Law Commons^™

Chasing Ghosts: On The Possibility Of Writing Cultural Histories Of Tax Law, Assaf Likhovski

Assaf Likhovski

This Article discusses the use of arguments about “culture” in two debates about the imposition, application and abolition of income tax law: A debate about the transplantation of British income taxation to British-ruled Palestine in the early twentieth century, and a debate about tax privacy in late eighteenth-century and early nineteenth-century Britain. In both cases, “culture,” or some specific aspect of it (notions of privacy) appeared in arguments made by opponents of the tax. However, it is difficult to decide whether the use of cultural arguments in these debates simply reflected some “reality” that existed prior to these debates, whether …

Эволюция Правового Статуса Академии Наук В 20-Е Годы Xx Века, Leonid G. Berlyavskiy

Leonid G. Berlyavskiy

Legal aspects of history of the Russian Academy of Science are obviously insufficiently studied. The 85th anniversary of the Charter of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR 1927 coming in 2012 makes urgent its detailed legal characteristics, background of fact that the Charter of the Academy of Sciences was developed by the Academy itself and was approved by the Government on its representation. The essential features of evolution of the Academy of Sciences legal status in 1920s are as follows: its transformation into the higher scientific organisation of the USSR; returning to the pre-revolutionary system of its submission to …

«Философский Пароход: 90 Лет Спустя, Leonid G. Berlyavskiy

Leonid G. Berlyavskiy

In case of the deportation 1922 the emergency state mode did not act, dispatch was performed in a greater degree for the limits of the country sent in the conditions of the New Economic Policy were not engaged in instigation to public disorders. It is represented that the given variant of deportatio nquite can be carried to repressive methods of state-legal adjustment which were approved in 20th years and were actively used during the subsequent period.

Законодательные Основы Противодействия Ксенофобии И Антисемитизму В Советском Государстве (1917-1939 Г.Г.), Leonid G. Berlyavskiy, Eugene V. Kolesnikov

Leonid G. Berlyavskiy

In the article the legislation of xenophobia and antisemitism counteraction in the Soviet Union is considered. The Sovnarkom of RSFSR Decree 27 July 1918, the Soviet criminal codes in the struggle against nationalism and antisemitism is shown

The Founders’ Hermeneutic: The Real Original Understanding Of Original Intent, Robert G. Natelson

Robert G. Natelson

This Article addresses whether the American Founders expected evidence of their own subjective views to guide future interpretation of the U.S. Constitution. The Article considers a range of evidence largely overlooked or misunderstood in earlier studies, such as contemporaneous rules of legal interpretation, judicial use of legislative history, early American public debate, and pronouncements by state ratifying conventions. Based on this evidence, the Article concludes that the Founders were “original-understanding originalists.” This means that they anticipated that constitutional interpretation would be guided by the subjective understanding of the ratifiers when such understanding was coherent and recoverable and, otherwise, by the …

A Republic, Not A Democracy? Initiative, Referendum, And The Constitution's Guarantee Clause, Robert G. Natelson

Robert G. Natelson

This article debunks the myth, first arising in the 1840s, that the Founders sharply distinguished between a "republic" and a "democracy." It explains that by a "republic," most of the Founders meant a government controlled by the citizenry, following the rule of law, and without a king. Accordingly, state provisions for initiative and referendum are fully consistent with the Constitution's requirement that each state have a republican form of government; in fact, most of the governments the Founders called "republics" had featured analogous forms of direct democracy.

Paper Money And The Original Understanding Of The Coinage Clause, Robert G. Natelson

Robert G. Natelson

Over a century ago, the Supreme Court decided the Legal Tender Cases, holding that Congress could authorize legal tender paper money in addition to metallic coin. In recent years, some commentators have argued that this holding was incorrect as a matter of original understanding or original meaning, but that any other holding would be absolutely inconsistent with modern needs. They further argue that the impracticality of functioning without paper money demonstrates that originalism is not a workable method of constitutional interpretation. Those who rely on the Legal Tender Cases to discredit originalism are, however, in error. This Article shows that …

Islam In The Mind Of American Courts: 1800 To 1960., Marie A. Failinger

Marie A. Failinger

This article surveys mentions of Islam and Muslims in American federal and state court cases from 1800 to 1960.

Hawthorne's 'Spectacle Of Guilt And Shame' And The Law Of Adultery In Puritan New England: 1631-1694., Joshua Erspamer Mr.

joshua Erspamer Mr.

The death penalty for the crime of adultery was only imposed on three occasions by the courts in colonial New England. Of these three, a majority come from Puritan Massachusetts. However, this majority is limited to one case and two defendants: the 1644 case of Mary Latham and James Brittaine. Adultery was codified as a capital crime in the Bay Colony in the 1641 Body of Liberties which remained in effect until the loss of charter and merger with Massachusetts Bay Province at the end of the century. This work explores the reasons for the Bay Colony court’s resistance to …

How The British Gun Control Program Precipitated The American Revolution, David B. Kopel

David B Kopel

Abstract: This Article chronologically reviews the British gun control which precipitated the American Revolution: the 1774 import ban on firearms and gun powder; the 1774-75 confiscations of firearms and gun powder, from individuals and from local governments; and the use of violence to effectuate the confiscations. It was these events which changed a situation of rising political tension into a shooting war. Each of these British abuses provides insights into the scope of the modern Second Amendment.

From the events of 1774-75, we can discern that import restrictions or bans on firearms or ammunition are constitutionally suspect — at least …

The Great Gun Control War Of The Twentieth Century--And Its Lessons For Gun Laws Today, David B. Kopel

David B Kopel

A movement to ban handguns began in the 1920s in the Northeast, led by the conservative business establishment. In response, the National Rifle Association began to get involved in politics, and was able to defeat handgun prohibition. Gun control and gun rights became the subjects of intense political, social, and cultural battles for much of the rest of the 20th century, and into the 21st.

Often, the battles were a clash of absolutes: One side contended that there was absolutely no right to arms, that defensive gun ownership must be prohibited, and that gun ownership for sporting purposes could be, …