Law Commons^™

The R-Word: A Tribute To Derrick Bell, Kenneth B. Nunn

UF Law Faculty Publications

Racism has become the “R-word,” an allegation that is so outrageous that it cannot even be spoken in public, let alone seriously addressed. In this brief exploration, I propose that it is exactly because racism continues to loom large in American society that talking about it has become taboo. In other words, banning the “R-word” serves a political function. It masks the failure of American society to confront the existence of racism and do something about its effects. Derrick Bell's path breaking work can be used to show why the focus of race discourse has moved from debating over what …

Talking About Race And Equality, Sharon E. Rush

UF Law Faculty Publications

Lots of people of different races are increasingly uncomfortable talking about race. They prefer to function in a colorblind society where they insist that race is irrelevant. Not surprisingly, the concept of racial silencing is consistent with the concept of colorblindness. Logically, it seems impossible to talk about race if we are not even supposed to see it. The idea seems to be that if people who believe in racial equality magically stopped seeing and talking about race they could avoid the negativity surrounding racial issues and just hope that the inequality would fix itself. But we know that if …

The Corporate Governance Of Iconic Executives, Tom C.W. Lin

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Essay explores the special corporate governance challenges posed by iconic executives. Iconic executives are complex, bittersweet figures in corporate governance narratives. They are alluring, larger-than-life corporate figures who often govern freely. Iconic executives frequently rule like monarchs over their firms, offering lofty promises to shareholders, directors, and managers under their reign. But like many stories of powerful and influential figures, the narratives of iconic executives also contain adversity and danger. Part of the acquiescence and enchantment with such figures is rooted in the virtuous promises embodied by their presence, promises of unity, accountability, and effectiveness in corporate governance. Unfortunately, …

The Path Between Sebastian's Hospitals: Fostering Reconciliation After A Tragedy, Jonathan R. Cohen

UF Law Faculty Publications

On October 8, 2007, Horst and Luisa Ferrero brought their healthy but short, three-year-old son Sebastian to a university hospital for a “routine” test to determine whether he lacked human growth hormone. Two days later, following a tragic string of errors, Sebastian was pronounced brain dead. Approximately two weeks later, the hospital offered a detailed public apology to the parents for Sebastian’s death. Several months after the apology, the parents began working collaboratively with the hospital to improve patient safety at the hospital and to advocate for a new children’s hospital in their community. This paper is a case study …

The Law School Firm, Bradley T. Borden, Robert J. Rhee

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Article introduces the concept of the law school firm. The concept calls for law schools to establish affiliated law firms. The affiliation would provide opportunities for students, faculty, and attorneys to collaborate and share resources to teach, research, write, serve clients, and influence the development of law and policy. Based loosely on the medical school model, the law school firm will help bridge the gap between law schools and the practice of law.

Reframing Economic Substance, Karen C. Burke

UF Law Faculty Publications

Under the economic substance doctrine as codified in 26 U.S.C. § 7701(o), legislatively unintended tax benefits may be disallowed if a transaction lacks a substantial business purpose or fails to accomplish a meaningful change in the taxpayer's economic position. In a recent article on framing the “transaction” in economic substance cases, David Hariton makes three interrelated points. First, he observes that even though the judicial outcome may depend largely on how the relevant transaction is framed, few courts have explicitly focused on the framing issue. Second, he proposes that courts should presumptively frame the underlying transaction broadly by focusing on …

Government Sponsored Social Media And Public Forum Doctrine Under The First Amendment: Perils And Pitfalls, Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

UF Law Faculty Publications

The goal of this article is to provide guidance to lawyers trying to navigate the morass that is the U.S. Supreme Court’s public forum jurisprudence in order to advise government actors wishing to establish social media forums.

Comprehensive Seagrass Restoration Planning In Southwest Florida: Science, Law And Management, Althea S. Hotaling, R. Benjamin Lingle, Thomas T. Ankersen

UF Law Faculty Publications

In coastal Florida, the development and maintenance of docks, marinas, and channels frequently cause destruction of seagrass beds. Seagrass loss is accompanied by a loss of the ecosystem services the beds provide, such as sediment stabilization, water filtration, protection from storms, and habitat and nursery grounds for fish species. The current legal framework for seagrass protection and the implementation of mitigation for seagrass loss could be improved. In this Article, the authors argue that policymakers could revise the Uniform Mitigation Assessment Method to include more assessments related specifically to the ecology of seagrass beds and their ecosystem services. Seagrass mitigation …

