Law Commons^™

New Voices At Work: Race And Gender Identity Caucuses In The U.S. Labor Movement, Ruben J. Garcia

UC Law Journal

Recently, scholars have pointed to race and gender identity groups in unions as a source of division within the working class, while other scholars have pointed to them as alternatives to traditional unions and more responsive to issues of race and gender in the workplace. In this Article, Professor Garcia argues that race and gender identity caucuses are neither a source of division in the labor movement today, nor are they viable alternatives to traditional unions. In spite of the National Labor Relations Act's subordination of minority rights to majority rule, this Article finds that women and people of color …

Preserving The Womb Of The Unknown Species With Hotspots Legislation, John Charles Kunich

UC Law Journal

The concept of "hotspots" is a cutting-edge biodiversity topic that has never received scholarly legal analysis until now. Recent credible scientific research indicates that most of the species on earth are concentrated within only a few ecosystems called hotspots. However, the current global extinction crisis, raging without any effective legal control, threatens these hotspots and the species they harbor. It is a matter of the highest importance to preserve the hotspots in the face of increasing threats from development, pollution, and other pressures.

This Article begins by tracing the history and science of extinction, including evidence as to the magnitude …

On The School Board's Hit List: Community Involvement In Protecting The First And Fourth Amendment Rights Of Public School Students, Patrick Richard Mckinney Ii

UC Law Journal

This Note examines public school students' Constitutional rights to due process, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures, and freedom of speech in light of the numerous school shootings that have taken place nationwide during the past few years. It argues that Supreme Court stare decisis has gradually diminished student rights, effectively impeding students' ability to seek remedy for their Constitutional injuries in a court of law. Moreover, school administrators have begun implementing policies, such as zerotolerance, that inherently tend to cause infringement of student rights. Although safety in schools is a legitimate state interest, student rights do not need to …

Certainty Thwarted: Broad Waiver Versus Narrow Waiver Of The Psychotherapist-Patient Privilege After Jaffee V. Redmond, Ellen E. Mcdonnell

UC Law Journal

This Note interprets the federal court split regarding waiver of the psychotherapist-patient privilege created in the aftermath of Jaffe v. Redmond. As Jaffe's landmark holding ages, case law addressing the issue of waiver in this context becomes progressively polarized. Some post-Jaffe rulings insist that a plaintiff must place privileged information at issue during trial in order to waive the privilege. Still others stubbornly hold that a plaintiff merely asserting a claim for emotional damages waives the privilege. Scholars have given little attention to this inconsistency; it is imperative, however, that the two schools be unified. Traditional views should be modernized …

Rethinking The Development Of Patents: An Intellectual History, 1550-1800, Adam Mossoff

UC Law Journal

The history of patents begins, not with inventions, but with royal grants of industrial monopolies in the fifteenth century. By the end of the eighteenth century, however, patents represent a legal right to property in a novel mechanical or scientific invention. Commentators today maintain that this radical shift from royal monopoly privilege to legal property right occurred solely in response to economic or institutional demands. While political, economic and institutional conditions certainly played a role in this story, this Article maintains that the ideas of John Locke were the true fountainhead behind the evolution of patents.

Although there were fits …

Why The Increasing Role Of Public Policy In California's Unfair Competition Law Is A Slippery Step In The Wrong Direction, Joshua D. Taylor

UC Law Journal

California's Business and Professions Code section 17200, a.k.a. "California's Unfair Competition Law," is being misapplied and abused. Specifically, members of the plaintiffs bar are beginning to regularly join a 17200 claim to any suit that is tangentially related to unfair competition. Additionally, the statute is being used by private citizens as a vehicle to assert their own policy agendas. There are several shortcoming in section 17200 that allow these abuses to occur: 1) The statute has no standing requirement-anyone may assert a suit on behalf of the general public. The plaintiff does not even have to suffer any actual injury …

Finding The Blight That's Right For California Redevelopment Law, George Lefcoe

UC Law Journal

This Article makes the case for liberalizing California's restrictive definition of blight, contending that no concept of blight can capture the salient costs and benefits of redevelopment. Present definitions of blight are failing to protect schools and counties from the fiscal drain resulting from the widespread use of tax increment financing to support redevelopment. Definitions of blight are also tangential to the underlying policy debate over whether local governments should take an active hand in shaping the urban environment by becoming land developers. This Article examines two recent cases striking down redevelopment projects for not meeting California's stringent blight standards …

"Thou Shalt Not Put A Stumbling Blick Before The Blind": The Americans With Disabilities Act And Public Transit For The Disabled, Michael E. Lewyn

UC Law Journal

By using transportation and housing policy to redistribute development from central cities to suburban areas without effective public transit, government at all levels has effectively excluded millions of transit-dependent disabled Americans from employment, shopping, and other opportunities. In the 1990s, the federal government sought to remedy this problem by enacting the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which ordered local transit systems to make bus and train systems more accessible to the disabled. The ADA imposed costly requirements upon local public transit systems, but did not give local governments funds with which to satisfy this mandate. By effectively reducing the funds …

The Illusory Death Penalty: Why America's Death Penalty Process Fails To Support The Economic Theories Of Criminal Sanctions And Deterrence, Allan D. Johnson

