In a dramatic acknowledgement of public interest in its proceedings, the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday announced that it would release audiotapes of three high-profile oral arguments shortly after they end.

Two of the arguments concern the legal ramifications of the post-Sept. 11 war on terror. The third involves a challenge to the secrecy of a Bush administration energy task force chaired by Vice President Dick Cheney -- a case from which Justice Antonin Scalia refused to recuse himself despite his presence with Cheney at a duck-hunting event in Louisiana earlier this year.

The cases and dates of oral argument are:

On April 20, Rasul vs. Bush and Al Odah vs. U.S. These cases involve legal challenges to the Bush administration's policy of indefinitely detaining foreign "enemy combatants" at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba. Shafiq Rasul is a detainee with British citizenship. Fawzi al Odah is a Kuwaiti.

On April 27, Cheney vs. U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. This is Cheney's appeal of a judge's order that his National Energy Policy Development Group produce documents showing whom it consulted in the early days of the Bush administration.

Two advocacy groups, the Sierra Club and Judicial Watch, convinced a lower court judge that inspection of the documents was necessary to determine whether energy industry officials participated as "de facto members" of the group. If so, their names could be released under the Federal Advisory Committee Act.

On April 28, Hamdi vs. Rumsfeld and Rumsfeld vs. Padilla. Yaser Hamdi and Jose Padilla are U.S. citizens imprisoned in South Carolina on suspicion of ties to al Qaida. The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the detention of Hamdi, who was seized in Afghanistan, as an enemy combatant. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that President Bush lacked the necessary authority from Congress to impose enemy-combatant status on Padilla, who was arrested in Chicago.

In expediting release of the audiotapes, the justices are following a procedure they have employed in only three other important cases: the Bush vs. Gore lawsuit concerning the disputed 2000 presidential election results in Florida; arguments in April 2003 in a challenge to affirmative-action programs at the University of Michigan; and arguments last September on the constitutionality of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law.

Ordinarily, Americans interested in a Supreme Court argument and unable to attend the proceedings must rely on news accounts or wait until transcripts of the arguments are available on the court's Website. As of yesterday, the most recent transcript posted on the Website was of a March 24 argument. Lawyers and other interested parties can obtain transcripts from a private court reporting service five business days after arguments take place.

Television news organizations have indicated a willingness to provide simultaneous audio or video coverage of Supreme Court arguments, but the justices have resisted the idea.