Law Commons^™

The Class Of 2009: Recession Or Restructuring?, William D. Henderson

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

(Mis)Judging Intent: The Fundamental Attribution Error In Federal Securities Law, Victor D. Quintanilla

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This article examines the element of scienter (fraudulent intent) in claims of federal securities fraud under Section 10(b) of the Exchange Act and, more specifically, the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Tellabs, Inc. v. Makor Issues & Rights, Ltd., 551 U.S. 308 (2007) from a social psychological perspective. The field of social psychology has documented a pervasive phenomena, the Fundamental Attribution Error, the failure of decision makers to consider situational explanations, including the force of environments and social and situational norms on human conduct. In light of robust social psychological research on the Fundamental Attribution Error, legal concepts such as …

The Legal Challenge Of Protecting Animal Migrations As Phenomena Of Abundance, Robert L. Fischman, Jeffrey B. Hyman

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Animal migrations are as familiar as geese in the sky on a fall afternoon and as mysterious as the peregrinations of sea turtles across thousands of miles of open ocean. This article discusses the distinguishing attributes of animal migrations, why they are important to biodiversity conservation, and the legal challenges posed by migration conservation. In particular, the article focuses on those aspects of migration conservation that existing law, dominated by imperiled species protection, fails to address. It consequently suggests law reforms that would better conserve animal migrations. A step toward serious legal efforts to protect the process and function of …

Comparative Law: Problems And Prospects, Elisabeth Zoller, George A. Bermann, Patrick Glenn, Kim Lane Scheppele, Amr Shalakany, David V, Snyder

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This is an edited transcript of the closing plenary session of the XVIIIth International Congress of Comparative Law. The session took place on Saturday, July 31, 2010, in Washington, D.C., at the conclusion of the week-long congress, which is held quadrennially by the International Academy of Comparative Law (Acadimie Internationale de Droit Compare). The remarks were given in a mix of French and English, but for ease of reading the transcript is almost entirely in English.

Paying Women For Their Eggs For Use In Stem Cell Research, Pamela Foohey

Articles by Maurer Faculty

On June 11, 2009, the Empire State Stem Cell Board (“Board”), which administers the $600 million in New York State funds allotted to stem cell research, voted to allocate a portion of those funds to compensate women up to $10,000 for “donating” their eggs for use in stem cell research. The Board's decision makes New York the first state to affirmatively allow state funds to be used to compensate women for providing their eggs for use in stem cell research beyond mere reimbursement of associated medical and other expenses, and, similarly, distinguishes it from most international countries, which either prohibit …

Statute Of Anne: Today And Tomorrow, Marshall Leaffer, Peter Jaszi, Craig Joyce, Tyler Ochoa

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Duplicative Foreign Litigation, Austen L. Parrish

Articles by Maurer Faculty

What should a court do when a lawsuit involving the same parties and the same issues is already pending in the court of another country? With the growth of transnational litigation, the issue of reactive, duplicative proceedings - and the waste inherent in such duplication - becomes a more common problem. The future does not promise change. In a modern, globalized world, litigants are increasingly tempted to forum shop among countries to find courts and law more favorably inclined to them than their opponents.

The federal courts, however, do not yet have a coherent response to the problem. They apply …

Review Of Labor And Employment Decisions From The United States Supreme Court’S 2008–2009 Term, Kenneth G. Dau-Schmidt, Todd C. Dvorak

Articles by Maurer Faculty

In its most recently completed Term, the United States Supreme Court decided eight labor and employment law cases of some consequence. The decided cases covered a broad array of labor and employment subjects, including: the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII), the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), public sector labor law, and private sector labor law. Practitioners who specialize in a particular area might be tempted to focus on only the cases in their area. Academics might be tempted to try to devise some economic or logical theory …

Judicial Elections In The Aftermath Of White, Caperton, And Citizens United, Charles G. Geyh

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Where Cultures And Sovereigns Collide: Balancing Federalism, Tribal Self-Determination, And Individual Rights In The Adoption Of Indian Children By Gays And Lesbians, Steve Sanders

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This article analyzes the complex interplay between adoption (traditionally a matter reserved to state family law) and the federal Indian Child Welfare Act in the context of adoptions by gays and lesbians.

