Law Commons^™

A Benign Prior Restraint Rule For Public School Classroom Speech, Scott R. Bauries

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This Article is a contribution to a symposium on schools and free speech. It advances the claim that the First Amendment doctrines that apply to the classroom should adopt a benign prior restraint rule. In the case of teacher classroom speech, the Garcetti rule should apply where the government’s action in interfering with the speech constitutes a prior restraint—the First Amendment should not reach such interference. In cases where a teacher first speaks and then is later punished for that speech, however, basic notions of due process and the dangers of arbitrary governmental decision making are far more pressing, and …

Child Witness Policy: Law Interfacing With Social Science, Louise E. Graham, Dorothy F. Marsil, Jean Montoya, David Ross

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The number of children testifying in court has posed serious practical and legal problems for the judicial system. One problem confronting the courts is how to protect children from experiencing the psychological trauma resulting from a face-to-face confrontation with a defendant who may have physically harmed the child or threatened future harm to the child. Another concern is that this trauma may impair children's memory performance and their willingness to disclose the truth. In response to these concerns, child witness innovations proliferated throughout the United States in the 1980s and 1990s. Among the innovations were: placing a screen between child …

State Marital Property Laws And Federally Created Benefits: A Conflict Of Laws Analysis, Louise Everett Graham

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The laws of individual states have historically controlled familial relationships and the rights and responsibilities derived from them. The injection of federal rights into the domestic relations area has generally been confined to resolution of claims that the application of particular state laws violated either due process or equal protection rights of particular persons. In a limited number of cases concerning marital property, however, one party has relied upon a federal law creating a benefit or right that conflicts with the state-created rule apportioning marital property or establishing a support obligation. Such a conflict of laws problem arose in McCarty …

Kentucky Law Survey: Education: Teachers’ Rights, Keith Graham Hanley, Robert G. Schwemm

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Tenure occupies an important place in the mind of any new teacher. During the past survey year, the Kentucky courts have demonstrated that this status is not only important to teachers generally; it is essential to continued job security. The aegis of tenure provides not only the substance of teachers’ rights but also the procedure used to protect those rights.

Discharged teachers have alleged violations of the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution in both its equal protection and due process aspects and violations of the Kentucky constitution. However, in each instance the courts have summarily dismissed these claims, preferring …

Kentucky Law Survey: Education, Carolyn S. Bratt

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This article provides a survey of Kentucky case law on the topic of education. During the past survey year, the Kentucky Court of Appeals decided several cases in which public education was the common denominator. Developments occurred in the areas of student discipline, merger of first class city-county school districts, and due process requirements for removal of tenured teachers. The most significant case, however, was Dorr v. Fitzer, which involved the authority of a county board of education to reject, without cause, a school superintendent's recommendation that a teacher with four consecutive limited service contracts be granted a continuing …

Kentucky Law Survey: Commercial Law, Harold R. Weinberg

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This article provides a survey of Kentucky legal developments in the area of commercial law. The focus of this survey is whether a creditor’s statutory prejudgment remedies, which involve an application of state authority, are constitutional under the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment.