Criminal Law Commons^™

The Mob Lawyer's Constitution, Sara Mayeux

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

This article reconstructs the constitutional rhetoric of mob lawyers, as well as drug lawyers and other icons of the high-priced criminal defense bar, from the 1970s through the 1990s-the heyday of federal organized crime prosecutions and thus, of the lawyers who defended against them. Drawing upon pop-culture sources including archival television footage, magazine features, newspaper coverage, and ghost-written mass-market memoirs, the article pieces together the constellation of soundbites through which mob lawyers disseminated their views. As the subjects of frequent media coverage, these lawyers advanced a coherent and distinctive (if crude) set of ideas about the proper relationship between individuals, …

Constitutional Limits On The Imposition And Revocation Of Probation, Parole, And Supervised Release After Haymond, Nancy J. King

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

In its Apprendi line of cases, the Supreme Court has held that any fact found at sentencing (other than prior conviction) that aggravates the punishment range otherwise authorized by the conviction is an "element" that must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury. Whether Apprendi controls factfinding for the imposition and revocation of probation, parole, and supervised release is critically important. Seven of ten adults under correctional control in the United States are serving terms of state probation and post-confinement supervision, and roughly half of all prison admissions result from revocations of such terms. But scholars have yet …

"Plausible Cause": Explanatory Standards In The Age Of Powerful Machines, Kiel Brennan-Marquez

Vanderbilt Law Review

Much scholarship in law and political science has long understood the U.S. Supreme Court to be the "apex" court in the federal judicial system, and so to relate hierarchically to "lower" federal courts. On that top-down view, exemplified by the work of Alexander Bickel and many subsequent scholars, the Court is the principal, and lower federal courts are its faithful agents. Other scholarship takes a bottom-up approach, viewing lower federal courts as faithless agents or analyzing the "percolation" of issues in those courts before the Court decides. This Article identifies circumstances in which the relationship between the Court and other …

Why Crime Severity Analysis Is Not Reasonable, Christopher Slobogin, Jeffrey Bellin, Et Al.

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Jeffrey Bellin’s article, Crime Severity Distinctions and the Fourth Amendment: Reassessing Reasonableness in a Changing World, argues that the severity of the crime under investigation ought to be taken into account in assessing both the reasonableness of searches and whether a government action is a search in the first place. In pursuit of this objective, his article provides the best attempt to date at dealing with the difficult issue of separating serious from not-so serious crimes (he ends up with three categories—grave, serious and minor. He then makes the enticing argument that calibrating the degree of Fourth Amendment protection according …

A Critical Appraisal Of The Department Of Justice's New Approach To Medical Marijuana, Robert A. Mikos

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

The Obama Administration has embarked upon a much-heralded shift in federal policy toward medical marijuana. Eschewing the hard-ball tactics favored by earlier Administrations, Attorney General Eric Holder announced in October 2009 that the Department of Justice (DOJ) would stop enforcing the federal marijuana ban against persons who comply with state medical marijuana laws. Given the significance of the medical marijuana issue in both criminal law and federalism circles, this Article sets out to provide the first in-depth analysis of the changes wrought by the DOJ’s new Non Enforcement Policy (NEP). In a nutshell, it suggests that early enthusiasm for the …

On The Limits Of Supremacy: Medical Marijuana And The States' Overlooked Power To Legalize Federal Crime, Robert A. Mikos

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Using the conflict over medical marijuana as a timely case study, this Article explores the overlooked and underappreciated power of states to legalize conduct Congress bans. Though Congress has banned marijuana outright, and though that ban has survived constitutional scrutiny, state laws legalizing medical use of marijuana constitute the de facto governing law in thirteen states. This Article argues that these state laws and (most) related regulations have not been, and, more interestingly, cannot be preempted by Congress, given constraints imposed on Congress's preemption power by the anti-commandeering rule, properly understood. Just as importantly, these state laws matter, in a …

Cunningham V. California - Case Comment, Rebecca Haw Allensworth

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Sixth Amendment--Allocation of Fact-finding in Sentencing.--Apprendi v. New Jersey spawned a series of Supreme Court sentencing decisions which, when viewed together, are at best confusing and at worst contradictory. Commentators and courts have struggled to find a coherent governing principle uniting "Apprendi," "Blakely v. Washington," and "United States v. Booker." The holding in "Apprendi," originally described as a bright-line rule, has proved anything but. Last Term, in "Cunningham v. California," the Court added another chapter to the Apprendi saga when it declared unconstitutional California's Determinate Sentencing Law (DSL). Justice Ginsburg authored the majority opinion that overturned the California Supreme Court's …

