Law Commons^™

The Constitutionality Of An Executive Spending Plan, Paul E. Salamanca

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Operation of government in the absence of appropriations has become relatively common in the United States, particularly when projected expenses exceed projected revenue, making adoption of a budget a difficult task for the legislature. This Article focuses on the budget crisis in the Commonwealth of Kentucky from 2002 through 2003. In Part I, this Article recapitulates the history of the spending plan, including the action filed in Franklin Circuit Court to affirm its constitutionality. In Part II, this Article discusses certain theoretical, historical, and legal principles that inform analysis of the plan. In Part III, it considers certain deviations and …

The Impact Of Modern Finance Theory In Acquisition Cases, Rutheford B. Campbell Jr.

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

In February of 1983, the Supreme Court of Delaware decided Weinberger v. UOP, Inc. The case holds that, in determining the present value of a corporation involved in an acquisition, courts are free to use “any techniques or methods [of valuation] which are generally considered acceptable in the financial community…”

The rule in Delaware prior to Weinberger required courts to determine the present value of a corporation by use of the Delaware block method of valuation exclusively. The Delaware block method, however, is a poor way to determine the present value of a corporation. As a result, even before the …

Race Conscious Affirmative Action By Tax Exempt 501(C)(3) Corporations After Grutter And Gratz, David A. Brennen

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment generally acts as a legal limit on the permissible bounds of government action. Accordingly, public universities and other government entities are constitutionally prohibited from engaging in acts that violate equal protection of the laws. The Supreme Court recently reinforced this point when it ruled, in two related cases, that public universities may consider the race of applicants when making admissions decisions, so long as an applicant's race does not amount to a deciding factor when granting admission. By its very terms, the constitutional limitation imposed by the Equal Protection Clause only directly …

Law, Culture, And Family: The Transformative Power Of Culture And The Limits Of Law, Nancy E. Dowd

UF Law Faculty Publications

Law inevitably is involved in the resolution of cultural conflicts. Nonintervention acts as powerfully as intervention; in either case, law is a powerful actor in its role as a part of cultural dialogue, as well as in its role as a coercive force. Law is never neutral in my view. If it “stays out” of a situation, then it is complicit in the status quo or in permitting the conflict to be resolved without legal intervention, which may weight the outcome in a particular direction. If law “comes in,” it similarly “sides” with a particular position because, in part, our …

Hegel’S Theory Of Measure, David G. Carlson

Articles

The final segment in Hegel's analysis of "being" is measure - the unity of quality and quantity. At stake in these chapters is the difference between quantitative and qualitative change. A being or thing is indifferent to quantitative change, which comes from the outside. For instance, a legislature can increase the stringency of zoning regulations, and yet the legislation is still constitutional "zoning." But there comes a point at which quantitative change effects a qualitative change - zoning becomes an uncompensated "taking" of property. This paper analyzes how Hegel, in the "Science of Logic," derives measure from the categories of …

Unregulable Defenses And The Perils Of Shareholder Choice, Jennifer Arlen, Eric L. Talley

Faculty Scholarship

A significant debate rages within corporate law scholarship as to whether shareholders or managers should be granted authority over the tender offer process once a bid is imminent. Both sides generally agree that the issue depends on whether shareholders are capable of exercising informed choice over takeover bids. Supporters of managerial veto power contend that the arguments favoring professional management of publicly held firms carry over into the tender offer context. Proponents of shareholder choice, on the other hand, argue that shareholders can act on their own behalf in the special circumstances surrounding contests for corporate control.

