Federal officials believe a localized "terror attack" was thwarted when an FBI raid on a Minnesota man's mobile home turned up Molotov cocktails, pipe bombs and several firearms.

Buford Rogers, 24, was apprehended Friday after the raid of his Montevideo, Minn., home.

“The FBI believes that a terror attack was disrupted by law enforcement personnel and that the lives of several local residents were potentially saved,” the Minneapolis FBI office said in a statement released Monday.

Authorities say the thwarted attack was a low-level case of domestic terrorism. The investigation remains ongoing, according to the FBI statement.

Buford is linked to an unidentified militia group, officials said.

The FBI wouldn’t disclose information Monday about the nature or target of the alleged plot, but authorities believe Rogers was targeting an area of western Minnesota, The Associated Press reported.

The alleged plot was exposed after “timely analysis of intelligence and through the cooperation and coordination” between local, state, and federal officials, the statement says.

Rogers has been charged with one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm. He remains in federal custody and is expected to make his first appearance in federal court this week.

It is not known if Rogers has retained an attorney.

The U.S. Supreme Court, in a case to be argued Monday, wades into a controversy over federal copyright law that could determine the legal rights of American consumers to sell thousands of used products on eBay and at garage sales and flea markets.

Stelios Varias / Reuters file photo

The legal battle involves Supap Kirtsaeng, a student from Thailand who was surprised by the high cost of academic textbooks when he arrived in the U.S. to attend college.  He asked his parents to search bookstores back home and send him much cheaper versions -- published overseas and sold at a fraction of the price -- of the same texts. 

He was soon running what amounted to a small business out of his apartment, helping to pay his way through school by selling textbooks on eBay. The exact amount of his profit is unclear, but court records say it was around $100,000. 

The textbooks his family shipped him each bore this warning: "Exportation from or importation of this book to another region without the publisher's authorization is illegal," but Kirtsaeng wasn't bothered.  He concluded -- based on a search of articles on the Internet -- that he was in no legal jeopardy.  

The publisher of some of the books he sold, John Wiley & Sons, didn't see it that way. It sued him in federal court, and a New York jury ordered him in 2009 to pay $600,000 in damages.  When he said he had nowhere near that kind of money, he had to hand over personal property, including his computer, printer and golf clubs. A federal appeals court last year upheld the verdict. 

Kirtsaeng was caught between two federal laws, and he's now asking the U.S. Supreme Court to see it his way.

One longstanding provision says when the holder of a copyright offers a work for sale, its legal interest in that specific copy evaporates as the item is sold. It's called the first-sale doctrine, and it means that if you buy the latest John Grisham novel, you can sell it on a website or give it away to the church library without violating copyright laws. 

But another law prohibits importing works "acquired outside the United States ... without the authority of the owner of copyright."  Applying that statue, the federal courts ruled against Kirtsaeng, reasoning that "the first-sale doctrine does not apply to copies manufactured outside of the United States."           

A who's who of companies and groups involved in selling used merchandise is urging the Supreme Court to overturn the publisher's victory. 

EBay warns that leaving the ruling intact would be a blow to "trade, consumers, secondary markets, e-commerce, small businesses, and jobs."  Goodwill Industries says the ruling would have "a catastrophic effect on the viability of the secondary market and, consequently, on Goodwill's ability to provide needed community-based services." 

"There are enough copyright owners out there -- and enough crazy copyright lawsuits," says a group of book store operators in a friend of court brief. "No one should be put to the choice of violating the law and hoping they don't get caught, and losing their business." 

The effect of a victory for the publisher, according to some experts in copyright law, would extend far beyond the market for books and other published materials.  It could also affect sales of thousands of used consumer electronic products made outside the U.S. that contain copyrighted software, perhaps even used cars. 

Kirtsaeng's lawyer makes the same expansive claim in his Supreme Court brief.  "Even cherished American traditions, such as flea markets, garage sales, and swapping dog-eared books are vulnerable to copyright challenge" under the appeals court ruling, argues Josh Rosenkranz of New York.

But could that really be the outcome? 

"It doesn't mean you'd have industry enforcers attending yard sales. You'd just be converting a bunch of people into law breakers," says Prof. Rebecca Tushnet, an expert on copyright law at Georgetown Law Center in Washington. 

Most likely, she says, music and book publishers would be visiting stores and Internet sites that sell used materials. "Anything more organized, like eBay sales or craigslist could be disrupted," she says.  "And I do think it's a very serious threat. They are very clearly willing to do this." 

Not so, argues Washington, D.C. lawyer Ted Olson, representing the publisher that sued Kirtsaeng. If such predictions were right, he says, "those consequences should already have occurred in response to 30 years of judicial decisions and commentary." 

However the court decides the case, it will undoubtedly affect a category known as graymarket sales, in which middlemen legally buy products overseas, then make them available for sale by retailers in the U.S. who can offer the products for lower prices.  

