Digital Commons Network^™

Codifying Capital: Legal Power, Racial Hierarchy, And The Gendered Dynamics Of Law, Tavia Andrew

University Honors Theses

This paper analyzes how law operates as a structuring force within racial capitalism by applying Austin Turk's "law as power" framework. It explores how legal institutions not only reflect but actively reproduce racial and gender hierarchies through their functions. Drawing from foundational work by Cedric Robinson, W.E.B. Du Bois, Angela Harris, Kimberlé Crenshaw, and others, this paper defines racial capitalism as a system in which economic exploitation is inseparable from racial and gender domination. The first section contextualizes the emergence of racial capitalism and its intersection with gender, emphasizing how bodies are commodified and governed through legal regimes. The core …

“Any Black Man Will Do”: A Transparency Framework For Eyewitness Identification In The Facial Recognition Technology Era, Ariam O. Kiflemariam

Washington Journal of Social & Environmental Justice

No abstract provided.

Justice Lewis Powell’S Quiet Luxury: From Bakke To Sffa, Lucille A. Jewel

Washington Journal of Social & Environmental Justice

No abstract provided.

Arts-Based Sustainability: From New York To Malawi, Martha B. Lerski

Publications and Research

Recognizing that libraries serve multiple constituencies and subject areas, this chapter documents and advocates for development of transdisciplinary arts-based research (ABR) and culture-related projects linked to environmental challenges. Libraries contribute collections and spaces, as well as the research of library and information scientists. Libraries are currently among invisible contributors to sustainability planning and services. The chapter will link this invisibility to the value of what visual arts refer to as negative space elements in subjects ranging from traditional ecological knowledge to environmental science. Library collections, projects, and research contribute to education for sustainable development (ESD) as required to achieve the …

Humans In Nature: Creating Our New Reality Through Ecological, Cultural, Global, Ethical, And Legal Reform, John Head

UMKC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Looking For The Public In Public Law, Nikhil Menezes, David E. Pozen

University of Chicago Law Review

The “public” is everywhere and nowhere in contemporary public law. Everywhere, in that the term is constantly invoked to justify and explain existing arrangements. Nowhere, in that serious attempts to identify a relevant public and elicit its input are few and far between. Scholars and officials depict the U.S. public as playing myriad roles in governance—checking, guiding, approving, repudiating—without offering an account of how public preferences are formed or how they exercise influence on questions of interest.

This Article seeks to identify and call attention to the foundational dilemmas underlying this disconnect, to clarify their normative contours and intellectual history, …

In Place Of Prison, Grace Y. Li

UC Law Journal

A new, previously unstudied institution is addressing felonies, including violent felonies of the highest levels, without imposing incarceration as the sanction. Attempts to abolish prisons, or at least reduce racialized mass incarceration, must consider how to respond to serious and violent crimes. This Article offers an analysis of a real-world, ongoing experiment in doing so.

The Manhattan Felony Alternative-to-Incarceration Court (“ATI Court”) is the first and, thus far, the only court in the country that systematically offers defendants of any demographic and any charge the opportunity to be diverted from the traditional criminal legal system and to avoid prison. Defendants …

Two Terribles: A Day Without Space And Ai Enabled Synthetic Biological Weapons A Warning Order, James E. Baker

Chicago Journal of International Law

A day without space, a term used to describe the loss or destruction of America’s space assets, and the potential generation of novel biological threats using AI and synthetic biology present catastrophic and potentially existential threats to U.S. security in a way that nuclear weapons did before and continue to do so today. Yet they have not received the level of attention from national security lawyers or commentators they warrant. This article describes the threats. It describes the current and inchoate nature of the law to address these threats. And it makes initial recommendations to policymakers and lawyers about how …

Trademarking Terroir: Geographical Indications As A Form Of Cultural Property In The U.S.-Eu Trade War, Sara Evans

Chicago Journal of International Law

Geographical indications (GIs) designating wines, spirits, and agricultural products have been the subject of a trade war between the U.S. and EU for several decades. The American legal regime often denies European producers exclusive rights to use GIs in the American market because U.S. authorities consider many European terms generic. As a result, EU regulators are reluctant to protect American designations of origin in the European market. Little progress has been made toward reaching a consensus about which terms should be protected and how they should be protected in transatlantic trade.