This Article challenges …

From Violent Crime To Terrorism: The Changing Basis Of The Federal, State And Local Law Enforcement Dynamic, Daniel C. Richman

Faculty Scholarship

Two lines of questions dominate discussions about how the nation ought to respond at home to the new (or rather newly perceived) terrorist threat: How do we ensure that information about potential terrorist activities is effectively gathered, shared, and used? And how do we ensure that the Government neither abuses the investigative authority we give it, nor demands more authority than it needs? Each line can profitably be pursued in its own terms. Yet to keep the conversations separate is to miss seeing how the very process of creating an effective domestic intelligence network may introduce a salutary level of …

The Admissibility Of Expert Testimony About Cognitive Science Research On Eyewitness Identification, Edward Stein

Articles

Eyewitness identifications are important to jurors, especially in criminal trials. Psychological research has shown, however, that eyewitness testimony is systematically fallible in ways that undermine the goals of the rules of evidence. This article assesses the arguments for and against admitting expert testimony concerning cognitive science research about eyewitness identification. The article concludes that experts should in many instances be allowed to testify about the problems with eyewitness identification testimony.

Did Privacy Cause Identity Theft?, Lynn M. Lopucki

UF Law Faculty Publications

This essay argues that the decline of public identities over the past three decades, combined with increasing secrecy in the process of identification, is the root cause of the burgeoning problem of identity theft. Identity theft is easy because impersonation increasingly takes place in private transactions that are invisible to the victim. The essay compares two proposed solutions: Professor Daniel Soloves' architectural approach and the author's Public Identity System. Both would make the identification process transparent to the person identified, put imposters at risk by requiring personal appearances, and ban the use of social security numbers as passwords. But the …

Building Bridges V—Cubans Without Borders: Mujeres Unidas Por Su Historia, Berta E. Hernández-Truyol

UF Law Faculty Publications

Part I of this Essay traces the role of women in Cuban society throughout history. It includes a review of the development of Cuban laws concerning women, and women's role in developing them. This Part also addresses laws pertaining to women that were adopted by the present revolutionary regime. Part II sets out laws, beyond the laws of Cuba, that address the issue of gender/sex equality. It focuses on international norms that protect sex equality pertinent to women in Cuba as well as to Cuban women outside of Cuba. It also reviews U.S. laws on equality as they affect Cuban …

Can Lawyers Be Cured?: Eternal Recurrence And The Lacanian Death Drive, Jeanne L. Schroeder

Articles

No abstract provided.

Nietzsche And The Nazis: The Impact Of National Socialism On The Philosophy Of Nietzsche, Charles M. Yablon

Articles

No abstract provided.

Not So Great Moments In Trial Advocacy: Clement Vallandigham, Richard H. Underwood

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The subject of this comment is "The Lawyer as Hero." Being the contrarian that I am, I thought I would present the story of someone who I do not consider to have been a hero—Clement L. Vallandigham. History has not been kind to him. I am sure those of you who do remember his name think of him as a traitor and a rascal—a loathsome individual. But to some, and for a time, he was a hero and a champion in court. This just goes to show that one person's hero is another person's goat.

What I Think That I Have Learned About Legal Ethics, Richard H. Underwood

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

In this short piece I want to say a few things that other academics teaching legal ethics may find disturbing. I say this because I believe that I may be swimming against the current academic fashion. Of course, it is possible that I do not have a very good handle on the current academic fashion. I hope I am not setting up a straw person to knock down, but I may be. If I am, I am sure someone will call me to task. What I am going to say is this: contrary to popular belief (among practitioners, at least) …

Quo Vadis: The Continuing Metamorphosis Of The Establishment Clause Toward Realistic Substantive Neutrality, Paul E. Salamanca

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

For years, the rhetoric of substantive neutrality has dominated interpretation of the Establishment Clause. Under this approach, courts and commentators purport to ask whether a public policy under scrutiny is likely to affect religious choices in an unacceptable way. In fact, so broadly has this approach been taken that both separationists and accommodationists resort to it freely, although with radically differing perceptions as to when policy becomes unacceptable. Arguably, however, adherents to this approach have paid insufficient attention to religious behavior per se. Had they paid sufficient attention to this phenomenon, they would have been forced to acknowledge that little …

Business Law Reform In The United States: Thinking Too Small?, Douglas C. Michael

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Dean Johan Henning presents the South African experience with business entity reform as one part of a coordinated whole. It included, for example, government funding for business, tax reforms, accounting and securities changes. Henning says that these reforms, though multi-faceted, had a uniform purpose: to use small business as an engine to improve the economy and to move “historically and socially disadvantaged groups” into the mainstream of the economy and the society.