As a federal statute that partially preempts state law for the benefit of Native Americans, ICWA implicates three sovereigns: the United States, the state where the adoption petition is brought, and the tribe whose child is the focus of the proceeding. This interplay of sovereigns in itself makes Indian child welfare law complicated and interesting. Beyond these sovereign interests, also to be considered are the interests and rights …

Judicial Selection, Judicial Disqualification, And The Role Of Money In Judicial Campaigns, Charles G. Geyh

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Transnational Legal Practice 2009, Carole Silver, Laurel S. Terry, Ellyn S. Rosen

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This article identifies some of the most important U.S. and international developments in transnational legal practice and provides citations for further research. The article begins by briefly reviewing the impact of the recession on legal services. The second section focuses on international developments. It identifies some of the ongoing efforts to implement the 2007 U.K. Legal Services Act, including the issuance of the influential Hunt and Smedley reports. It also provides information about law reform initiatives in France, Scotland and Korea. This section of the article also provides information about Canadian and Australian developments regarding admission of foreign applicants and …

Cyberspace Is Outside The Schoolhouse Gate: Offensive, Online Student Speech Receives First Amendment Protection, Joseph A. Tomain

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Normative and doctrinal analysis shows that schools do not possess jurisdiction over offensive online student speech, at least when it does not cause a substantial disruption of the school environment. This article is a timely analysis on the limits of school jurisdiction over offensive online student speech.

On February 4, 2010, two different Third Circuit panels issued opinions reaching opposite conclusions on whether schools may punish students based on online speech created by students when they are off-campus. The Third Circuit vacated both decisions and is considering these cases in a consolidated en banc appeal. Another case addressing the same …

Managing Fiscal Volatility By Redefining "Tax Cuts" And "Tax Hikes", David Gamage, Jeremy Bearer-Friend

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This report analyzes how states should cope with fiscal volatility at the level of institutional-design policy. We propose that states reconsider how they define terms like ‘‘tax cuts’’ and ‘‘tax hikes.’’ By adopting a new baseline for defining those terms, states can increase the likelihood of using tax rate adjustments to cope with fiscal volatility rather than more harmful spending fluctuations.

The Ifc's New Africa, Latin America, And Caribbean Fund: Its Worrisome Start, And How To Fix It, Christiana Ochoa, Patrick J. Keenan

Articles by Maurer Faculty

In April 2010 the International Finance Corporation announced the creation of the African, Latin American, and Caribbean fund, a new co-investment vehicle funded largely with commitments from sovereign wealth and pension funds. The fund's objective was to draw on the IFC and the World Bank's strengths in emerging markets to identify and support enterprises that might not otherwise have come to the attention of large investors and thereby help strengthen the private sector and alleviate poverty in some of the world's poorest countries. Unfortunately the fund has, so far, proven a disappointment. It has invested only in large corporations that …

Religion, Science And The Secular State: Creationism In American Public Schools, Gene Shreve

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Article examines the current debate whether creationism may be taught in American schools given the constraints of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The author considers some of the social and political consequences of the U.S. Supreme Court's leading cases. The article concludes by questioning whether the Supreme Court has succeeded in justifying its restrictive decisions in this controversial area.

Adaptive Management In The Courts, Robert L. Fischman, J. B. Ruhl

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Adaptive management has become the tonic of natural resources policy. With its core idea of “learning while doing,” adaptive management has infused the natural resources policy world to the point of ubiquity, surfacing in everything from mundane agency permits to grand presidential proclamations. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to suggest that these days adaptive management is natural resources policy. But is it working? Does appending “adaptive” in front of “management” somehow make natural resources policy, which has always been about balancing competing claims to nature’s bounty, something more and better? Many legal and policy scholars have asked that question, with …

Reconceiving The Fourth Amendment And The Exclusionary Rule, Craig M. Bradley

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Globetrotting Law Firms, Jayanth K. Krishnan

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Despite the current financial crisis, prestigious American and British law firms continue to maintain a presence in Continental Europe, Latin America, and China. Yet, in one economically fertile, democratic country - India - such global legal powerhouses are scarcely found. This study seeks to understand empirically why there is a general absence of these and other foreign law firms practicing in India. Based on fieldwork and compiled interview data of lawyers, judges, government officials, activists, and clients from India, the United States, and Britain - the latter two being the foreign countries most interested in gaining access to the Indian …