Swiss watch maker Omega and discount retailer Costco have been battling in court for years over this issue. Omega claimed Costco was improperly selling its watches acquired overseas through just such a graymarket mechanism. 

Omega says its authorized US dealers charge prices "that are higher than the prices charged in other, less developed and less competitive markets."  It argues that any erosion of copyright protection for overseas sales would limit a manufacturer's ability to tailor prices to global markets. 

But discount retailer Costco is siding with Supap Kirtsaeng, saying it "often sells copyrighted products that, although genuine, were not purchased directly from the copyright owner."

The U.S. Supreme Court term that begins Monday promises to be one of the most important for civil rights in decades, with the potential for blockbuster decisions on issues from race in classrooms and the voting booth to legal recognition for same-sex marriage.

Related: Conservatives warily ponder prospect of an 'Obama court'

Less than a decade after ruling that the nation's colleges and universities can consider the race of student applicants to achieve more racially diverse campuses, a practice now widely used by the nation's selective schools, the court has agreed to take a fresh look.

The new challenge comes from Abigail Fisher, a white student denied admission to the University of Texas at Austin. The school admits the top 10 percent of academic performers from all Texas high schools, then considers the race of applicants as one factor in admitting the remainder of an incoming freshman class.

Evan Vucci / AP

People who waited in line overnight to hear the Supreme Court on a landmark case on health care hold their belongings as they make their way into the court in Washington, Thursday, June 28, 2012.

Fisher did not finish in the top 10 percent at her high school and claims that the consideration of race in reviewing applications cost her a spot at the university. 

"There were people in my class with lower grades, who weren't in all the activities I was in, who were accepted into UT. And the only difference between us was the color of our skin," she said. 

The university, backed by civil rights groups, contends that while the top 10 percent plan achieves some campus diversity, many of its classes would have only a few, if any, black and Hispanic students without additional considerations of race. 

Making it harder to achieve the diversity colleges need, argues Gregory Garre, a Washington, D.C. lawyer representing the University of Texas, "would jeopardize the nation's paramount interest in educating its future leaders in an environment that best prepares them for the society and workforce they will encounter." 

The Supreme Court that will hear the case Oct. 10 is different from the one that upheld a race-conscious admissions program at the University of Michigan law school in 2003. 

"Sandra Day O'Connor was on the court then, and she's been replaced by Samuel Alito, who has much less tolerance for affirmative action," says Tom Goldstein, a Washington, D.C. lawyer who specializes in Supreme Court cases. 

O'Connor, who wrote the decision in the Michigan case, retired from the court in 2006. 

As a result, says Pamela Harris, a former Obama administration official in the Justice Department, "I don't think anyone thinks affirmative action is long for this world." 

Justice Elena Kagan, considered one of the court's liberals, will sit this one out. She was the Obama administration's solicitor general when the Justice Department became involved in the case in the lower courts. 

The Supreme Court will take up another racially charged issue this term if, as seems likely, it agrees to consider efforts to scale back the landmark Voting Rights Act. 

Passed by Congress in 1965 and renewed four times since then, most recently in 2006, a key provision requires states with a history of discrimination at the polls to get federal permission before making any changes to election procedures -- from redrawing congressional district boundaries to changing the locations of polling places. 

Three years ago, the Supreme Court brushed off a challenge to that requirement but strongly suggested that several justices had doubts about its constitutionality, given recent electoral reforms. 

"Things have changed in the South," the court said in 2009. "Blatantly discriminatory evasions of federal decrees are rare." 

Pending cases ask the court to strike down the pre-clearance requirement entirely or throw out the list of areas, consisting of nine entire states, and of 12 cities and 57 counties elsewhere, that must get permission to modify their election procedures. 

The current map, says Bert Rein, a Washington, D.C. lawyer representing Shelby County, Ala., includes some localities that have made substantial reforms while missing other parts of the country that have failed to root out discrimination at the polls. 

As a result, Rein says, the system is unfair. "Florida has been forced into pre-clearance litigation to prove that reducing early voting from 14 days to 8 is not discriminatory, when states such as Connecticut, Rhode Island and Pennsylvania have no early voting at all." 

But Debo Adegbile of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund says the current map is a close enough fit to cover the areas of greatest concern. 

"Congress is not a surgeon with a scalpel when it acts to legislate across the 50 states. But it can reasonably attack discrimination where it finds it," he says. 

The court is almost certain to take up a host of challenges to the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1996. 

It defines marriage, for the purposes of federal law, as "only a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife." As a result, same-sex couples who get married in the states where such marriages are legal are accorded state and local benefits but miss out on more than 1,100 federal ones. 

After at first defending the law, the Obama administration notified federal courts early last year that it concluded the law was unconstitutional. House Republicans then took up the law's defense. 

A Supreme Court ruling striking down DOMA as discriminatory would not force states to permit same-sex marriage. But it would require the federal government to recognize those marriages where they are legal. 