Regulation, Deregulation, And Happiness, Jeffrey L. Harrison

UF Law Faculty Publications

Happiness, in general, is in many respects the topic du jour. A great deal of theoretical and empirical work has been devoted to dissecting it. Studies of happiness have crossed over to law, and the result is an addition to the long list of the list of “law and” interdisciplinary areas. In fact, in 2010, Eric Posner and Matthew Alder presented an excellent book of readings the title of which is Law and Happiness. Peter Henry Huang has written the definitive survey of law and happiness literature. My own writing has reflected on the promise of happiness research and the …

Is The Wto Quietly Fading Away?: The New Regionalism And Global Trade Rules, Stephen J. Powell, Trisha Low

UF Law Faculty Publications

While scholars and governments alike view the liberalization of international trade as a positive development, they disagree on the medium that will accomplish this objective with the highest economic returns. Some experts believe that multilateralism through the 150+ member World Trade Organization (WTO) is the only way to achieve truly open and efficient trade. Others view multilateralism as but an aspiration and find that regionalism offers the only viable prospect for the meaningful further opening of markets.

In light of what we label the "new regionalism," our paper explores in detail the positive and negative effects of regional trade arrangements …

Explaining The Importance Of Public Choice For Law, D. Daniel Sokol

UF Law Faculty Publications

The next generation of government officials, business leaders and members of civil society likely will draw from the current pool of law school students. These students often lack a foundation of the theoretical and analytical tools necessary to understand law's interplay with government. This highlights the importance of public choice analysis. By framing issues through a public choice lens, these students will learn the dynamics of effective decision-making within various institutional settings. Filling the void of how to explain the decision-making process of institutional actors in legal settings is Public Choice Concepts and Applications in Law by Maxwell Stearns and …

Antitrust Merger Efficiencies In The Shadow Of The Law, D. Daniel Sokol, James A. Fishkin

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Essay provides an overview of U.S. antitrust merger practice in addressing efficiencies both in terms of actual practice before the agencies and in scholarly work as a response to Jamie Henikoff Moffitt's Vanderbilt Law Review article Merging in the Shadow of the Law: The Case for Consistent Judicial Efficiency Analysis. Moffitt’s analysis could have benefited from a more thorough discussion of the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission’s (collectively, the “agencies”) analysis of efficiencies during investigations and the broader process of negotiations involving mergers. For instance, the article does not discuss the empirical work addressing when the agencies …

The Limits Of Reproductive Rights In Improving Women's Health, Rachel Rebouché

UF Law Faculty Publications

South Africa's Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act (CTOPA) is heralded as one of the most progressive abortion laws in the world. The law permits unfettered access to government-funded abortion services for all women through the twelfth week of gestation, stating in its preamble that "every woman [has] the right to choose whether to have an early, safe and legal termination of pregnancy according to her individual beliefs." Despite increased availability of legal abortions' (and the inclusion of rights to reproductive health care and decision-making in South Africa's Constitution), the number of illegal terminations in South Africa does not appear …

Protecting Equine Rescue From Being Put Out To Pasture: Whether Ranches Dedicated To Abused, Abandoned, And Aging Horses May Qualify For "Agricultural" Classifications Under Florida's Greenbelt Law, Michael T. Olexa, Joshua A. Cossey, Katherine A. Smallwood

UF Law Faculty Publications

Florida's equestrian community is currently experiencing an influx of horse owners and equestrian facilities. This generates opposition within those counties refusing to recognize equestrian property uses as “agricultural.” Subject to the restrictions set out in section 193.461 of the Florida Statutes (otherwise known as the Greenbelt Law) only property “used primarily for bona fide agricultural purposes shall be classified agricultural.” This article addresses whether the use of property to board, train, and graze abused, abandoned, and aging horses (referred to throughout this paper as “rescue” horses) should fall under the Greenbelt Law‟s “agricultural” tax classification. Several points support classifying rescue …

Narratives Of Identity, Nation, And Outsiders Within Outsiders: Not Yet A Post-Anything World, Berta E. Hernández-Truyol

UF Law Faculty Publications

The essays in this cluster all deploy narratives of identity and nation. They also bring to life the status of outsiders as racialized "others." This reality of racialization contradicts the popular narrative that we live in a post-racial society. The current claim of post-racialism is grounded in the simple fact that in the United States a huge margin of the popular vote elected a Black man as president. That man is Barack Hussein Obama, someone who has to engage, as those who are the subject of the essays, with concerns about nation, identity, and being a racialized "other."