Protecting Privacy In Health Research: The Limits Of Individual Choice, Fred H. Cate

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Right Problem; Wrong Solution, Joseph L. Hoffmann, Nancy J. King

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Independent Directors In Startup Firms, Brian Broughman

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Article develops a new theory to explain the widespread use of independent directors in the governance of startup firms. Privately held startups often assign a tie-breaking board seat to a third-party independent director. This practice cannot be explained by the existing corporate governance literature, which relies on diffuse ownership and passive investment-features unique to the publicly traded firm. To develop an alternative theory, I model a financing contract between an entrepreneur and a venture capital investor. I show that allocating a tie- breaking vote to an unbiased thirdparty can prevent opportunistic behavior that would occur ifthe firm were controlled …

Charity And Information: Correcting The Failure Of A Disjunctive Social Norm, Brian Broughman, Robert Cooter

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Charitable donations fund social goods that the state and markets undersupply. Despite widespread belief in the importance of private charity, most Americans donate little or nothing. Experiments in behavioral economics show that anonymity, not human nature, causes low contributions. Anonymity poses a particular challenge for charity because of the special character of the obligation. Charity is a disjunctive social norm, meaning the obligation is owed to ‘A or B or C or …’. Disclosure of each individual’s aggregate conduct is necessary for the effectiveness of any disjunctive social norm. To revitalize charity we propose a public registry where each taxpayer …

Her Last Words: Dying Declarations And Modern Confrontation Jurisprudence, Aviva A. Orenstein

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Dying declarations have taken on increased importance since the Supreme Court indicated that even if testimonial, they may present a unique exception to its new confrontation jurisprudence. Starting with Crawford v. Washington in 2004, the Court has developed strict rules concerning the use of testimonial statements made by unavailable declarants. Generally, testimonial statements (those made with the expectation that they will be used to prosecute the accused) may be admitted only if they were previously subject to cross examination. The only exceptions appear to be dying declarations and forfeiture by wrongdoing if the accused intentionally rendered the declarant unavailable.

This …

The Price Of Conflict: War, Taxes, And The Politics Of Fiscal Citizenship, Ajay K. Mehrotra

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Since 2003 American political leaders and lawmakers have been committed to the simultaneous pursuit of tax cuts and military excursions abroad. Just a few decades ago, when military hawks were also deficit hawks, such a position would have seemed incongruous. This essay reviews, War and Taxes, a provocative and fascinating new book that seeks to explain the apparent dissonance of recent American wartime tax policy. In contrast to conventional wisdom which presumes that wartime patriotism has always and everywhere trumped self-interest, War and Taxes shows that the history of U.S. wartime taxation is not quite such a heroic tale. By …

Lawyers, Guns & Public Monies: The U.S. Treasury, World War One, And The Administration Of The Modern Fiscal State, Ajay K. Mehrotra

Articles by Maurer Faculty

The First World War was a pivotal event for American political and economic development, particularly in the realm of public finance. For it was during the war years that the federal government ended its traditional reliance on regressive import duties and excise taxes as principal sources of revenue and began a modern era of fiscal governance, one based primarily on the direct and progressive taxation of personal and corporate income. Like other aspects of war mobilization, this fiscal revolution required an enormous infusion of national administrative resources. Nowhere was this more evident than within the corridors of the U.S. Treasury …

American Economic Development, Managerial Corporate Capitalism, And The Institutional Foundations Of The Modern Income Tax, Ajay K. Mehrotra

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Histories of the modern American income tax have generally focused on the role that social and political forces have played in the development of a new tax system. This article seeks to move beyond the social and political determinants to examine the economic factors that facilitated the adoption of the modern, graduated income tax. Without marginalizing the importance of social and political factors, the central aim of this article is to make a modest contribution to the legal and political historiography of the U.S. income tax by highlighting how changing material economic conditions afforded social groups, political reformers, and lawmakers …

Anger, Irony, And The Formal Rationality Of Professionalism, Ajay K. Mehrotra

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Melendez-Diaz And The Right To Confrontation, Craig M. Bradley

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The Unappreciated Inportance, For Small Business Defendants, Of The Duty To Settle, Robert H. Heidt

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.