Law Commons^™

Court-Created Boundaries Between A Visible Lesbian Mother And Her Children, Susan J. Becker

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This essay identifies some of the boundaries and obstacles imposed by the courts on a "visible" lesbian mother striving to maintain a healthy relationship with her children. The term "visible" is used to describe a mother whose lesbian sexuality has been revealed to a court empowered with defining her future contact with her children. The primary focus here is on children who were conceived through a heterosexual relationship, and where a heterosexual parent, grandparent, or other person is challenging the lesbian mother's right to custody of, or visitation with, her own children. Court created boundaries are identified and discussed in …

Law Students' Commitment Benefits Everyone - A View On Law Student Participation, Pamela Daiker-Middaugh

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Describes the value of law students participating in pro-bono and volunteer opportunities.

A Brilliant Instance Of Flabby Thinking, Deborah A. Geier

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This article provides a short history of the lower-of-cost-or-market rule.

Choosing Substantive Justice: A Discussion Of Choice, Rights And The New Reproductive Technologies, April L. Cherry

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This paper is an expanded version of the speech that Professor Cherry presented at the National Women Law Students' Association Conference, entitled Consensus and the Community: Diversifying Our Points of View, at the University of Wisconsin Law School on March l, 1996. For Professor Cherry's complete article on this topic, see 10 Wis. Women's L.J. 161 A Feminist Understanding of Sex-Selective Abortion: Solely a Matter of Choice

Innovative Teaching Methods And Practical Uses Of Literature In Legal Education, Karin M. Mika

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Because I believe a breadth of reading enhances one's ability to think and write, throughout the years I have tried to encourage extra curricular and diversified reading to be done in conjunction with my Legal Writing class. Unfortunately, yet understandably, law students generally only do the required work, but not more. As a consequence, I have discovered, over time, that the "readers" in my classes continue to read while the "non-readers" never take the opportunity to discover what advantage there might be in taking my advice. Because no change has occurred in students' overall attitudes, I decided to make life …

Book Review: Postmodern Legal Movements: Law And Jurisprudence At Century's End By Gary Minda, Chris Sagers

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Postmodem Legal Movements does two things. First, the bulk of the book provides an overview of American jurisprudence, from Christopher Columbus Langdell to the present. This overview is necessary because, in order to understand "postmodem forms of jurisprudence, we must first explore what came before postmodernism, that is, modernism" (p. 5). Second, the relatively short latter portion of the book presents an argument about the current state of American legal scholarship and its future. Minda's picture of contemporary legal thought is that of a paradigm shift in the making.

Postmodern Legal Movements will prove useful to those in search of …

An Implied Cause Of Action Under The Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act, Chris Sagers

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This Note contends that consumers should have a private damages action under section 10. Part I discusses the method federal courts currently employ to determine whether a private cause of action should be recognized under a given federal statute. Part II applies this standard to section 10, and it argues that, although the federal courts currently exhibit a fairly restrictive attitude toward implication of remedies, an action should be implied under section 10 because the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act of 1974 (RESPA) was enacted at a time when Congress relied on a more permissive judicial implication doctrine. Finally, Part …

The Parma Housing Racial Discrimination Remedy Revisited, W Dennis Keating

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

In 1980, the city of Parma, Ohio, Cleveland's largest suburban city was found guilty of violating the Fair Housing Act. Federal District Court Judge Frank Battisti imposed an extensive remedy upon Parma. Upon approval by the Sixth Circuit of the imposed remedy, its implementation began in 1982. Controversy surrounded much of the remedy, and fourteen years later following Battisti's death, Federal District Court judge Kathleen O'Malley approved a new settlment aimed at ending the court's supervision of the modified remedy after another two years. Along with the Gautreaux, Mt. Laurel, and Yonkers cases, the Parma case represents a longstanding remedy …

Ohio Tort Reform In 1998: The War Continues, Stephen J. Werber

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

For more than a decade a war has been waged between forces seeking legislative reform of tort law, with emphasis on product liability, and the Ohio Supreme Court. The battleground has been the legislative enactments of the Ohio General Assembly. This legislation has faced consistent challenge before the court as a proper exercise of its power of judicial review. Time and time again the court's philosophical approach, predicated on a need to protect injured parties and guarantee compensation for harm, has led to determinations that given legislation fails constitutional scrutiny. In a real sense, the Court has become a super …

