in the pending Supreme Court case D.C. v. Heller. In the government’s amicus brief, rather than adopt the White House’s hard-line view that the Second Amendment precluded handgun bans, Clement’s brief urged the high court to remand the case back to the lower court first to determine to what extent such a rule would thwart federal gun control efforts.

Clement, 41, has not announced what his plans will be after his June 2 departure.

Clement’s is the latest in a series of announced Justice Department departures as the Bush Administration draws to a close.

Dennis Quaid, whose newborn daughters were accidentally given a nearly-lethal dose of the blood-thinning drug herapin, told lawmakers yesterday that without the right to sue pharmaceutical companies, consumers will becomes “uninformed and uncompensated lab rats.”

“Like many Americans, I believed that a big problem in our country was frivolous lawsuits,” Quaid told members of the House Reform and Government Oversight Committee. “But now I know that the courts are often the only path to justice.”

Quaid’s testimony comes as the Food and Drug Administration has increasingly stepping into lawsuits against drugmakers, arguing that its regulatory authority in approving drugs supercedes state laws - including civil tort claims that drugs are unsafe.

The U.S. Supreme Court is set to weigh in on the issue new year with the case Wyeth v. Levine. This year, the Court held in Riegel v. Medtronic that state law tort claims alleging unsafe medical devices are preempted by FDA approval.

Lawsuit limits have been included in 51 rules proposed or adopted during the last few years of the Bush Administration. The civil claim limits governing a wide array of areas - from drugs and medical devices, to cars, railroads, and food.

Somehow last week DC Dicta missed the news about a civil settlement former Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork reached with the Yale Club. Bork filed a lawsuit against the club after he slipped and fell during a speaking engagement back in 2006. The conservative legal scholar sought $1 million in damages. The terms of the settlement are confidential, according to the Associated Press.

The news of the settlement was not missed by plaintiffs’ trial attorney group American Association for Justice, though. The group’s CEO Jon Haber released a statement ribbing Bork for his past support of strong tort reform measures. “Robert Bork today proved that the civil justice system works even for tort reformers who spent their careers trying to undermine it,” Haber said in a statement Friday when news of Bork’s settlement broke. “Bork’s lawsuit underscores how all people deserve to have a fair chance to receive justice.”

Supreme Court justices own stock. We know this, because often one or two justices must recuse themselves from consideration of a case involving a company they hold shares in.

But what happens when more than three justices find themselves in that position? The entire Court must take a pass on the case, because it takes at least six justices to tango.

Such was the case yesterday when the Court had no choice but the let a lawsuit alleging that a host of the nation’s largest companies violated international law by assisting South Africa’s former apartheid government. More here from AP.

Today, in an opinion authored by Justice John Paul Stevens, the Supreme Court held that express consent by counsel suffices to permit a magistrate judge to preside over jury selection in a felony trial, pursuant to the Federal Magistrates Act. A criminal defendant need not explicitly and personally waive his right U.S. District Court judge preside over the voir dire when his counsel agreed, the Court held in Gonzalez v. United States, No. 06-11612.

The Court also agreed to consider whether deference under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d), the federal habeas corpus law, should be given to the state court’s judgment in claims of ineffective assistance of counsel which the state court did not consider in Bell v. Kelly, No. 07-1223.

This morning the U.S. Supreme Court will likely hand down decisions and orders - among the cases that have yet to be decided is the closely-watched Second Amendment challenge to DC’s handgun ban - and we’ll update any newsworthy developments here. The justices are set to meet again on Thursday. The House meets in a pro forma session today and lawmakers from both houses resume work tomorrow.

Meanwhile:

According to a memo obtained by the Washington Post, Office of Special Counsel chief Scott J. Bloch, whose home and office were raided by the FBI last week, repeatedly butted heads with top career staffers over which cases should be pursued by the principal office protecting federal whistle-blowers and policing partisan politicking in the federal workplace. (WaPo).

Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens says the euthanized Kentucky Derby horse Eight Belles probably died more humanely than death row prisoners do. (AP)

So far this term, the Court has avoided the plethora of 5-4 splits that defined the October 2006 term. (AP).

Emails containing racially derogatory banter exchanged by Secret Service agents were revealed in federal court in a lawsuit brought by black former agents alleging racially-motivated employment discrimination. (NYT)

President George W. Bush was in Crawford, Texas over the weekend on a covert family operation, if you haven’t heard. (WaPo)

Congress is in session today, but it should be a quiet day on the Hill as no hearings or sessions are scheduled. Across the street at the Supreme Court, there may be some orders released following yesterday’s conference. Expect some opinions to be released next week. We’ll keep you posted on any developments.

Meanwhile,

Yesterday the Democratic-controlled House passed a housing rescue plan aimed at easing the subprime-fueled burden on homeowners. But President George W. Bush said he will veto the measure, saying prudent borrowers should not bail out those who bit off more debt than they could chew - and Congress may not have the votes to override the veto. (AP)

Congress’s compromise on the farm bill also won’t likely please President Bush. (AP)

Sen. Richard C. Shelby, who has links to the mortgage industry, also has more say over the Congressional housing rescue plan. And some are not too happy about that. (NYT)

Partners of Chinese women who were forced to have abortions are pressing the Supreme Court to make it easier to get asylum in the United States. (AP)

The House of Representatives yesterday passed a bill that will create a White House czar for intellectual property rights and also increase resources to fight bootleggers. (Variety)

The Senate Ethics Committee on Thursday dismissed a complaint against Sen. David Vitter, a suspected patron of a prostitution ring headed by a woman who killed herself last month. (Reuters)

Two lawsuits filed by former employees against Fidelity Investments are seeking to expand Sarbanes-Oxley. (Boston Globe).

Justice Antonin Scalia isn’t the only justice hitting the speaking circuit these past few days the Supreme Court has been dark.

Speaking last weekend at a gathering of attorneys in Alaska, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg hit on topics ranging from gender quality to her longtime friendship with Scalia.

“Alaska: Where men are men … and women have not only won the governorship, but a senate seat and the chief justiceship of the Supreme Court,” Ginsburg said to the crowd.

Ginsburg, who said she is close to Scalia and therefore doesn’t let his sometimes “zinging” criticisms get to her, said she’d like to see language added to the Constitution protecting women’s equal rights, even though there is already law in place to guard against discrimination. “It may be largely symbolic, but it’s an important symbol,” Ginsburg said.

DC Dicta does not normally watch the show “Boston Legal,” but with all of the hubbub over a recent episode featuring the fictitious legal team before the U.S. Supreme Court - including an interview in Legal Times with show creator (and, like DC Dicta, Boston University School of Law alum) David E. Kelley - we had to check it out.

Now we want to know what you think. Kelley is known for his over-the-top drama, particularly on this show. Did you like the episode or is it - as some have criticized - too unrealistic and disrespectful of the high court? Give us your two cents in the comments section below. (Unfortunately this clip does not show what DC Dicta thought was the funniest part of the episode - when William Shatner’s Denny Crane was flirting with Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg during opposing counsel’s argument.)

Mildred Loving - the black woman whose 1958 marriage to a white man in Virginia led to the landmark Supreme Court case striking down laws banning interracial marriage - has died.

The unanimous decision, Loving v. Virginia, authored by Chief Justice Earl Warren, held that Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act violated the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause. The ruling invalidated miscegenation laws in place across the country.

Her husband, Richard Loving, died in 1975.

More here from The New York Times.