Good Deficits: Protecting The Public Interest From Deficit Hysteria, Neil H. Buchanan

UF Law Faculty Publications

President Obama has come under increasingly fierce criticism for the size of the federal budget deficit, as both Democratic and Republican politicians loudly proclaim that federal spending should be cut. This article explains why such anti-deficit fervor is misguided and simplistic, and why, perhaps counter-intuitively, cutting government spending can hurt the country, rather than help it, in both the short run and the long run. In the short run, cutting deficit spending can be disastrous to the economy, especially if the economy is already in decline. In addition, because the federal budget fails to separate spending that provides long-term benefits …

Author Meets Reader, Scholar Meets Worker: An Introduction To The Section On Labor Relations And Employment Law 2011 Aals Panel Presentation, Rachel Arnow-Richman

UF Law Faculty Publications

This article introduces the AALS Section on Labor Relations & Employment’s January 2011 Program, 'Author Meets Reader: Jack Getman’s Restoring the Power of Unions,' while exploring the significance of the contemporaneous union boycott of the Union Square Hilton, the primary site of the AALS 2011 Meeting. When the national leadership of the AALS proved unresponsive to UNITE HERE’s entreaties, a group of interested law professors undertook to convince the organization to relocate its conference using a combination of direct appeals to AALS leadership and grassroots mobilization of faculty attendees. Like many of the union movements described in Jack Getman’s monograph …

Framing The Fourth, Tracey Maclin, Julia Mirabella

UF Law Faculty Publications

Book Review of "The Fourth Amendment: Origins and Original Meaning", 602-1791. By William J. Cuddihy. Oxford and New York: Oxford Press. 2009. Pp. lxviii, 940. $165. History is again an important element of the Supreme Court’s Fourth Amendment analysis. In Wyoming v. Houghton, Justice Scalia’s opinion for the Court announced that a historical inquiry is the starting point for every Fourth Amendment case. William Cuddihy’s book on the origins and original meaning of the Fourth Amendment will undoubtedly assist the Justices (and everyone else) in understanding the history of search and seizure law. Cuddihy’s historical analysis is unprecedented. As Justice …

What Kind Of Environment Do We Owe Future Generations?, Neil H. Buchanan

UF Law Faculty Publications

Despite widely held beliefs that current generations bear heavy obligations to look out for the welfare of future generations, the philosophical case in support of such intergenerational obligations is surprisingly tentative. Moreover, quantifying any such obligations is subject to even greater uncertainty. Even so, current generations bring future generations into existence in the knowledge that doing so will put a claim on resources that could have been used to reduce suffering among people who are already alive. The choice to allow living people to suffer and die, and instead to bring forth more people in the future, thus implies a …

Working Relationships, Laura A. Rosenbury

UF Law Faculty Publications

In this Essay written for the symposium on "For Love or Money? Defining Relationships in Law and Life," I extend my previous consideration of friendship to the specific context of the workplace, analyzing friendship through the lens of the ties that arise at work instead of those assumed to arise within the home. Many adults spend half or more of their waking hours at work, in the process forming relationships with supervisors, co-workers, subordinates, customers, and other third parties. Although such relationships are at times primarily transactional, at other times they take on intimate qualities similar to those of family …

The French Jury At A Crossroads, Valerie P. Hans, Claire M. Germain

UF Law Faculty Publications

This article describes the contemporary landscape of the French jury. Putting the institution in its historical and political context, it begins with an overview of the rich history of the French jury. We describe the earliest form of community judgment in France, the introduction of a formal jury system following the French Revolution, and the political and legal influences that transformed it from an independent body of lay citizens to a mixed decision-making body of professional and lay judges. We next identify characteristic features of contemporary French jury trial procedure and the respective roles and responsibilities of professional and lay …

Public Forum 2.0, Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

UF Law Faculty Publications

Social media have the potential to revolutionize discourse between American citizens and their governments. At present, however, the U.S. Supreme Court's public forum jurisprudence frustrates rather than fosters that potential. This article navigates the notoriously complex body of public forum doctrine to provide guidance for those who must develop or administer government-sponsored social media or adjudicate First Amendment questions concerning them. Next, the article marks out a new path for public forum doctrine that will allow it to realize the potential of Web 2.0 technologies to enhance democratic discourse between the governors and the governed. Along the way, this article …

Representational Competence: Defining The Limits Of The Right To Self-Representation At Trial, E. Lea Johnston

UF Law Faculty Publications

In 2008, the Supreme Court held that the Sixth Amendment permits a trial court to impose a higher competence standard for self-representation than to stand trial. The Court declined to delineate a permissible representational competence standard but indicated that findings of incompetence based on a lack of decisionmaking ability would withstand constitutional scrutiny. To date, no court or commentator has suggested a comprehensive competence standard to address the particular decisional context of self-representation at trial. Conceptualizing self-representation as an exercise in problem solving, this Article draws upon social problem-solving theory to identify abilities necessary for autonomous decisionmaking. The Article develops …

