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Full-Text Articles in Law
Just Listening: The Equal Hearing Principle And The Moral Life Of Judges, Barry Sullivan
Just Listening: The Equal Hearing Principle And The Moral Life Of Judges, Barry Sullivan
Barry Sullivan
No abstract provided.
Construction, Originalist Interpretation And The Complete Constitution, Richard Kay
Construction, Originalist Interpretation And The Complete Constitution, Richard Kay
Richard Kay
Book Review: Justice In Robes By Ronald Dworkin (2006), Dan Priel
Book Review: Justice In Robes By Ronald Dworkin (2006), Dan Priel
Dan Priel
Since the 1960's Ronald Dworkin has been arguing for a particular account of law that he believed was both explanatorily superior to the one offered by competing theories, and also the basis for normative arguments for producing right answers to legal questions. Justice in Robes collects Dworkin's most recent essays on this subject and thus provides the appropriate opportunity for assessing the legal theory of one of the more influential legal philosophers. In this Review I seek to offer a clearer account than appears in the book itself of Dworkin's project, and in this way offer a measured assessment of …
When Judges Have Reasons Not To Give Reasons: A Comparative Law Approach, Mathilde Cohen
When Judges Have Reasons Not To Give Reasons: A Comparative Law Approach, Mathilde Cohen
Mathilde Cohen
The New Doctrinalism: Implications For Evidence Theory, Alex Stein
The New Doctrinalism: Implications For Evidence Theory, Alex Stein
Alex Stein
This Article revisits and refines the organizing principles of evidence law: case specificity, cost minimization, and equal best. These three principles explain and justify all admissibility and sufficiency requirements of the law of evidence. The case-specificity principle requires that factfinders base their decisions on the relative plausibility of the stories describing the parties’ entitlement–accountability relationship. The cost-minimization principle demands that factfinders minimize the cost of errors and the cost of avoiding errors as a total sum. The equal-best principle mandates that factfinders afford every person the maximal feasible protection against risk of error while equalizing that protection across the board. …
Catalogs, Alex Stein, Gideon Parchomovsky
Catalogs, Alex Stein, Gideon Parchomovsky
Alex Stein
It is a virtual axiom in the world of law that legal norms come in two prototypes: rules and standards. The accepted lore suggests that rules should be formulated to regulate recurrent and frequent behaviors, whose contours can be defined with sufficient precision. Standards, by contrast, should be employed to address complex, variegated, behaviors that require the weighing of multiple variables. Rules rely on an ex ante perspective and are therefore considered the domain of the legislator; standards embody a preference for ex post, ad-hoc, analysis and are therefore considered the domain of courts. The rules/standards dichotomy has become a …
Weeds, Seeds, & Deeds Redux: Natural And Legal Evolution In The U.S. Seed Wars, Rebecca Stewart
Weeds, Seeds, & Deeds Redux: Natural And Legal Evolution In The U.S. Seed Wars, Rebecca Stewart
Rebecca K Stewart
Ever since the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office began issuing utility patents for plants, the United States has sat squarely on the frontlines of what have come to be known as the “seed wars.” In the last two decades, the majority of battles in the U.S. seed wars have been waged in the form of patent infringement lawsuits. Typically these suits are filed by biotechnology corporations such as Monsanto against farmers accused of saving and planting patented seed that self-replicates to produce progeny embodying—and thus infringing—the biotech corporations’ patented inventions.
Yet in recent years, the seed wars have begun to …
Tell Us A Story, But Don't Make It A Good One: Resolving The Confusion Regarding Emotional Stories And Federal Rule Of Evidence 403, Cathren Page
Cathren Page
Abstract: Tell Us a Story, But Don’t Make It A Good One: Resolving the Confusion Regarding Emotional Stories and Federal Rule of Evidence 403 by Cathren Koehlert-Page Courts need to reword their opinions regarding Rule 403 to address the tension between the advice to tell an emotionally evocative story at trial and the notion that evidence can be excluded if it is too emotional. In the murder mystery Mystic River, Dave Boyle is kidnapped in the beginning. The audience feels empathy for Dave who as an adult becomes one of the main suspects in the murder of his friend Jimmy’s …
"Standing" In The Shadow Of Erie: Federalism In The Balance In Hollingsworth V. Perry, Glenn Koppel
"Standing" In The Shadow Of Erie: Federalism In The Balance In Hollingsworth V. Perry, Glenn Koppel
Glenn Koppel
Abstract “Standing” in the Shadow of Erie: Federalism in the Balance in Hollingsworth v. Perry In Hollingsworth v. Perry, one of the two same-sex marriage cases decided by the Supreme Court in 2013, the Court declined to address the constitutionality of California’s Proposition 8, finding that the initiative proponents lacked standing to appeal the district court’s judgment declaring the proposition unconstitutional and enjoining its enforcement. Since the State’s Governor and Attorney General declined to appeal, the proponents sought to assert the State’s particularized interest in the proposition’s validity. State law, as interpreted by the California Supreme Court, grants authority to …
Parsing Judicial Activism, Scott Dodson
Parsing Judicial Activism, Scott Dodson
Scott Dodson
This microsymposium contribution responds to Suzanna Sherry's paper "Why We Need More Judicial Activism" and offers a heuristic--what I call libertarian activism--for distinguishing activism that reduces governmental power from activism that enhances governmental power.