UC Law Journal

The central tenet of the economic approach to criminal law is deterrence. This approach provides a useful tool to analyze the theoretical justifications of capital punishment. From an economic view, the death penalty is a logical extension of the criminal justice system's primary goal of deterrence and is arguably necessary to solve inherent deterrence problems such as marginal deterrence and discounting. Nevertheless, current empirical research on capital punishment in America has shown that, in practice, capital punishment provides, at best, very little deterrence to serious crimes. This Note discusses a few of the possible reasons why America's death penalty process …

When Good Value Chains Go Bad: The Economics Of Indirect Liability For Copyright Infringement, Richard J. Gilbert, Michael L. Katz

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

A Personal Injury Law Perspective On Copyright In An Internet Age, Alfred C. Yen

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

A Case For Letting A Firm Take Advantage Of "Locked-In" Customers, Dwight R. Lee, Richard B. Mckenzie

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Antitrust As Consumer Protection In The New Economy: Lessons From The Microsoft Case, Mark Cooper

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Internet Regulation And Consumer Welfare: Innovation, Speculation, And Cable Bundling, John E. Lopatka, William H. Page

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Is Napster A Vcr--The Implications Of Sony For Napster And Other Internet Technologies, Stacey L. Dogan

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The Revision Of The Uniform Commercial Code--How Successful Has It Been, Henry Gabriel

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Foreword, Scott J. Burnham

UC Law Journal

On January 4, 2001, members of the Contracts Section of the Association of American Law Schools convened in San Francisco, California to discuss the recent controversial revisions of Article 2 of the Uniform Commercial Code. The rather bland title, "Perspectives on the Uniform Laws Revision Process," belied what one commentator called the "high drama" behind the revision of Article 2. With more dramatic flair, the program could have been presented as a mystery story entitled "Who Killed Revised Article 2?" Hastings Law Journal is proud to publish transcripts and a few of the papers presented by the symposium's panelists.

What's Wrong With The Uniform Law Process, Gail Hillebrand

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Is Article 2 The Best We Can Do, Robert E. Scott

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Clean Air, Clean Processes? The Struggle Over Air Pollution Law In The People's Republic Of China, William P. Alford, Benjamin L. Liebman

UC Law Journal

The People's Republic of China (PRC) suffers greatly from problems of air pollution that also have global implications. This Article examines the PRC's efforts in recent years to address the question of air quality legislatively. It uses a detailed analysis of the process through which China has developed national air pollution law to assess the impact of institutional design on such efforts and to consider Chinese legal development more generally.

Revising Ucc Article 2: A View From The Trenches, Richard E. Speidel

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The View From Experience, Fred Miller

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Taking Democracy Seriously, Neil B. Cohen

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Questions And Answers, Uc Hastings College Of The Law

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Insulin: Can't Be Disabled With It--Can't Live Without It: Creative Solutions For Employees With Diabetes Claiming Disability Discrimination In A Post-Sutton World, Amy M. Kimmel

UC Law Journal

This Note focuses on Americans with diabetes and their status as individuals with disabilities under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in the light of recent Supreme Court decisions. The Sutton trilogy requires courts to examine individuals with diabetes, and all individuals, in their treated or "mitigated" state to decide if they are disabled. Many people can substantially control their diabetes with insulin. But this mitigating (and life saving) measure may, under Sutton, cost them the protections of the ADA. This Note details the current law surrounding disability discrimination in employment and explains diabetes and the side effects and complications …

To Every Remedy A Wrong: The Confounding Of Civil Liberties Through Mandatory Arbitration Clauses In Employment Contracts, Katherine Eddy

UC Law Journal

California courts continue to support an aggressive policy eliminating workers' access to courts under the Fair Employment and Housing Act by enforcing mandatory arbitration clauses in employment contracts. The author examines the facts surrounding the California Court of Appeal's decision in 24 Hour Fitness v. Superior Court and criticizes the holding as inequitable on three bases. First, the author asserts that the court acted hastily in granting summary judgment to the defendants while also holding that the plaintiff had waived her right to arbitration. The author then argues that- the facts of this case did not merit a grant of …

The Ali And The Ucc, Lance Liebman

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Text Of Remarks On Panel: Codes Of Conduct And Transparency, Cynthia Williams

UC Law SF International Law Review

No abstract provided.

A First Look At The Interim Merits Award In S.D. Myers, Inc. V. Canada: It Is Possible To Balance Legitimate Environmental Concerns With Investment Protection, Todd Weiler

UC Law SF International Law Review

This Article is a response to Joseph de Pencier's paper Investment, Environment and Dispute Settlement: Arbitration Under NAFTA Chapter Eleven in issue 23:3-4 of this journal. This reply is based upon the author's experience as counsel for the investor in S.D. Myers, Inc. v. Canada (Myers) and similar cases.

This Article provides a critical commentary on various elements of Mr. de Pencier's paper that deal with the Myers claim. It provides some tentative suggestions on how the substantive provisions of NAFTA Chapter 11 might be interpreted in future cases where investment protection and environmental protection appear to be at odds.

The Internet Content Rating Association: The Way To Patrol The Internet Highway, Carrie Lam

UC Law SF International Law Review

The Internet makes information easily accessible and allows people all over the world to research and telecommute from the comforts of their own homes. However, such unlimited access is a double-edged sword. Problematic information that is accessible to anyone with a computer and a modem, such as sexually explicit material, can also be found on the Internet.

This Note examines the conflict between protecting children online and protecting free speech. A comparison is made between the United States' attempts at solutions through the Communications Decency Act and the Child Online Protection Act, and the new international and self-regulatory approach of …