Law Commons^™

Letter To Editor—Trees Vs. Air Pollution, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Bruce Finley's article lauded trees for absorbing smog. Trees also mitigate CO2 emissions. But not all trees are equally beneficial: some species emit more volatile organic compounds than they absorb. In urban environments, we need more restrictions to avoid negative impacts on those around us: e.g., wood burning or watering restrictions. Sunlight plays an increasing role in energy solutions - for solar energy and urban gardens. Trees that mature at over 70 feet can create shade pollution for neighbors up to three lots away. Several of the "right trees" for smog absorption are also those that mature at lower heights: …

Honest Services After Skilling: Judicial, Prosecutorial And Legislative Responses, Iris E. Bennett, Jessie K. Liu, Cynthia J. Robertson, Govind C. Persad

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

In Skilling v. United States, the U.S. Supreme Court substantially narrowed the reach of the “honest services fraud” statute, 18 U.S.C. § 1346, by holding that it applies only to “bribery and kickback schemes,” not to “undisclosed self-dealing by a public official or private employee.” Skilling v. United States, 130 S. Ct. 2896 (2010). Two companion cases also were decided the same day. See Black v. United States, 130 S. Ct. 2963 (2010); Weyhrauch v. United States, 130 S. Ct. 2971 (2010). These decisions have major significance for federal fraud prosecutions.

Professor's Paper Targets Klan Reference On University Of Texas Dorm... And Gets Action, Thomas D. Russell

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Ten weeks ago, my 48-page legal history paper started a Texas-sized controversy about a University of Texas dormitory named for a Klan leader. UT first admitted African-American students in 1950 after the NAACPʼs Legal Defense Fund lawyers beat Texas before the US Supreme Court in Sweatt v. Painter. Four years later, the great NAACP lawyers won Brown v. Board of Education. Just a few weeks after the Brown decision, UT put a Klansmanʼs name on a brand-new dormitory for law and graduate students.

Risk, Everyday Intutions, And The Institutional Value Of Tort Law, Govind C. Persad

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

This Note offers a normative critique of cost-benefit analysis, one informed by deontological moral theory, in the context of the debate over whether tort litigation or a non-tort approach is the appropriate response to mass harm. The first Part argues that the difference between lay and expert intuitions about risk and harm often reflects a difference in normative judgments about the existing facts, rather than a difference in belief about what facts exist, which makes the lay intuitions more defensible. The second Part considers how tort has dealt with this divergence between lay and expert perspectives. It also evaluates how …

Breaking Aro’S Commandment: Recognizing That Inventions Have Heart, Bernard Chao

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Based on the landmark 1961 Supreme Court decision, Aro Manufacturing Co. v. Convertible Top Replacement Co., the long held wisdom in patent law has been that there is no heart or gist of the invention. In other words, patent law does not attribute any special significance to a particular subset of claim limitations regardless of how important those limitations are. Under Aro, judges and juries are told that they need to view all the limitations, even stock components, with equal significance. They must resist focusing on the heart of the invention when making any decision.

Aro’s commandment has spread far …

Gross Disunity, Martin J. Katz

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

This Article will proceed as follows: Part I will explain Gross in terms of causation and unification. Part II will argue that Gross rejected the doctrine of uniformity, a well-established and useful canon of statutory construction, without explanation. Part III will show how the courts‟ post-1991 rejection of uniformity, culminating in Gross, might be seen as a form of judicial recalcitrance. However, that Part will suggest that the Court's rejection of uniformity in Gross is better understood as a rejection of burden-shifting in disparate treatment doctrine. Finally, Part IV will argue that burden-shifting is normatively desirable in disparate treatment doctrine, …

Private Relationships And Public Problems: Applying Principles Of Relational Contract Theory To Domestic Violence, Tamara L. Kuennen

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

This Article maps out a new theoretical critique of no-drop prosecution policies, the criminal justice system’s predominant approach to domestic violence. No-drop rules compel prosecutors to make decisions about whether to pursue charges against a batterer without regard to the victim’s wishes. When the law mandates this approach, it not only enforces the criminal law, but also effectively terminates the relationship between the victim and her partner. This blunt response to what is often a complex situation indiscriminately dispenses with the many reasons a victim may want or need to preserve her intimate relationship. While numerous scholars have grappled with …

Library Anxiety Of Law Students: A Study Utilizing The Multidimensional Library Anxiety Scale, Stacey L. Bowers

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

The purpose of this study was to determine whether law students experienced library anxiety and, if so, which components contributed to that anxiety. The Multidimensional Library Anxiety Scale (mlas) developed by Dr. Doris Van Kampen was used to assess library anxiety levels of law students. The mlas is a 53 question Likert scale instrument that measures the construct of library anxiety. Participants in the study were law students enrolled in a private midwestern university during the 2009-2010 academic year who completed the survey instrument. Law students are a unique graduate school population who undergo an extremely rigorous and competitive course …