Internet Jurisdictional Issues: Fundamental Fairness In A Virtual World, Karin M. Mika, Aaron J. Reber

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This Article explains Internet jurisdictional issues within the current framework that enables a state to assert in personam jurisdiction. This Article argues that existing jurisdictional tests are appropriate in determining the fairness of jurisdiction in cases involving the Internet, despite the vast outreach capacity of computers. This Article will first examine the development of law concerning in personam jurisdiction. Next, this Article will reflect on how courts have handled jurisdictional issues respecting other modes of communication, namely the mail and telephone. Third, this Article will argue that in traditional jurisdictional analysis, courts have placed primary emphasis on business contacts and …

Responsibilities Of Employers Toward Mentally Disabled Persons Under The Americans With Disabilities Act, Karin M. Mika, Denise Wimbiscus

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This article discusses the standards of the American with Disabilities Act with respect to accommodating mental illness in the workplace. It argues that the ADA definitions are not precise enough in apprising employers of what their obligations are regarding mentally ill persons in the workplace. It additionally suggests revising the statue and regulations to achieve this goal.

Suppressed History Or Distorted History? A Review Of Rosenfeld's The American Aurora, Arthur R. Landever

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

A book review of Richard N Rosenfeld, American Aurora: A Democratic-Republican Returns: The Suppressed History of Our Nation's Beginnings and the Heroic Newspaper That Tried to Report It, Macmillan, 1997.

A National Product Liability Statute Of Repose - Let's Not, Stephen J. Werber

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Despite the failure of the 104th Congress to override President Clinton's veto and enact the Common Sense Product Liability Legal Reform Act, there is little doubt that such an Act will be passed by the 105th Congress. Uniform national laws concerning product liability are necessary, can be enacted consistent with Congressional authority, and should be enacted at the earliest possible time. A balanced Act, recognizing the need to protect injured consumers while providing necessary protection to product manufacturers and distributors, can be drafted. Such an Act could include provisions that abolish the consumer expectancy test for design defect litigation, reject …

The Child's Right To An Open Future: Yoder And Beyond, Dena S. Davis

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Every time I teach a class on church and state, I am reminded again of how much we owe to the religious minorities in our midst. If it were not for Amish, Quakers, Jews, Santerians and especially Jehovah's Witnesses, what an impoverished understanding we would have, not only of the religion clauses of the First Amendment, but also of the Free Speech Clause. The original parents in Wisconsin v. Yoder are now grandparents, and their children, with or without the benefit of a high school education, have grown to adulthood and probably have children of their own. But 25 years …

The Challenge Of Providing Adequate Housing For The Elderly . . . Along With Everyone, Alan C. Weinstein

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Our patterns of land use and development have failed to accommodate the changed housing needs of an aging population. Primary among these needs is the desire of the elderly to be able to "age in place." To meet this need, America's suburban communities in particular will need to re-think their reliance on exclusive single-family zoning and begin planning and zoning for an increasingly large number of the elderly. Despite understandable concerns about maintaining housing values, this may well prove to be politically achievable simply because the very demographic changes that create the need will create a growing constituency in favor …

Tell Me A Story: Using Short Fiction In Teaching Law And Bioethics, Dena S. Davis

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

For some years now, I have been experimenting with the use of short stories. Despite rich resources for stories, there remains a void best filled by fiction. When discussing fiction, we can probe, criticize, and express ourselves freely without the constraints we feel when discussing real people. Good fiction lays bare the innermost thoughts and experiences of its characters, perhaps even their dreams and nightmares, in a way that would be intrusive, uncomfortable, or impossible, even in autobiography. When the entire class reads a short story, it provides a pool of shared experience, a fixed point for discussion. Just as …

Lovewell V. Physicians Insurance Co.: Personal Liability For Prejudgment Interest, Karin M. Mika

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This article looks at the Supreme Court of Ohio's decision in Lovewell v. Physicians Insurance Co. and the variety of issues and unanswered questions the decision presents relating to insurance law. First, it may no longer be assumed that the insurer acts in tandem with the insured when the insurer is defending a suit brought against the covered individual. Secondly, the Lovewell decision seems to be contrary to one of the basic tenets of insurance law – that an insurance contract must be construed liberally in favor of the insured and strictly against the insurer. Third, the decision gives insureds …

