I hope the Supreme Court enjoyed its summer vacation — such as it was, in spite of a deluge of rulings on emergency applications — because the big-ticket battles over Donald Trump’s expansive notions of executive power are coming fast. The Court has now set November 5 for the oral argument in the cases challenging Trump’s tariffs, and it has scheduled no other arguments that day, so expect a solid 2–3 hours of fireworks that will probably have the markets on edge.

And speaking of the financial markets, with the D.C. Circuit having kept Lisa Cook on the Federal Reserve board of governors as it met to cut interest rates on Wednesday — a step urged by Trump, although less than he asked for — the Trump Administration this morning asked the Court to step in and allow Trump to remove Cook.

However much the Court may want to settle first the question of executive power to remove independent agency heads outside of the Fed, the Fed dispute will be hard to avoid.