Law Commons^™

Ella P. Stewart And The Benefits Of Owning A Neighborhood Pharmacy, Randall K. Johnson

Faculty Works

This Essay is the first to explain how and why Ella P. Stewart, who was among the first Black women to earn a doctoral degree in Pharmacy, used her status as a small business owner to protect the limited set of legal rights that were available to African-Americans in the twentieth century. It also describes how Stewart’s early personal and professional experiences informed her subsequent public service career. Additionally, this Essay highlights the various ways that Stewart expanded the real freedoms that Black Americans enjoyed by guaranteeing they received a fair share of public goods or services. It concludes by …

The Power Of The Public Defender Experience: Learning By Fighting For The Incarcerated And Poor, Patrick C. Brayer

Faculty Works

This Essay discusses how public defender apprenticeships impact law students and help mold their future careers. Brayer discusses the tangible advantages that the apprenticeship imparts on students as well as the transferable skills that students gain. Brayer then analyzes the internal and professional growth of students that participate in this apprenticeship. Brayer situates this growth within the context of Chief Justice John Marshall’s own similar experience, arguing how the public defender experience focuses and matures aspiring lawyers.

Law's Box: Law, Jurisprudence And The Information Ecosphere, Paul D. Callister

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For so long as it has been important to know what the law is, the practice of law has been an information profession. Nonetheless, just how the information ecosphere affects legal discourse and thinking has never been systematically studied. Legal scholars study how law attempts to regulate information flow, but they say little about how information limits, shapes, and provides a medium for law to operate.

Part I of the paper introduces a holistic approach to medium theory - the idea that methods of communication influence social development and ideology - and applies the theory to the development of legal …

Demythologizing The Legal History Of The Jehovah’S Witnesses And The First Amendment, Allen K. Rostron

Faculty Works

In 2002, for the first time in more than 20 years, the Supreme Court of the United States decided a case involving the First Amendment rights of Jehovah's Witnesses. The Court ruled that Witnesses cannot be required to give their names to local government authorities in order to obtain permits before going door-to-door to distribute their publications and preach their religious message.

While the amount of new law being generated by the religion's followers has slowed, scholars have finally begun in recent years to give significant attention to the legal history of the Jehovah's Witnesses, and, in particular, to their …