Anti-abortion groups have won approval in at least 18 states for specialized license plates with the tagline "Choose Life," even as officials in New Jersey and other states fight the requests on various grounds.

The cases raise unresolved questions about whether license plates — or even portions of them — convey government or private speech. To raise revenues, many states let drivers buy specialty plates that recognize everything from military units and colleges to sports teams and nonprofit groups.

"Legislatures can say there might be certain controversies they do not want discussed on license plates," Assistant New Jersey Attorney General Andrea Silkowitz argued Tuesday in the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court, referring to an Illinois case.

Silkowitz argued that her state rejected the "Choose Life" plate not to avoid controversy but because the relevant law limits designs to group names and logos, and does not permit slogans.

In 2003, the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission approved a request from the New York-based Children First Foundation, but later rejected the proposed design, which included a small graphic of a sun, two children's faces and the words "Choose Life."

The New Jersey agency also dismissed a later attempt to substitute a new domain name, "NJChoose-Life.Org," for the original "Fund-Adoption.Org" on the plate.

But economists expect that trend to moderate soon, as businesses bring inventories in line with slower sales. That should allow production to decline at a slower pace in the current quarter.

Still, the drop in March was steeper than expected. The Federal Reserve said production at the nation's factories, mines and utilities dropped a seasonally adjusted 1.5 percent, matching February's decline and worse than the 1 percent decline analysts forecast.

Factories and mines are increasingly idle, as the total industrial capacity utilization rate fell to 69.3 percent from 70.3 percent, the lowest on records dating to 1967.

Industrial production fell at a 20 percent annual rate in the first quarter, the Fed said, the sharpest quarterly downturn of the current recession. The drop will contribute to another steep contraction in the overall economy in the January-March period that economists estimate will be in the 4 to 5 percent range. The nation's economy shrank 6.3 percent in the fourth quarter of last year.

Some analysts expect industrial production to fall at a rate of less than 10 percent in the current quarter, as the economy's contraction slows.

Instead, Kagan, confirmed by the Senate last month as solicitor general, will wait until the fall to make her debut, Justice Department spokeswoman Beverley Lumpkin said Tuesday.

By the time Kagan took up her post, Lumpkin said, most of the cases the court will hear in April already had been assigned.

"I suppose she could have spent the last several weeks doing nothing but preparing, but that's not something she wanted to do. There's a lot to do getting up to speed in the office," Lumpkin said.

The solicitor general typically handles the top cases before the court. The challenge to a provision of the Voting Rights Act, which will be argued April 29, is perhaps this term's highest-profile case.

Kagan has a most impressive resume — former Harvard Law School dean, Clinton White House official and Supreme Court clerk — but she has little courtroom experience.

A Manhattan judge cleared the way for the newly filed Chapter 7 petition last week by granting a request from the same investors to lift a temporary order barring bankruptcy for Madoff. They had argued that a bankruptcy case was needed to protect their rights amid an ongoing scramble to seize his assets.

Madoff, 70, pleaded guilty last month to federal charges his secretive investment advisory service actually was a multibillion Ponzi scheme in which he paid longtime clients with money from new ones. He is jailed, awaiting a June sentencing for charges that carry a sentence of up to 150 years in prison.

Federal authorities already have begun forcing Madoff to forfeit property they allege was paid for by his fraud. In addition, a court-appointed trustee is liquidating assets from his securities firm to help play claims from thousands of burned investors.

The investors who sought bankruptcy believe it was the best way to make sure "all the property available would go to the victims," their lawyer, Jonathan Landers, said Monday.

They include a general partnership in Florida that claims it lost $30.2 million and another Madoff client who says he lost about $29 million in personal and charitable trust accounts. The claims are based on amounts listed in the last statements they received from Madoff — documents investigators say were fictitious.

His lawyers filed an emergency appeal with Justice Stephen Breyer after the federal appeals court in Denver turned down Nachio's latest bid to stay out of prison while he asks the high court to review his conviction in 2007 involving the sale of $52 million worth of stock in Qwest Communications International Inc.

Nacchio has been ordered to report to a prison camp in Minersville, Pa., by noon Tuesday to start a six-year term.

He says he should be allowed to remain free pending the Supreme Court's consideration of his case because there is a reasonable chance the justices will agree to consider overturning the conviction.

Federal prosecutors have opposed Nacchio's request.

They have said Nacchio hasn't met the requirement of showing that his Supreme Court appeal would probably win him a new trial or acquittal.

Coleman has 10 days to appeal to the state Supreme Court. Once the petition is filed, it could further delay the seating of Minnesota's second senator for weeks.

"It's time that Minnesota like every other state have two" senators, a jovial Franken said outside his Minneapolis townhouse with his wife Franni at his side. "I would call on Senator Coleman to allow me to get to work for the people of Minnesota as soon as possible."

After a statewide recount and seven-week trial, Franken stands 312 votes ahead. He gained more votes from the election challenge than Coleman, the candidate who brought the legal action.

The state law under which Coleman sued required three judges to determine who got the most votes and is therefore entitled to an election certificate, which is now on hold pending an appeal.

"The overwhelming weight of the evidence indicates that the November 4, 2008, election was conducted fairly, impartially and accurately," the judges wrote. "There is no evidence of a systematic problem of disenfranchisement in the state's election system, including in its absentee-balloting procedures."

Law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell recruited the Securities and Exchange Commission's former enforcement chief and another former high-level government lawyer to join its white-collar defense group, part of an effort to expand its Washington practice.

Linda Chatman Thomsen, who left the SEC earlier this year, and Raul Yanes, former staff secretary to President George W. Bush, are joining the law firm as partners.

Both had worked at Davis Polk in New York before joining the government.

The duo will be the first litigators in the 11-person Washington office in years.

Former SEC Commissioner Annette Nazareth and Robert Colby, a former deputy director of the SEC's trading and markets division, also recently joined the firm's Washington office to focus on financial regulatory issues.

Davis Polk clients, including large financial institutions, are closely entangled with the government as it has pumped billions of dollars into financial rescue plans. Congress is studying new regulation of financial markets.