Law Commons^™

Brief For The United States In Opposition

Lummi Nation v. Samish Indian Tribe, Docket No. 05-445 (546 U.S. 1090 (2006))

No abstract provided.

Brief In Opposition

Lummi Nation v. Samish Indian Tribe, Docket No. 05-445 (546 U.S. 1090 (2006))

No abstract provided.

Petition For Writ Of Certiorari

Lummi Nation v. Samish Indian Tribe, Docket No. 05-445 (546 U.S. 1090 (2006))

No abstract provided.

A Tribute To Viola A. Bird On The Occasion Of Her 100th Birthday, Patrick E. Kehoe

Librarians' Articles

Consists of a biographical sketch and reminiscences of Mrs. Bird by former students and co-workers.

Learning A Little About The World: Foreign And International Research And The Nonspecialist, Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

In reflecting on the various ways she has developed some expertise in the area of foreign and international research (without being an expert), Ms. Whisner offers suggestions to others who would like to build their own knowledge in this field.

Cool Web Sites, Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

In the process of exploring cool Web sites-those that make her sit up and take notice-Ms. Whisner also comments on the hazards of writing about Web sites generally, some ways to find cool sites, and keeping track of them once you do.

On Not Doing Research, Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

Even though her usual business is "looking up," Ms. Whisner explores a variety of situations in which it is professionally appropriate not to engage in research.

Judicial Regrets And The Case Of The Cushman Dam, William H. Rodgers, Jr.

Articles

This essay is a criticism of the Ninth Circuit's en banc decision in Skokomish Indian Tribe v. United States [401 F.3d 979 (9th Cir. 2005]. It finds particular fault with the court's understanding of Indian treaty rights as "something given," and its outlandish conclusion that fishing was not a "primary purpose" of the Stevens treaties.

The article further criticizes the court's treatment of the "continuing nuisance" doctrine that is applied to afford a statute of limitations defense to enterprises that did lasting environmental damage by diverting the entire North Fork of the Skokomish River out of the watershed.

It concludes …

The Priest-Penitent Privilege – An Hibernocentric Exercise In Postcolonial Jurisprudence, Walter J. Walsh

Articles

Although much has been written on the history of the priest-penitent privilege, this Article will show that such writing tends toward an unconscious, but strong, anglocentric tilt. It seems that no scholar has tried to locate and interpret all the Irish and American sources that inspired this initially hibernocentric, later more generally American, postcolonial deviation from the English common law. Since the Second World War, the significance of Philips and its 1828 New York codification have gained widespread recognition, but the scholarly inquiry has never advanced in any truly historical fashion. This article is thus the first history of the …

Intellectual Property Rights And Stem Cell Research: Who Owns The Medical Breakthroughs?, Sean M. O'Connor

Articles

This article will not address the science and ethics of stem cell research—at least as far as those topics are normally addressed in the existing literature. Instead, this article argues that an even more contentious battle is looming on the horizon, with dire practical consequences: Namely, who will own the revolutionary medical breakthroughs that are supposed to emerge from this research? Along the way, this article will assume that stem cell research will progress in some fashion and that at least some of the purported benefits will materialize.

But the central premise is that the pitch of the ownership battle …

Contracting Spyware By Contract, Jane K. Winn

Articles

The question of what constitutes "spyware" is controversial because many programs that are adware in the eyes of their distributors may be perceived as spyware in the eyes of the end user. Many of these programs are loaded on the computers of end users after the end user has agreed to the terms of a license presented in a click-through interface.

This paper analyzes whether it might be possible to reduce the volume of unwanted software loaded on end users' computers by applying contract law doctrine more strictly. Unwanted programs are often bundled with programs that the end user wants, …

Scylla Or Charybdis: Navigating The Jurisprudence Of Visual Clutter, Ryan Calo

Articles

State and local governments seeking to address the proliferation of billboards and other outdoor advertising must negotiate two obstacles of First Amendment law. The first is the Supreme Court’s 1981 decision in Metromedia, Inc. v. City of San Diego. Following Metromedia, regulators can neither select among noncommercial messages nor privilege commercial messages over noncommercial ones. For years, regulators navigated around Metromedia by drawing a distinction between commercial and noncommercial speech. Then came the Supreme Court’s decision in City of Cincinnati v. Discovery Network, holding that regulators had to account for why they were privileging noncommercial over commercial …

The Character Of Discrimination Law: The Incompatibility Of Rule 404 And Employment Discrimination Suits, Lisa Marshall Manheim

Articles

This Note illustrates how violations of Rule 404 of the Federal Rules of Evidence (which prohibits litigants from relying on certain propensity proofs) occur routinely. It demonstrates that the ineffectiveness of the ban in the context of discrimination suits cannot be blamed on clever lawyers or negligent judges, but rather is a predictable consequence of the dearth of evidence available to discrimination plaintiffs. This Note concludes by arguing that this subtle but problematic incongruity justifies a reform of the Rule.

Holding Intellectual Property, Xuan-Thao Nguyen

Articles

The collapse of WorldCom, Inc., exposed a complex web of accounting irregularities. Within that web, recent filings by Dick Thornburgh, WorldCom's Bankruptcy Court Examiner, reveal a different type of scheme that involves the holding of intellectual property. Further scrutinizing the scheme reveals that WorldCom and its tax advisors, KPMG Peat Marwick LLP (KPMG), devised a tax avoidance scheme through the creation of an intellectual property holding company (IP holding company). This type of scheme has been widely and quietly utilized in the last twenty years by many corporations with substantial intellectual property.

Indeed, as state taxing authorities have become more …

Telling Stories About Health Insurance: Using New Films In The Classroom, Elizabeth Pendo

Articles

In keeping with the theme of "The Mass Media's Influence on Health Law and Policy," this essay is designed to share my experience using clips from three recent popular films as a method of enhancing coverage and discussion of legal and policy issues surrounding the private health insurance system, and to provide some practical advice for others interested in doing the same. It builds upon a presentation that I gave along with Professors Timothy S. Hall and Ross D. Silverman at the 2004 Health Law Teachers Conference entitled "Health Law, Policy and Media," and was inspired by Professor Paul Bergman's …

Reforming The Criminal Rap Sheet: Federal Timidity And The Traditional State Functions Doctrine, Mary De Ming Fan

Articles

For decades, criminal justice officials have based key decisions about a defendant's fate and crime deterrence on a tool deplored by practitioners for its indecipherability and potential for inaccuracy or incompleteness—the rap sheet. Though the Supreme Court's criminal rights evolution progressed late last year to requiring rigor in documenting penalty maximum-enhancing prior convictions, the problem of the rap sheet has received little notice from jurists and scholars because the rap sheet plays its central role in discretionary decision-making areas shielded from scrutiny.[para] The rap sheet is not just a practitioner's problem. The flawing of the rap sheet is a parable …