Current issues frequently turn on civil liberties, civil rights, and federal-state controversies. State Court or Federal Court of Appeals decided a substantial federal question that has not been determined by Supreme Court or in a fashion probably in disagreement with Courts position on this issue. Two Federal Courts of Appeals are in Disagreement. When the Federal Circuit Court Reverses the District Court Decision on a Controversial Issue that Court Feels is still open. When a Federal Court of Appeals holds a state law to be unconstitutional.
Controversies can brew for a number of years before the court decides to rule on that issue.
First, the course asks whether or not there is the possibility of a political compromise in the making. Secondly, even if there looks to be little prospect for compromise the Court may still bide its time waiting for precisely the right case to hear on a particular issue. In this instance, the judgment often turns on the extent to which the Court believes that a particular case will enable them to get to the heart of the constitutional question as opposed to merely deciding the case on technicalities. This is important because if a particular case is decided on a technicality peculiar to that case then the ruling will have significantly less application to other cases on that issue, the constitutional debates about the issue itself will remain unresolved, and the court will have to consider other cases on this issue. Unless forced to consider a particular issue because of such things as contradictory rulings by lower courts, the Supreme Court generally prefers to wait to consider an issue until it gets the case that will enable it to make a definitive ruling.