Taking Miranda's Pulse, William T. Pizzi, Morris B. Hoffman

Vanderbilt Law Review

The Supreme Court decided five Miranda1 cases in 2003-2004, making this one of the most active fifteen-month periods for the law of self-incrimination since the controversial case was decided in 1966. In this Article, we consider three of those five cases-Chavez v. Martinez, Missouri v. Seibert and United States v. Patane-along with the blockbuster decision four years ago in Dickerson v. United States. in an attempt to decipher what, if anything, this remarkable level of activity teaches us about the direction of the Court's self-incrimination jurisprudence. In the end, while these cases, like those before them, may not entirely clarify …

Books Received, Journal Editor

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

THE DISCONNECTED By Penn Kimball New York: Columbia University Press, 1972.Pp. 317. $2.95/Paperback

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION (2d ed.). Edited by Robert T. Golembiewski, Frank Gibson & Goeffrey Y. Cornog, Chicago: Rand McNally & Company, 1972. Pp. xxxix, 617.$6.95/Paperback

THE AUSTRIAN-GERMAN ARBITRAL TRIBUNAL By Ignaz Seidl-Hohenveldern Syracuse:Syracuse University Press, 1972. Pp. xi, 261. $15.00.

CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS OF PRISONERS By John W. Palmer Cincinnati: The W.H.Anderson Company, 1973. Pp. xv, 710.

CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS OF THE ACCUSED: PRETRIAL RIGHTS By Joseph G. Cook Rochester: The Lawyer's Co-operative Publishing Company, 1972. Pp. ix, 572. $35.00.

CRIMINAL SENTENCES: LAW WITHOUT ORDER By Marvin E. Frankel New …

How We Should Think About The Constitutional Status Of The Suspected Terrorist Detainees At Guantanamo Bay, Akash R. Desai

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

In the aftermath of the September 11th attacks, the United States has held suspected terrorist detainees captured during the military campaign in Afghanistan indefinitely at the United States military facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Among those currently detained are members of the al-Qaeda terrorist group and the Taliban. Currently the detainees are in the peculiar situation of generally being outside the scope of protections offered by both the international humanitarian law and the Unites States criminal law regimes.

This Note examines the extraterritorial scope of the United States Constitution as it applies to the suspected terrorist detainees at Guantanamo Bay. …

The Brady Bill: Surviving The Tenth Amendment, Amy M. Pepke

Vanderbilt Law Review

In late 1993, Congress passed the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act ("Brady Bill")' as an amendment to the Gun Control Act of 1968. By mid-1994, several suits had been initiated challenging the constitutionality of the Bill. Although the plaintiffs in each case brought several claims, the most viable and controversial challenge centers on the Tenth Amendment. Plaintiffs have argued that certain provisions of the Bill unconstitutionally commandeer state resources by imposing mandatory duties on the chief law enforcement officer ("CLEO") of the place of residence of the prospective gun purchaser. Supreme Court decisions on tenth amendment questions have been ambiguous …

Books Received, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

JAPANESE CRIMINAL JUSTICE

By A. Didrick Castberg

New York, New York: Praeger Publishers, 1990. Pp. 153. $42.95.

THE INTERNATIONALIZATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS

By David P. Forsythe

Lexington, Massachusetts; Lexington Books, 1991. Pp. 209.$34.00.

FEDERAL COURTS AND THE INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS PARADIGM By Kenneth C. Randall

Durham, North Carolina; Duke University Press. 1990. Pp. 295. $45.00.

ROMAN LAW AND COMPARATIVE LAW

By Alan Watson

Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press, 1991. Pp. 328. $50.00

THE U.S. CONSTITUTION AND FOREIGN POLICY

By Victoria Marie Kraft

New York, New York: Greenwood Press, 1990. Pp. 185. $45.00.

Books Received, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Quaderni Di Scienze Criminali: The Penal Protection of Works of Art. Edited by the International Institute of Higher Studies in Criminal Sciences. Siracusa, Italy: The International Institute of Higher Studies in Criminal Sciences, 1983. Pp. 447.