Patents, Genetically Modified Foods, And Ip Overreaching, Elizabeth A. Rowe

UF Law Faculty Publications

Genetically engineered plants and animals have become and will continue to constitute a large part of the food we consume. The United States is the world's largest producer of genetically modified foods, making American consumers the most exposed population to these products. Agricultural biotechnology patents spur and support innovation. Accordingly, patent law is one of the main contributors to this phenomenon that has changed not only the kinds of food we eat, but the nature of the agri-business industry that produces these foods. This Article takes on an area of concern involving the patenting of food that has remained unexplored: …

The Dormant Commerce Clause And Water Export: Toward A New Analytical Paradigm, Christine A. Klein

UF Law Faculty Publications

Facing water shortages, states struggle with competing impulses, desiring to restrict water exports to other states while simultaneously importing water from neighboring jurisdictions. In 1982, the Supreme Court weighed in on this issue through its seminal decision, Sporhase v. Nebraska ex rel. Douglas. Determining that groundwater is an article of commerce, the Court held invalid under the dormant Commerce Clause a provision of a Nebraska statute limiting water export. The issue has again come into the national spotlight, as the Tarrant Regional Water District of Texas has challenged Oklahoma legislation limiting water exports, and as Wind River L.L C …

A Yellow Light For “Green Zoning”: Some Words Of Caution About Incorporating Green Building Standards Into Local Land Use Law, Michael Allan Wolf

UF Law Faculty Publications

The focus of this essay is a growing practice to which we can attach the label “Green Zoning” — the incorporation of LEED and competing privately generated standards into local government law, as part of the existing zoning or land use ordinance, or as a free-standing green building ordinance. After reviewing some of the pertinent literature on this topic, this essay will highlight and provide illustrations of six problems with Green Zoning practices: 1. The Delegation Problem — Can and should local laws be based on a moving target (standards set by private parties that continue to change and evolve)? …

Small, Slow, And Local, Mary Jane Angelo

UF Law Faculty Publications

The United States is in the middle of a significant cultural shift. Until very recently, United States citizens and policy-makers were willing to accept, or at least tolerate, what has become our food status quo--a highly subsidized, centralized, industrial food system that is environmentally harmful and unsustainable and encourages unhealthy eating habits. Many citizens and policy-makers are now demanding that we re-evaluate our entire agricultural system from farm to table and look for ways to develop a new food paradigm that is environmentally sound, sustainable, socially equitable, and that makes healthy whole foods available to all.

During the summer of …

Antitrust Merger Efficiencies In The Shadow Of The Law, D. Daniel Sokol, James A. Fishkin

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Essay provides an overview of U.S. antitrust merger practice in addressing efficiencies both in terms of actual practice before the agencies and in scholarly work as a response to Jamie Henikoff Moffitt's Vanderbilt Law Review article Merging in the Shadow of the Law: The Case for Consistent Judicial Efficiency Analysis. Moffitt’s analysis could have benefited from a more thorough discussion of the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission’s (collectively, the “agencies”) analysis of efficiencies during investigations and the broader process of negotiations involving mergers. For instance, the article does not discuss the empirical work addressing when the agencies …

A Need For Culture Change: Glbt Latinas/Os And Immigration, Berta E. Hernández-Truyol

UF Law Faculty Publications

In conversations about Latina/o immigration, such as the one that took place at LLEADS #2: The U.S. Immigration Crises: Enemies at Our Gates or Lady Liberty's Huddled Masses?, there is one issue that we tend not to address. There exists a Latina/o immigration cuento normativo (normative narrative) that obscures and denies an entire group of Latinas/os. This cuento normativo is not only insufficiently attentive to, but is downright erasing of GLBT Latinas/os. In this Article, I want to urge participation in a movement for cultural change within the various and varied comunidades Latinas (Latina/o communities) to embrace a new, inclusive …

Unsex Cedaw? No! Super-Sex It!, Berta E. Hernández-Truyol

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Article reflects upon Darren Rosenblum's provocative piece Unsex CEDAW, or What's Wrong with Women's Rights. At the outset I should note that this critical analysis should not be misinterpreted. I do not quarrel with Professor Rosenblum's observations that inequality in law and life is much broader than sex inequalities. To the contrary, I am in full accord with him that discrimination along other categorical axes is also undesirable and sometimes as prevalent as sex inequality. Indeed, oftentimes such other discriminatory tendencies dovetail with those rooted in sex discrimination.

Where we diverge, however, is in his proposal that the …