Economics has been the dominant lens through which the …

"A Man’S Home Is His Castle"? Intimate Partner Violence, Firearm Surrender, And Home Searches Under Article I, Section 7 Of The Washington Constitution, Dana Raigrodski

Washington Law Review

Intimate partner violence (IPV) remains a vexing problem in Washington. Firearms make intimate partner violence much more dangerous and, frequently, deadly. To protect victims of IPV and to reduce its severity when guns are present, the State of Washington put in place a comprehensive statutory scheme to disarm perpetrators of IPV. In 2022, however, the Washington Court of Appeals for Division II held, in State v. Flannery, that the statutory firearm surrender scheme violates article I, section 7 of the Washington Constitution, which prohibits disturbing a person’s private affairs or invading their home without authority of law. This Article …

Climate Resilience: A Typology, Shi-Ling Hsu

UMKC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Are Markets Better Than Law In Achieving Sustainability And Water Security In The Face Of Climate Disruption?, Joseph W. Dellapenna

UMKC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Unpacking Open Source Bio, Jorge L. Contreras

Indiana Law Journal

For at least a quarter of a century, life science researchers around the world have undertaken initiatives loosely based on principles, goals, and institutional structures derived from the open source software (OSS) movement—approaches that I term “open source bio.” Yet open source bio lacks a clear definition and set of guiding principles. Given public calls for greater openness in life science research, it is useful to understand how open source bio projects have fared over the past quarter century: how they were structured, what they hoped to achieve, and, as social and policy experiments, whether or not they were successful. …

Discord And The Pentagon's Watchdog: Countering Extremism In The U.S. Military, Amy Gaudion

Indiana Law Journal

In his 2022 book, Ward Farnsworth crafts a metaphor from the lead-pipe theory for the fall of Rome to consider how rage and misinformation traveling through today’s technology-enabled pipes are poisoning our civic engagement and threatening our governmental structures: “We have built networks for the delivery of information––the internet, and especially social media. These networks too, are a marvel. But they also carry a kind of poison with them. The mind fed from those sources learns to subsist happily on quick reactions, easy certainties, one-liners, and rage.”1 This Article carries the metaphor into a new context and considers what should …

All-American Crime: Reflections On Welcome The Wretched By César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández, Kit Johnson

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

In his 2024 book, Welcome the Wretched, Professor César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández questions why it is that non-citizens who have committed crimes are slated for removal from this country. After all, he notes, “Migrants don’t bring crime here. It’s already here. It always has been and always will be.”

We may not readily admit it, but crime in the United States is truly All-American. Section I of this Essay tries to shed light on the widespread nature of criminality in the United States by recounting my own crimes and those of family and friends, with the goal of pushing the …

Self-Determination Beyond The Nation-State, Ash U. Bali, Omar M. Dajani

University of the Pacific Law Review

No abstract provided.

Leadership And Antiracism In Legal Education, Danielle M. Conway

University of the Pacific Law Review

No abstract provided.

Dark Patterns As Disloyal Design, Johanna Gunawan, Woodrow Hartzog, Neil Richards, David Choffnes, Christo Wilson

Indiana Law Journal

Lawmakers have started to regulate “dark patterns,” understood to be design practices meant to influence technology users’ decisions through manipulative or deceptive means. Most agree that dark patterns are undesirable, but open questions remain as to which design choices should be subjected to scrutiny, much less the best way to regulate them.

