Law Commons^™

Weed And Water Law: Regulating Legal Marijuana, Ryan Stoa

Faculty Publications

Marijuana is nearing the end of its prohibition in the United States. Arguably the country’s largest cash crop, marijuana is already legal for recreational use in Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Alaska, and Washington DC. Between now and election day 2016, an additional 14 states may place marijuana legalization initiatives on their ballots. In addition, 23 states and Washington DC have legalized medical marijuana, with up to seven states pending legislation. The era of marijuana prohibition is rapidly coming to a close.

At the same time, traditional doctrines of water law are struggling to cope with the modern realities of water scarcity. …

Droughts, Floods, And Wildfires: Paleo Perspectives On Disaster Law In The Anthropocene, Ryan Stoa

Faculty Publications

Humanity’s impact on the earth has become so pronounced that momentum is building toward adopting a new term for the modern geological age — the “Anthropocene.” The term signifies that human activity has reached a scale that it is now a planetary force capable of shaping ecosystems and natural processes. And yet, anthropocentric natural resources management and environmental lawmaking in the United States reveals a lack of control in managing natural systems and fostering resilience to extreme events. These systems do not easily conform to the whims of reactionary environmental policies. Droughts, floods, and wildfires, in particular, are often conceptualized …

Governing The Ungovernable: Integrating The Multimodal Approach To Keeping Agricultural Land Use From Swallowing Ecosystems, Kalyani Robbins

Faculty Publications

As the population grows, so does the conflict between demand for agricultural productivity and the need to maintain healthy ecosystems. Unfortunately, this concern alone does not motivate the agricultural industry to operate in a more environmentally friendly manner, nor is it an industry that has proven amenable to strict regulation. Indeed, any such effort must face one of the mightiest lobbies of all time. As it functions today, agriculture is unsustainable and at risk of wiping out more than its fair share of our already dwindling biodiversity. As demand increases, there is the potential for it to get worse than …

Two Degrees Of Speech Protection: Free Speech Through The Prism Of Agricultural Disparagement Laws, Howard M. Wasserman

Faculty Publications

In the wake of a 1989 national television broadcast reporting the alleged cancer risk of a chemical applied to apples on trees, many states passed agricultural product disparagement (APD) statutes. These statutes grant civil causes of action to the growers and sellers of perishable food products, against anyone who speaks negatively or disparagingly, without basis in scientific evidence, about the product's safety. In this Article, Howard M Wasserman explores the interplay between the APD statutes and the First Amendment. First, Mr. Wasserman discusses the three categories of restrictions on the freedom of speech, focusing primarily on private civil tort actions …