The court could address the issue of same-sex marriage more directly if it takes up the legal challenge to California's Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in the state.  

Legal experts differ on whether the court is prepared to go that far, rather than deciding the DOMA issue now and coming back to the constitutionality of gay marriage in a later term. 

"We're not at the point where the Supreme Court will require the state of Mississippi to allow same-sex marriage," says Louis Michael Seidman of the Georgetown University Law Center. 

Among other questions the justices will confront: 

- Must police get a search warrant before taking a blood sample from a suspected drunk driver? 

- How far can police go in using drug-sniffing dogs outside someone's house? 

- Can a 1789 law, the Alien Tort Statute, be used to bring lawsuits in US courts for violations of international law that occur in other countries? 

- And, in an issue of growing interest to U.S. businesses, should more limits be placed on the ability to bring class-action lawsuits?

Oh, not that kind.

Take a good look at the familiar front of the U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington, because it's about to go under wraps.

Starting next week, workmen will begin putting up scaffolding along the entire West front of the building, the side that faces the U.S. Capitol, according to a court official. After the scaffolding is completed, a huge fabric covering will be stretched over the framework, concealing both the scaffolding and the building.

Joshua Roberts / Reuters

A dentil molding from the facade of the Supreme Court is damaged after a piece of the marble detail fell from the building in Washington, D.C., November 28, 2005. The marble chunk, above the allegorical figure representing "Order," fell about an hour before the court opened without causing any injuries.

However, the fabric will be imprinted with an image of the court building, so it will be like looking at a huge sketch or photo, reminding passersby of the splendid building hidden beneath.

The reason for this extensive work goes back to one morning in November 2005, when a chunk of marble about the size of a loaf of bread came loose from the building and crashed onto the steps below. No one was hurt. 

The piece came from a section just above the figures carved into marble in the triangular pediment over the steps. A short time later, a wire mesh surrounding that area was installed as a temporary measure to prevent any further pieces from falling. But conservators decided the building needed more extensive work to avoid any similar disasters.

During the roughly two years that the covering will be in place, mortar in the 80-year-old building will be examined and replaced, and carved elements on the marble facade will be strengthened as needed.

Airport screeners found 1,306 guns in carry-on bags last year, and passengers continue to try sneaking prohibited items onboard, hiding them in their shoes or using hollowed-out books.

John Pistole, the man in charge of the Transportation Security Administration, said the full-body scanners are catching much of the contraband.  That includes ceramic knives, which don't show up on the metal detectors and, remarkably, "exotic pets strapped to a passenger's legs."

In nearly all these cases, he told the National Press Club on Monday, the passengers don't plan to use the weapons onboard the plane. "Very few have malicious intent," he said.

Courtesy TSA

A passenger bound for Antigua was stopped at a Newark Liberty International Airport checkpoint on Feb. 10 after TSA officers discovered a spear gun and utility knife in his carry-on, "Just to be clear, passengers should not attempt to bring a spear gun as a carry on item. The same rule holds for utility knifes," said TSA Spokesman Kawika Riley.

Courtesy TSA

A man was arrested at LaGuardia International Airport on Feb. 3 after TSA officers discovered that he had a baton with an 18-inch, double-edged dagger concealed inside that he was planning to bring onto the aircraft.

This weapon confiscated at Westchester County's White Plains Airport on Jan. 16 was determined to be a BB gun.

Courtesy TSA

A TSA officer spotted these two hand grenades inside a passenger's carry-on bag March 2 at Newark-Liberty International Airport. As it turns out, the grenades were determined to be inert replicas altered to be used as gearshift knobs on a car.

Courtesy TSA

This "gun" spotted in the X-ray machine at LaGuardia International Airport on Feb. 22 was actually a flashlight/lighter designed in the shape of a firearm.

Courtesy TSA

A TSA officer spotted what appeared to be a grenade in a passenger's carry-on bag at JFK International Aiprort on Feb. 23, but it turns out it was just a bottle of cologne. "You know what, it may have been cologne, but having something like that in your carry-on just stinks!" said TSA spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein.

Pistole said the TSA plans to continue expanding its Pre-Check program, which allows passengers who submit information about themselves in advance to get faster airport screening. They usually won't have to take off their shoes, for example, or remove laptop computers and liquids from carry-on bags. The program is underway at nine airports now, and TSA hopes to expand it to 45 by the end of the year.

TSA will soon begin allowing active duty military personnel who carry valid ID cards to get the same expedited treatment, beginning with departures at Reagan National Airport outside Washington, D.C.

Pistole was asked today whether he has ever been patted down. "Oh, yes," he said. "I go through regular screening several times."

The most notable event, he said, came overseas during a recent trip.

"I was transiting through a well-known western European hub. I went through the walk-in metal detector. I knew I had no metal on me, but the alarm went off."

"I received a thorough pat-down. I complimented the security officer on the thoroughness of his pat-down. It made me stand up straight," he said.