Judges Commons^™

Corpus Linguistics: Misfire Or More Ammo For The Ordinary - Meaning Canon?, John D. Ramer

Michigan Law Review

Scholars and judges have heralded corpus linguistics—the study of language through collections of spoken or written texts—as a novel tool for statutory interpretation that will help provide an answer in the occasionally ambiguous search for “ordinary meaning” using dictionaries. In the spring of 2016, the Michigan Supreme Court became the first to use corpus linguistics in a majority opinion. The dissent also used it, however, and the two opinions reached different conclusions. In the first true test for corpus linguistics, the answer seemed to be just as ambiguous as before.

This result calls into question the utility of corpus linguistics. …

Amendment Creep, Jonathan L. Marshfield

Michigan Law Review

To most lawyers and judges, constitutional amendment rules are nothing more than the technical guidelines for changing a constitution’s text. But amendment rules contain a great deal of substance that can be relevant to deciding myriad constitutional issues. Indeed, judges have explicitly drawn on amendment rules when deciding issues as far afield as immigration, criminal procedure, free speech, and education policy. The Supreme Court, for example, has reasoned that, because Article V of the U.S. Constitution places no substantive limitations on formal amendment, the First Amendment must protect even the most revolutionary political viewpoints. At the state level, courts have …

Terry Firma: Background Democracy And Constitutional Foundations, Frank I. Michelman

Michigan Law Review

Ages ago, I had the excellent luck to fall into a collaboration with Terrance Sandalow to produce a casebook now long forgotten. There could have been no more bracing or beneficial learning experience for a fledgling legal scholar (meaning me). What brought us together indeed was luck from my standpoint, but it was enterprise, too - the brokerage of an alert West Publishing Company editor picking up on a casual remark of mine as he made one of his regular sweeps through Harvard Law School. A novice law professor, I mentioned to him how much I admired a new essay …

Electing Justice, Sol Wachtler

Michigan Law Review

A Review of In Pursuit of Justice: Reflections of a State Supreme Court Justice by Joseph R. Grodin

Safeguarding The Litigant's Constitutional Right To A Fair And Impartial Forum: A Due Process Approach To Improprieties Arising From Judicial Campaign Contributions From Lawyers, Mark Andrew Grannis

Michigan Law Review

This Note will argue that the improprieties arising from some campaign contributions are so egregious that they offend the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment. Consequently, states must either reform judicial campaigns to eliminate such improprieties, or, through mandatory judicial recusal or disqualification, respect the absolute constitutional right to an impartial forum. Part I of this Note will examine the history of disqualification at common law and in American practice, focusing on the extent to which it has been held to be a requirement of due process. Part II will argue that under the applicable due process standards, a …

Congressional Repair Of The Erie Derailment, Leonard V. Quigley

Michigan Law Review

It is the thesis of this article that such legislative review and repair is required today on the part of the federal legislature in regard to the diversity jurisdiction of the federal courts. Such reconsideration is particularly appropriate where, as in the analogous commerce clause area, the subject matter has been committed specifically to the Congress by the Constitution.

Eminent Domain - Procedure - Relation Of Judge And Jury In Michigan Condemnation Proceedings, John H. Jackson S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

The relationship of judge to jury in Michigan condemnation proceedings presents in many ways a merger of some of the problems and questions contained in the relationship of judge to jury in civil trials, and of court to tribunal in administrative law. Theorists as well as the practicing lawyer in Michigan and some other states" may well find in the development of the Michigan condemnation proceeding an interesting example of the growth of a procedure for adjudication, in a context of cross-fire between legislative ideas and judicial interpretation of a constitutional provision.

Judges-De Facto Judges, J. R. Swenson S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

In 1947, the Arkansas legislature created an additional division in the First Chancery Circuit and provided that the office be filled until the next general election by Ruth F. Hale, the then Master of Chancery in that circuit. In Arkansas, divorce is an equitable proceeding, and from the date of her appointment, Chancellor Hale had granted an estimated 1,750 divorces. Defendant appealed a divorce decree granted by Chancellor Hale alleging it to be void. Held, decree vacated. Three judges dissented. Howell v. Howell, (Ark. 1948) 208 S.W. (2d) 22.

Unreported Michigan Supreme Court Opinions, 1836-1843, Clark F. Norton

Michigan Law Review

It is a commonly known fact that, although Michigan was admitted to the Union in 1837 (many of her citizens had claimed statehood for more than a year prior to her formal admission), few opinions of the state supreme court written before 1843 have ever been published. Why a period of almost ten years should have elapsed before the first volume of state reports was issued in 1846 ( with the exception of two volumes of chancery reports), or why the early reporters seem, from a casual examination, to have neglected decisions of the court before 1843, or what happened …

Book Reviews

Michigan Law Review

Six brief book reviews of various law topics.

Judicial System Of Michigan Under Governor And Judges, W L. Jenks

Michigan Law Review

When the Territory of Michigan came into existence July i, 1805, it found a system of jurisprudence in operation which had been adopted by the Governor and Judges of the Northwest Territory from the laws of Pennsylvania, due no doubt, to the fact that Gov. Arthur St. Clair had lived some years in that State, had been a member of its Board of Censors, a magistrate, and was familiar with its judicial system which provided a-Court of General Quarter Sessions of the Peace in each county composed of Justices of the Peace, a Court of Common Pleas in each County, …

The Recall And The Political Responsibility Of Judges, W. F. Dodd

Michigan Law Review

The movement for the recall of State officers is one which has became important only within the past three or four years. The first application of the recall as a modem institution in the United States appears to have been in Los Angeles in 19o3, where the institution was adopted in the amendment of the charter framed by that city. From Los Angeles the recall as applicable only to municipal officers spread to other California cities, and has now been rather widely adopted in other States. The first State constitutional amendment with respect to the recall, that of California in …