Japanese Business Law and the Legal System. By Elliott J. Hahn. Westport, Connecticut and London, England: Quorum Books, 1984. Pp. vii, 168. $35.00.

The Exchange Rate System: Lessons of the Past and Options for the Future. Edited by Ellas H. Wright. Washington, D.C.: International Monetary Fund, 1984. Pp. vii, 55. $7.50.

The International Maritime Organization. Edited by Samie Mandrabody. London: Croom Helm Ltd., 1984. …

Recent Cases, Journal Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Antitrust Law--Robinson-Patman Act--To Satisfy the "In Commerce" Requirement of Section 2(a) at Least One of the Allegedly Discriminatory Sales in a Secondary-Line Case Must Cross a State Line

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Constitutional Law--Equal Protection--Exclusion of Pregnancy-Related Disabilities from State Salary Compensation Insurance Program Denies Equal Protection to Pregnant Employees

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Criminal Procedure--Grand Juries--Exclusionary Rule in Search and Seizure Cases Does Not Apply to Grand Jury Proceedings

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Securities Regulation-Rule 10b-5--Plaintiffs Who Are Neither Purchasers nor Sellers of Securities May Recover Under Rule 10b-5 if Injured in Their Capacity as Investors as a Direct Consequence of Fraud in Connection with a Securities Transaction …

Recent Developments, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

The institution of criminal charges against critical or disfavored legislators by the King of England was the prime factor prompting the long struggle for parliamentary privilege and, in the context of the American system of separation of powers, is the predominant thrust of the speech or debate clause. If the privilege of legislative immunity is to perform its traditional function of permitting legislators to carry out their legislative functions without fear of prosecution or harrassment from the executive and judicial branches, it should be applied broadly to effectuate its intended purpose of preserving the independence of the legislature and public …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Topics Discussed in Recent Cases:

Administrative Law--Freedom of Information Act--Unclassified Documents Physically Connected with Classified Documents May Not Be Withheld Under the National Security and Foreign Affairs Secrets Exemption

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Antitrust--Treble Damage Class Actions--Privity with Defendant Required To Maintain Suit

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Constitutional Law--Equal Protection-State Probate Code Discriminating in Favor of Males Violates Equal Protection Clause

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Constitutional Law--Federal Preemption--Atomic Energy Act Requires Exclusive Federal Regulation of Radioactive Discharges from Nuclear Power Plants

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Corporations -Shareholder Suits -Shareholder May Inspect Corporate Records Only for Proper Purpose Ger-mane to his Economic Interest As Shareholder, Not Merely To Further his Own Social and …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Bar Admissions-The Character Investigation as an Unconstitutional Scheme to Promote Conformity: Comment on "LSCRRC v. Wadmond"

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Civil Rights--Desegregation--HEW is Required to Make a Program-by-Program Finding of Discrimination in Order to Terminate Federal Funds Under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964

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Constitutional Law--Civil Rights-Section 1985(3) Does Not Reach Private Conspiracies

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Constitutional Law--Criminal Procedure--Sixth Amendment Does Not Require Right to Counsel for In-Custody Suspects at Photographic Identifications

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Constitutional Law--Equal Protection--States May Not Require More Than a Simple Majority to Authorize Local Bond Issues and Tax Levies Through Popular Election

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Constitutional Law--Reapportionment--Multi-Member Districts Which Minimize …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Conflict of Laws--Significant Interest Doctrine Extended to Marital Property Litigation

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Constitutional Law-Search and Seizure--Fourth Amendment Restrictions Apply to Electronic Eavesdropping When Conversations Are Private--Physical Trespass Test Discarded

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Constitutional Law-Section 5(a) (1) (D) Prohibiting Members of Communist-Action Organizations from Employment in Defense Facilities Held Unconstitutional Infringement Upon Freedom of Association

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Criminal Law--Evidence-Unauthorized Juror View Violates Sixth Amendment Right to Confrontation

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Domestic Relations--Intentional False Representation of Pregnancy Grounds for Annulment

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Income Tax--Corporations--Attorneys' and Accountants' Fees Incurred in Sale of Assets Pursuant to a Section 337 Liquidation Are Not Deductible