Hiding Behind The Cloak Of Invisibility: The Supreme Court And Per Curiam Opinions, Ira P. Robbins
Hiding Behind The Cloak Of Invisibility: The Supreme Court And Per Curiam Opinions, Ira P. Robbins
Ira P. Robbins
The Hollowness Of The Harm Principle, Steven D. Smith
The Hollowness Of The Harm Principle, Steven D. Smith
Steven D. Smith
Among the various instruments in the toolbox of liberalism, the so-called “harm principle,” presented as the central thesis of John Stuart Mill’s classic On Liberty, has been one of the most popular. The harm principle has been widely embraced and invoked in both academic and popular debate about a variety of issues ranging from obscenity to drug regulation to abortion to same-sex marriage, and its influence is discernible in legal arguments and judicial opinions as well. Despite the principle’s apparent irresistibility, this essay argues that the principle is hollow. It is an empty vessel, alluring but without any inherent legal …
Ripe Standing Vines And The Jurisprudential Tasting Of Matured Legal Wines – And Law & Bananas: Property And Public Choice In The Permitting Process, Donald J. Kochan
Ripe Standing Vines And The Jurisprudential Tasting Of Matured Legal Wines – And Law & Bananas: Property And Public Choice In The Permitting Process, Donald J. Kochan
Donald J. Kochan
From produce to wine, we only consume things when they are ready. The courts are no different. That concept of “readiness” is how courts address cases and controversies as well. Justiciability doctrines, particularly ripeness, have a particularly important role in takings challenges to permitting decisions. The courts largely hold that a single permit denial does not give them enough information to evaluate whether the denial is in violation of law. As a result of this jurisprudential reality, regulators with discretion have an incentive to use their power to extract rents from those that need their permission. Non-justiciability of permit denials …
Much Ado About Pluralities: Pride And Precedent Amidst The Cacophy Of Concurrences, And Re-Percolation After Rapanos, Donald J. Kochan, Melissa M. Berry, Matthew J. Parlow
Much Ado About Pluralities: Pride And Precedent Amidst The Cacophy Of Concurrences, And Re-Percolation After Rapanos, Donald J. Kochan, Melissa M. Berry, Matthew J. Parlow
Donald J. Kochan
Conflicts created by concurrences and pluralities in court decisions create confusion in law and lower court interpretation. Rule of law values require that individuals be able to identify controlling legal principles. That task is complicated when pluralities and concurrences contribute to the vagueness or uncertainty that leaves us wondering what the controlling rule is or attempting to predict what it will evolve to become. The rule of law is at least handicapped when continuity or confidence or confusion infuse our understanding of the applicable rules. This Article uses the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Rapanos v. United States to …
Much Ado About Pluralities: Pride And Precedent Amidst The Cacophony Of Concurrences, And Re-Percolation After Rapanos, Matthew J. Parlow, Donald J. Kochan
Much Ado About Pluralities: Pride And Precedent Amidst The Cacophony Of Concurrences, And Re-Percolation After Rapanos, Matthew J. Parlow, Donald J. Kochan
Matthew Parlow
Of Metaphor, Metonymy, And Corporate Money: Rhetorical Choices In Supreme Court Decisions On Campaign Finance Regulation, Linda L. Berger
Of Metaphor, Metonymy, And Corporate Money: Rhetorical Choices In Supreme Court Decisions On Campaign Finance Regulation, Linda L. Berger
Linda L. Berger
No abstract provided.
Attempting The Impossible: The Emerging Consensus, Ira P. Robbins
Attempting The Impossible: The Emerging Consensus, Ira P. Robbins
Ira P. Robbins