AMERICA'S TOP COURT | Justices' other rulings

In other decisions today, the Supreme Court:
Sidestepped a dispute over whether Internet providers can be forced to identify subscribers illegally swapping music and movies online. The subject, however, may be back at the court soon. The Bush administration agrees with recording and movie companies that want to use a 1998 law to get information about Internet users, but the administration also had encouraged the Supreme Court to wait to settle the issue. The copyright law was written before file-swapping was common, and an appeals court said it could not be used to get information about people who share copyrighted files.
Declined to decide whether the Pentagon is constitutionally obligated to give news media access to U.S. troops during combat. The court, without comment, rejected the appeal by Larry Flynt, the self-described smut peddler who publishes Hustler magazine. He was challenging a lower ruling earlier this year that the First Amendment does not shield journalists from government interference in gathering news from the battlefield.
Agreed to consider the constitutionality of a federal law that requires state prisons to accommodate inmate religions, from Christianity to Satanism. The case does not question inmates' right to practice their religion, but asks whether states have to accommodate requests for a particular diet, special haircut or religious symbols.
Source: Associated Press