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Interest--Usury--Charging Debtor with Statutory Maximum Loan Fees …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Antitrust--Labor Law-Exemption of Union from Antitrust Laws Is Lost When It Imposes Minimum Price Levels on a Member-Employer Acting on their own initiative, the plaintiffs, union member'

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Civil Rights--Desegregation--School Authorities Have Afirmative Duty To Integrate School System Negro children in six Louisiana and three Alabama school systems

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Constitutional Law--Citizenship--Stripping Congress of Its Right To Expatriate

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Constitutional Law--State Constitutional Amendment Guaranteeing Discretion to Seller of Real Estate Violates Fourteenth Amendment

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Criminal Law--The "Mere Evidence" Rule Is Expressly Abolished

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antitrust, civil rights, constitutional law, criminal law

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Antitrust-Section 2(b) of the Robinson-Patman Act Permits Seller To Use a Pricing System To Meet the Prices of Competing Goods of Equal Saleability

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Constitutional Law--First Amendment--State Legislature May Not Require Local School Boards To Lend Textbooks to Pupils of Parochial Schools

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Constitutional Law--Imports Shipped Directly to Dealer Under Consignment Contracts With the Importer Are Not Immune to State Taxation Under the Import-Export Clause

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Constitutional Law--Reapportionment--One Man-One Vote Principle Applies to Popularly Elected Local School Boards

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Criminal Law--Admissibility in Evidence of Blood Tests Over Defendant's Objection

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Criminal Law--Resentencing--Court Has Duty To Make Known Reasons for Increased …

Miranda--Some History, Some Observations, And Some Questions, Karl P. Warden

Vanderbilt Law Review

At this writing Miranda v. Arizona' is less than four months old. Although its place in the annals of leading constitutional decisions is assured, its meaning for, and influence upon, the criminal law process in the United States is not at all certain. It will require years of data accumulation and analysis to determine how profound an effect it will have and to evaluate that effect in terms of social impact. It is too soon to know whether the Miranda case has started a new revolution in the administration of criminal justice or has merely ended an old one. Is …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Advertising--Use of "Free," a Deceptive Practice Under the Federal Trade Commission Act

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Anti-Trust Law--Conspiracy To Subvert Competitor's Employees and Customers Violates Section 1 of the Sherman Act

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Conflict of Laws--Depositor's Request That Disposition of Foreign-Owned Funds Deposited In New York Bank Be Governed By New York Law Upheld as a Matter of Public Policy

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Constitutional Law--Applicability of Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 to Wheat Grown On State-Owned Farms

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Corporations--Dissolution of Close Corporation Not Granted On Mere Showing of Low Profits Insufficient To Provide Minority Shareholder With Adequate Return on Invested Capital

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Criminal Law--Illegal Searches and …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Conflict of Laws--Mexican Bilateral Divorce Decree Recognized Even Though Neither Party was a Mexican Domiciliary At Time of Divorce

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Constitutional Law--Section 504 of LMRDA a Bill of Attainder

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Corporations--DeFacto Merger--Dissenters' Rights--Construction of Merger and Amendment Statutes

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Criminal Law--Search and Seizure--Standing Granted for Dyer Act Prosecutions Without Allegation of Possession

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Damages--Restitutionary Relief for Breach of Contract Granted Under the Tucker Act to a Government Contractor

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Federal Employers' Liability Act--Applicability of "In Whole or in Part" Rule of Proximate Cause to Employer's Efforts To Prove Contributory Negligence Plaintiff brought suit under the Federal Employers' Liability Act'

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Justice William 0. Douglas And The Concept Of A "Fair Trial", Helen S. Thomas

Vanderbilt Law Review

This article seeks briefly to demonstrate the ways in which this basic commitment of Justice Douglas bear on particular constitutional issues, particularly with regard to criminal cases. The article treats these issues under five general headings: detention; the right to counsel; bail; the right to trial by jury; and trial procedures. Some overlapping between sections cannot be avoided; but it is hoped that this organization will bring the problems more sharply into focus.

