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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Case For The Third-Party Doctrine, Orin S. Kerr
The Case For The Third-Party Doctrine, Orin S. Kerr
Orin Kerr
This Article offers a defense of the Fourth Amendment's third party doctrine, the controversial rule that information loses Fourth Amendment protection when it is knowingly revealed to a third party. Fourth Amendment scholars have repeatedly attacked the rule on the ground that it is unpersuasive on its face and gives the government too much power This Article responds that critics have overlooked the benefits of the rule and have overstated its weaknesses. The third-party doctrine serves two critical functions. First, the doctrine ensures the technological neutrality of the Fourth Amendment. It corrects for the substitution effect of third parties that …
Prosecuting Conduit Campaign Contributions - Hard Time For Soft Money, Robert D. Probasco
Prosecuting Conduit Campaign Contributions - Hard Time For Soft Money, Robert D. Probasco
Robert Probasco
In recent years, there have been several high-profile prosecutions for violations of the Federal Election Campaign Act, involving contributions nominally by one individual but funded or reimbursed by another individual deemed to be the true contributor. Prosecutions of these “conduit contribution” cases have been surprising in at least three significant respects. First, the prosecutions have been based on violations of FECA’s reporting requirements and may not have involved any violations of the substantive prohibitions or limitations of contributions. Second, the defendants were the donors rather than campaign officials who actually filed reports with FECA. Third, the cases were prosecuted as …
Knockin' On Heaven's Door: Rethinking The Role Of Religion In Death Penalty Cases, Gary J. Simson, Stephen P. Garvey
Knockin' On Heaven's Door: Rethinking The Role Of Religion In Death Penalty Cases, Gary J. Simson, Stephen P. Garvey
Stephen P. Garvey
Religion has played a prominent role at various points of capital trials. In jury selection, peremptory challenges have been exercised against prospective jurors on the basis of their religion. At the sentencing phase, defendants have offered as mitigating evidence proof of their religiosity, and the prosecution has introduced evidence of the victim's religiosity. In closing argument, quotations from the Bible and other appeals to religion have long been common. During deliberations, jurors have engaged in group prayer and tried to sway one another with quotes from scripture. Such practices have not gone unquestioned. Rather remarkably, however, the questions have almost …
The Conspiracy Origin Of The First Amendment, Steven R. Morrison
The Conspiracy Origin Of The First Amendment, Steven R. Morrison
Steven R Morrison
Scholars and jurists have misunderstood the import of three seminal 1919 First Amendment cases—Schenck v. United States, Frohwerk v. United States, and Abrams v. United States—as primarily free speech cases. They are better understood as free assembly cases. This is important for two reasons. First, individuals’ speech has the intended First Amendment effect only when speakers combine into groups. Second, the 1919 cases were the beginning of substantive First Amendment law, and so have resulted in a First Amendment jurisprudence that favors individual rights over group rights. This is a constitutional and normative mistake. Combined with the first reason, the …
Terrorism And Associations, Ashutosh A. Bhagwat
Terrorism And Associations, Ashutosh A. Bhagwat
Ashutosh Bhagwat
The domestic manifestation of the War on Terror has produced the most difficult and sustained set of controversies regarding the limits on First Amendment protections for political speech and association since the anti-Communist crusades of the Red Scare and McCarthy eras. An examination of the types of domestic terrorism prosecutions that have become common since the September 11 attacks reveals continuing and unresolved conflicts between national security needs and traditional protections for speech and (especially) associational freedoms. Yet the courts have barely begun to acknowledge, much less address, these serious issues. In the Supreme Court’s only sustained engagement with these …
Where Did My Privilege Go? Congress And Its Discretion To Ignore The Attorney-Client Privilege, Don Berthiaume, Jeffrey Ansley
Where Did My Privilege Go? Congress And Its Discretion To Ignore The Attorney-Client Privilege, Don Berthiaume, Jeffrey Ansley
Don R Berthiaume
“The right to counsel is too important to be passed over for prosecutorial convenience or executive branch whimsy. It has been engrained in American jurisprudence since the 18th century when the Bill of Rights was adopted... However, the right to counsel is largely ineffective unless the confidential communications made by a client to his or her lawyer are protected by law.”[1] So said Senator Arlen Specter on February 13, 2009, just seven months before Congress chose to ignore the very privilege he lauded. Why then, if the right to counsel is as important as Senator Specter articulated, does Congress maintain …