These are noble goals and far reaching efforts, and a lot to ask of business entity reform. But because the South African experience was nonetheless successful by all …

The Liberal Polity And Illiberalism In Religious Traditions, Paul E. Salamanca

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

It is in the nature of religious traditions to be somewhat illiberal. Indeed, a religion that does not require its adherents to affirm at least some belief is probably a logical impossibility. Christians, for example, must believe something about the nature of Christ. Even Unitarians, who advocate tolerance of all religions, must affirm a belief in tolerance.

Recently, and largely because of the events of September 11, 2001, enhanced attention has been paid to certain potentially illiberal aspects of Islam in the United States. The journalist Daniel Pipes, for example, has written about certain Moslem Americans who, according to his …

Controlling Controlling Shareholders, Ronald J. Gilson, Jeffrey N. Gordon

Faculty Scholarship

The rules governing controlling shareholders sit at the intersection of the two facets of the agency problem at the core of public corporations law. The first is the familiar principal-agency problem that arises from the separation of ownership and control. With only this facet in mind, a large shareholder may better police management than the standard panoply of market-oriented techniques. The second is the agency problem that arises between controlling and non-controlling shareholders, which produces the potential for private benefits of control. There is, however, a point of tangency between these facets. Because there are costs associated with holding a …

Regionalism Versus Globalism: A View From The Americas, Carlos Manuel Vázquez

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The well-deserved celebration of UNIDROIT'S first seventy-five years focused on a topic that is of particular interest to the Organization of American States and to the organ of the OAS to which the author belongs, the Inter-American Juridical Committee. The topic of the 75th Anniversary Congress--"Worldwide Harmonization of Private Law and Regional Integration"--implicates one of the several dichotomies with which we in the Inter-American system who work on questions of private international law (and international private law) have been grappling in recent years, the problem of regional versus global approaches to the harmonization of private international law (and international private …

Law In The Heart Of Darkness: Atrocity & Duress, Rosa Ehrenreich Brooks

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Our faith in the law is rarely tested, since in America, at least, few of us ordinary people ever find ourselves at the extremes, confronting violence and terror. But the extremes have a way of creeping up on us, and the unimaginable can quickly and imperceptibly begin to seem routine. Millions of ordinary Europeans discovered this in the middle of the last century, and thousands of ordinary Americans discovered it in Vietnam. Some Americans are discovering it again today in the mountains and deserts of Afghanistan and Iraq. Experientially, there is often no sharp dividing line between "ordinary" life and …

Constitutional Legitimacy, Randy E. Barnett

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The problem of constitutional legitimacy is to establish why anyone should obey the command of a constitutionally-valid law. A lawmaking system is legitimate if there is a prima facie duty to obey the laws it makes. Neither "consent of the governed" nor "benefits received" justifies obedience. Rather, a prima facie duty of obedience exists either (a) if there is actual unanimous consent to the jurisdiction of the lawmaker or, in the absence of consent, (b) f laws are made by procedures which assure that they are not unjust. In the absence of unanimous consent, a written constitution should be assessed …

The New Mccarthyism: Repeating History In The War In Terrorism, David Cole

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This Essay will argue that the government has invoked two methods in particular in virtually every time of fear. The first, discussed in Part I, involves a substantive expansion of the terms of responsibility. Authorities target individuals not for what they do or have done but based on predictions about what they might do. These predictions often rely on the individuals' skin color, nationality, or political and religious associations. The second method, the subject of Part II, is procedural-the government invokes administrative processes to control, precisely so that it can avoid the guarantees associated with the criminal process. In hindsight, …

Suing The Federal Government: Sovereignty, Immunity, And Judicial Independence, Vicki C. Jackson

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

As I suggest below in Part I, federal sovereign immunity was a doctrine of limited effect in the early years of this republic and allowed for a number of remedies for governmental wrongdoing. Moreover, the constitutional provenance of federal "sovereign immunity" is obscure, and was a matter of genuine uncertainty in early years. Over time the doctrine developed, drawing support from some aspects of constitutional architecture as well as from unreasoning and mistaken extensions of other versions of "sovereign immunity." Among the strands of constitutional structure behind federal "sovereign immunity" are Congress' powers over appropriations and the jurisdiction of the …