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Antitrust--Consignment Agreements To Fix Retail Prices

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Constitutional Law--Fifth Amendment-Denial of Passport

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Constitutional Law--State Procedure To Determine The Voluntariness of a Confession

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Criminal Law--Statutory Rape-Good Faith, Reasonable Belief That Female Has Reached Age of Consent as a Defense

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Insurance--Validity of Policy Provision Permitting Insured To Choose Forum for Determination, of Disputes Under the Policy

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Labor Law-Closing of Plant Due to Unionization

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Labor Law--National Labor Relations Act--Strike by Minority of Union as Protected Concerted Activity When in Support of Union Position

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Labor Law--National Labor Relations Act--Union's Duty of Fair Representation Not Implicit in Section 7--Discrimination …

Recent Case Comments, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Attorneys--Violation of Canon 27 by Encouraging or Permitting Favorable Publicity

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Constitutional Law--Dismissal of Criminal Charges Because of Deprivation of Right to Effective Counsel by Eavesdropping

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Criminal Law--Credit Card Invoice as a "Security" under National Stolen Property Act

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Criminal Law--Rights of Alleged Parole Violator at Revocation Hearing

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Labor Law--Federal Procedure--Right to Jury Trial under Section 17 of the Fair Labor Standards Act

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Labor Law--Representation. Elections--Provision on Ballot Allowing Vote for "No Representation"

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Labor Law--Unfair Labor Practice--Availability of Injunction Prior to Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies

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Taxation--Federal Estate Tax--Survivor's Annuity as Insurance Under Section 2039 a …

Recent Case Comments, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Conflict of Laws--Full Faith and Credit--Prior Conflicting Divorce Decrees

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Conflict of Laws--Tax Claims of One State Held Not Enforceable in Another State

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Constitutional Law--Discrimination--Statute Prohibiting Racial Discrimination in Renting of Private Apartment Houses Does Not Violate Due Process

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Constitutional Law--Establishment of Religion--Recitation of State Composed Prayer in Public Schools Held Unconstitutional

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Criminal Law--Narcotics-Criminal Prosecution for Addiction Is a Cruel and Unusual Punishment Violating Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments

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Damages--Collateral Source Rule--Value of Medical Services Plaintiff Received as a Gratuity Not Allowed as Special Damages

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Due Process--Taxation of Insurance Premiums Paid to Foreign Insurers on Property …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Automobiles--Owner's Liability Statutes--Application to the Master-Servant Relationship

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Bankruptcy--Discharge--Failure of Creditor to Inform Bankruptcy Court of Bankrupt's Fraud in Procuring Loan

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Bills and Notes--Demand Instruments--Time When Statute of Limitations Begins to Run

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Bills and Notes--Holder in Due Course--Giving a Check in Exchange for Another Negotiable Instrument is not the Giving of Value When the Check Turns Out to be Worthless

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Constitutional Law--Due Process of Law--Use of Perjured Testimony and Suppression of Material Evidence Favorable to Accused in State Criminal Proceedings

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Constitutional Law--Equal Protection of the Laws--Executory Interest Conditioned upon Racial Restriction on Use of Land

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Book Reviews, Edward R. Hayes, Bennett B. Patterson, Elston Roady

Vanderbilt Law Review

Anatomy of a Murder

By Robert Traver

This novel of a killing and its consequences has great dramatic qualities and is outstanding in its description of the lawyer's role in defending one accused of crime. The author, who has written several other books under the name of Robert Traver, qualifies as a legal expert through many years of practice in the Upper Peninsula; he has also recently become a Justice on the Supreme Court of Michigan.

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Groups and the Constitution

By Robert A. Horn

The first chapter in the book, which deals with the growth of the freedom of …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Attorneys--Unauthorized Practice of Law--Negligence per se for Which Liable to Injured Person Other than Client

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Conflict of Laws--Choice of Law--Application of Dramshop Act Where Injury Occurs in Another State

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Constitutional Law--Due Process--Legislative Publication of Intercepted Attorney-Client Communication

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Corporations--Stockholders' Rights--Mandamus to Compel Inspection of Corporate Books at Place Outside Forum State

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Creditors' Rights--Federal Tax Liens--Removal of Lien from Property in Hands of Bonafide Purchaser

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Criminal Law--Perjury--Witness Brought before Grand Jury for Primary Purpose of Extracting Perjured Testimony

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Domestic Relations--Torts--Action by Husband against Wife for Negligently inflicted Personal Injuries

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Evidence--Witnesses--Cross-Examination of Character Witness for Accused …