Right To Talk: Has Justice Antonin Scalia Compromised His Objectivity With A Public Remark?, Lloyd B. Snyder

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

With two assisted suicide cases scheduled for argument before the Supreme Court this term, Justice Antonin Scalia already has publicly staked out his position on the issue. While sentiments he expressed in 1990 in Cruzan v. Director, Missouri Department of Health, 497 U.S. 261, are well-known, Scalia told an audience at Catholic University late last year that it is "absolutely plain there is no [constitutional] right to die." Is it proper for sitting judges to make such statements? While no one would deny Scalia his First Amendment right to say what he pleases, that hardly quells concerns about the advisability …

Ancient Answers To Modern Questions: Death, Dying And Organ Transplants - A Jewish Law Perspective, Stephen J. Werber

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Core values of the Jewish heritage are life and family, not death. An interpretation of Halachah which permits a broad definition of passive euthanasia without lapsing into acceptance of active euthanasia or its more evil cousin, assisted suicide, is consistent with these values. Also consistent with these values and the Jewish tradition is a modern definition of death which recognizes advances in medical technology that were beyond the knowledge or imagination of those who created the vast body of Rabbinic law. This approach will not only ease the suffering of families, it will allow organ transplants to save the lives …

Concepts Of Culpability And Deathworthiness: Differentiating Between Guilt And Punishment In Death Penalty Cases, Phyllis L. Crocker

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

The punishment of death is supposed to be reserved for those defendants who commit the most grievous murders and deserve the most extreme punishment. It is constitutionally insufficient to conclude that because a defendant is guilty of committing murder, death is the only deserved punishment. The judgment that a defendant is one of the few who will be sentenced to death requires an inquiry that looks beyond the defendant's guilt to consider whether the defendant is worthy of a death sentence. This article argues that the distinction between a defendant's guilt and deathworthiness is so often obscured that defendants who …

Arendt, Tushnet, And Lopez: The Philosophical Challenge Behind Ackerman's Theory Of Constitutional Moments, S. Candice Hoke

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

In his provocative article, Mark Tushnet asks whether United States v. Lopez signals a major constitutional shift in federalism-- specifically in the allocation of political and regulatory power between State and Nation. Tushnet uses the Lopez problem to test the adequacy of the political theory that Bruce Ackerman terms “dualist democracy,” delineated in Ackerman's work in progress. Like many other reviewers, Tushnet finds Ackerman's theory wanting in crucial respects.My response takes two tracks. First, I will argue that the import of Ackerman's theory is better understood and evaluated when it is considered more as a work of political philosophy and …

Book Review, S. Candice Hoke

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

The author reviews Federalism and Rights by Ellis Katz and G. Alan Tarr and To Make a Nation: The Rediscovery of American Federalism by Samuel H. Beer.

What Kulch Accomplished; What Kulch Left Out, Sandra J. Kerber

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

An analysis of the rights of terminated whistleblowers in Ohio, as mandated by section 4113.52 of the Ohio Revised Code and interpreted by Kulch v. Structural Fibers, Inc., 677 N.E.2d 308 (Ohio 1997).

Don't Ride Buses In Honduras, David R. Barnhizer

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

The first indication my trip to Honduras might be eventful came when our airplane divebombed the mountain-top runway in a landing that left the passengers looking at each other with relief. We stumbled from the American Airlines flights to the customs windows. That was just the beginning of a fascinating week.

From The Mouths Of Babes: Dealing With The Child Witness, Susan J. Becker

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This article addresses the challenges of child witnesses and the use of expert testimony in child abuse cases. The author offers tips for litigators on what not to do when working with children as witnesses.

The Law And Psychiatry Wars, 1960-1980, Sheldon Gelman

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

The chapter of the book excerpted below examines litigation developments from the late 1960s to the early 1980s. In law no less than in psychiatry, professional judgments produced anomalous results and professional processes worked in unexpected ways when it came to medications. These departures advanced a public mental health vision that was functionally the same as psychiatrists', even if couched in utterly different and more legalistic terms. Psychiatrists hailed medications as a medical revolution; lawyers by and large ignored the drugs. Yet, both professions reached the same general conclusions about what should be done.Commentators at the time saw an emerging …