Cultural Change And "Catholic Lawyers", Stephen F. Smith

Journal Articles

If there is anything that America definitely does not need, it would seem, it is more lawyers. Over the last thirty years or so, the number of lawyers practicing in the United States has almost tripled to current levels of roughly 900,000 practicing attorneys. To this number, our nation's law schools add another 35,000 attorneys annually. In spite of this, the purpose of this special inaugural law review issue is to commemorate the founding of a new school, the Ave Maria School of Law. It is an honor for me to be able to share in the joy and pride …

Biodiversity And Mom, John C. Nagle

Journal Articles

In December 1973, Congress enacted the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The law was the latest, and greatest, federal effort to prevent wildlife from becoming extinct. The members of Congress who voted for the law always mentioned bald eagles, grizzly bears, whooping cranes, alligators, and whales—the animals, in short, that today are most likely to be memorialized as Beanie Babies. They were also aware of the species that had already disappeared from the earth, such as the passenger pigeon and the great auk. Such images yielded an overwhelming vote in favor of the law. President Nixon signed it on December 28, …

A Crisis Of Caring: A Catholic Critique Of American Welfare Reform, Vincent D. Rougeau

Journal Articles

The current deterioration of the American economy is bringing new attention to the problem of poverty in the United States. After falling over the last few years, the number of Americans living in poverty has begun to rise once again. Notwithstanding the achievements of recent "welfare reforms," the American poor continue to be numerous by any measure.

Unfortunately, decades of affluence have exacerbated American tendencies to view liberal concepts such as freedom, autonomy, tolerance, and choice in ways that accentuate personal autonomy over community integration. These liberal values have been increasingly unhinged from strong countervailing principles like duty and responsibility, …

Subsidiarity As A Structural Principle Of International Human Rights Law, Paolo G. Carozza

Journal Articles

This article argues that the principle of subsidiarity should be recognized as a structural principle of international human rights law primarily because of the way that it mediates between the universalizing aspirations of human rights and the fact of the diversity of human communities in the world. The idea of subsidiarity is deeply consonant with the substantive vision of human dignity and the universal common good that is expressed through human rights norms. Yet, at the same time it promotes respect for pluralism by emphasizing the freedom of more local communities to realize their own ends for themselves.

Looking at …

From Conquest To Constitutions: Retrieving A Latin American Tradition Of The Idea Of Human Rights, Paolo G. Carozza

Journal Articles

This article explores the historical roots of the Latin American region's strong commitment to the idea of universal human rights, focusing on four key intellectual moments: the ethical response to the Spanish conquest; the rights ideology of the continent's liberal republican revolutions; the articulation of social and economic rights in the Mexican Constitution of 1917; and the Latin American contributions to the genesis of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Constructing a narrative from these examples, the article argues for the recognition of a distinct Latin American tradition within the global discourse of human rights.

The Biblical Prophets As Lawyers For The Poor, Thomas L. Shaffer

Journal Articles

Lawyers practicing poverty law often lack mentors and role models. This author discusses how biblical figures, who served poor people, could be mentors and role models for lawyers practicing poverty law. Prophets, and particularly prophets-as-lawyers, redefine power relationships. Shaffer discusses his personal journey through out his career in using religious guidance to help him better understand his career. He also discuss his teachings to his law students of the value of learning from prophets in their legal careers.

Mixed Up About Mixed Motive: What Will Trigger A "Mixed Motive" Analysis In Title Vii Cases? An Analysis Of Desert Palace, Inc. V. Costa, Barbara J. Fick

Journal Articles

This article previews the Supreme Court case Desert Palace, Inc. v. Costa, 539 U.S. 90, 2003. The author expected the Court to clarify and define the circumstances in which it is appropriate to use the "mixed-motive model" to prove a violation of Title VII under the disparate treatment theory.