Law Commons^™

Love, Justice, And Power, David F. Forte

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Abortion is the quintessential act of power.

The Road Not Taken: State Constitutions As An Alternative Source Of Protection For Reproductive Rights, Kevin F. O'Neill

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Lawyers seeking constitutional protection for reproductive rights have relied almost exclusively on a liberty/privacy theory under the Federal Constitution. In the wake of Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, this theory may be seen as providing a floor of minimum protection-preventing states from banning abortion outright. But it is not strong enough to prevent states from enacting restrictions on the availability of abortion. Thus, the battle over reproductive rights may be seen as shifting from one phase ("Can abortion be banned?") to another ("How far can states go in restricting access to abortion'?"). If proponents of reproductive freedom are …

Brief Of Amici Curiae Of Ohio Right To Life Society, Inc., Cleveland Lawyers For Life, Inc., Physicians For Life, Inc. In Support Of Respondents, National Organization For Women V. Scheidler, 114 S. Ct. 798 (1993), David F. Forte

Law Faculty Briefs and Court Documents

(In this action, petitioner health care clinics alleged, among other things, that respondents, a coalition of antiabortion groups called the Pro-Life Action Network (PLAN) and others, were members of a nationwide conspiracy to shut down abortion clinics through a pattern of racketeering activity -- including extortion under the Hobbs Act -- in violation of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) chapter of the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970, 18 U.S.C. §§ 1961-1968.)

Amici contend that the ordinary canons of statutory interpretation support the Seventh Circuit's conclusion below that the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations ("RICO") chapter of …

Brief Of Defendant-Appellees Catholic Diocese Of Cleveland And Bishop Anthony M. Pilla , Hawley V. City Of Cleveland, 24 F3d 814 (6th Cir. 1994), David F. Forte, Douglas J. Paul, Edward J. Maher, Bernard Niehaus

Law Faculty Briefs and Court Documents

A City of Cleveland Ordinance leasing space in the airport to the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland for use as a chapel, which is available to religious groups and persons of all faiths does not violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

Form, Substance, And Section 1041, Deborah A. Geier

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

The article reviews recent cases and rulings dealing with the interplay of section 1041 with both (1) the assignment of income doctrine in the deferred compensation context and (2) the substance over form doctrine in the context of redemptions of closely held stock. The author argues that such doctrines, which attempt to avoid improper shifting of income between taxpayers, are inappropriate in the context of section 1041 transfers in light of the history and goals of that section. She believes that final regulations adopted under section 1041 should ensure that the form of transfers or redemptions negotiated by the parties …

Book Review: An Overview Of Health Care Reform: A View Of The Forest--An Introduction To Taft Strategic Atlas: U.S. Health Care Reform By Frederick I. Taft, Stephen J. Werber, Stephen R. Smith

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Those interested in health law, who wish to follow and participate in the national debate, need a method of organizing the trees of definition, individual issues, and plans found in the forest of the debate. The cliche of not seeing the forest for the trees is reversed in this debate as we all can see the forest, but we cannot distinguish or truly discern its contents. To aid in understanding these issues, The Journal of Law and Health has taken the unusual step of reprinting a significant portion of a new book. The Editors believe that a traditional Book Review …

The Role Of Public Opinion In Constitutional Interpretation, James G. Wilson

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This Article seeks to answer two questions. First, to what degree has public opinion influenced American constitutional interpretation, both on and off the Supreme Court, over the past two centuries? Second, how much weight, if any, should constitutional decision-makers give to public opinion, however that protean concept is defined? The Article initially places these queries in a contemporary context by considering the extended discussion of public opinion in the Planned Parenthood v. Casey opinions of Justice Souter, Chief Justice Rehnquist, and Justice Scalia. Justice Souter partially relied on public opinion to not overrule the constitutional right to an abortion created …

Freedom To Do What? Institutional Neutrality, Academic Freedom And Academic Responsibility, David R. Barnhizer

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Our topic is whether law schools should remain institutionally neutral, presumably concerning the fundamental political and moral issues that besiege our society. The answer depends on several competing considerations, including one's concept of the university as either ivory tower or critical force obligated to serve the society that sustains it. I opt in the direction of the university as social force while also accepting the validity of the passive mode and seeing the dispassionate search for knowledge as a means to serve important human needs. The abstract formulation of the university as institutionally neutral is in many ways illusory because …

Conservatism And The Rehnquist Court, David F. Forte

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Now that the Supreme Court has been overwhelmingly staffed by appointees of Republican Presidents, we can ask: To what extent have they been faithful to the original version of the Constitution as articulated during its early years? How have they revivified the structural protections? How have they communicated an ethical sense of their own role in the structure? The answer, unfortunately, is that the record remains disappointing.

Nurture And Natural Law, David F. Forte

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

The state cannot take the place of the nurturing acts between individuals. It can assist the formation of those relationships. It can seek to prevent the vulnerabilities present in intimate relationships from resulting in harm (spousal abuse or abortion, for example), but it cannot construct its own alternative to how humans can beneficially interact. It can coordinate the generic basics of security, subsistence, and education; it can encourage patterns of nurturing (parental involvement in education, a wider range of information available in abortion decisions, welfare policies that reward bonding and independence); it can seek to prevent harm (rescuing those in …

Commentary: Textualism And Tax Cases, Deborah A. Geier

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This 1993 article uses tax cases to explore the rhetoric surrounding "textualism" in statutory interpretation.