In this Article, we propose adapting the concept of dark patterns to better fit legal frameworks. Critics allege that the legal conceptualizations of dark patterns are overbroad, impractical, and counterproductive. We argue that law and policy conceptualizations of dark patterns suffer from three deficiencies: First, dark patterns lack …

Design Patent Law's Three Little Words, Mark D. Janis

Indiana Law Journal

U.S. design patent law protects the visual characteristics of articles of manufacture. For many years, major manufacturers of athletic footwear have protected their visually iconic designs with design patents, fueling a global market valued at nearly $100 billion. Today, however, shoe design has arrived in the digital universe. Digital sneakers such as Gucci’s Virtual 25 and Nike’s “Our Force Ones” can be “worn” only in virtual worlds but have substantial real world economic value. Yet U.S. design patent law makes it difficult—some would say impossible—to protect those designs, on the ground that they do not satisfy the statutory requirement for …

Roll For Lawsuit: Are Actual-Play Series Copyright Ingringers?, Mark Mehochko J.D. Candidate

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

Dungeons and Dragons is a highly popular Tabletop Role-Playing Game designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson in 1973. The game’s emphasis on narrative storytelling makes it an interesting subject for copyright analysis. When a group plays Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) for an audience, using copyrighted materials from Dungeons and Dragons’s publisher, Wizards of the Coast, there is an open question about whether the players infringe on Wizards of the Coast’s exclusive rights under § 106 of the Copyright Act of 1976. This issue is further complicated by Wizards of the Coast’s unique approach to licensing.

This Note examines how …

Legal Personhood For Artwork, Sergio Alberto Gramitto Ricci

UC Law Journal

Artwork is unique and irreplaceable. It is signifier and signified. The signified of a work of art is its coherent purpose. But the signified of a work of art can be altered when not protected. The ramifications of unduly altering the signified of a work of art are consequential for both living and future generations. While the law provides protection to artists and art owners, it fails to grant rights to works of art themselves. The current legal paradigm, designed around the interest of owners and artists, also falls short of protecting Indigenous art aimed at conserving traditions and cultural …

The Law Of Killing For Biodiversity, David Takacs

UC Law Journal

In the United States, Australia, New Zealand, and elsewhere, people kill sentient creatures—by the millions every year—in the crusade to conserve biodiversity.

I explain how laws permit, and in some instances require, killing to save nonhuman species and to keep ecosystems functioning. In Australia, the nation with the worst record of mammalian extinctions, the government has tagged various invaders as “Key Threatening Processes.” In 2023, it laid out elaborate plans to rid the nation of as many feral cats as poison and hunters could kill. Similarly, “Predator Free New Zealand 2050” is the New Zealand government’s elaborate plan to trap …

You Are Your Child’S Keeper: People V. Crumbley Opens The Door To Parental Criminal Liability, Abigail C. Letts

Mercer Law Review

In the spring of 2024, James and Jennifer Crumbley, parents to Michigan school shooter Ethan Crumbley, were convicted of involuntary manslaughter after their son shot and killed four Oxford High School classmates. This decision marks the first time in the history of the United States that the parents of a school shooter have been charged criminally for contributing to the death of the shooting victims, and comes in the midst of an era where our nation is wracked by gun violence.

In the quarter century since the 1999 Columbine High School shooting, a generation of children have lived under the …

Sustainability-Competent Lawyering In The International Context, Amy L. Edwards, John C. Dernbach

UMKC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Arctic Law: Even More Sustainable? Roles Of The Us And Eu, Joseph F.C. Dimento, Jessica L. Pierucci

UMKC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Policing In The Age Of Criminal Records, Eisha Jain

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Ai For Good: Expanding Legal Services For Immigrants, Huyen Pham, Bryan Garcia

Faculty Scholarship

In this Essay, we explore the possibilities for putting AI technology in the hands of clients themselves, considering the advantages and disadvantages. Thinking about the specific context of immigration law, we could envision apps that help individuals to prepare for interviews for affirmative asylum, visas, or naturalization; to educate them about their rights in ways that are more specific, timely, and convenient than current know-your-rights formats; or, in a more attorney-adjacent interaction, using an app to conduct the initial intake interview and organize that information, making the usual time-consuming intake process more efficient and effective. We are not envisioning apps …

Looking For The Public In Public Law, Nikhil Menezes, David E. Pozen

Faculty Scholarship

The “public” is everywhere and nowhere in contemporary public law. Everywhere, in that the term is constantly invoked to justify and explain existing arrangements. Nowhere, in that serious attempts to identify a relevant public and elicit its input are few and far between. Scholars and officials depict the U.S. public as playing myriad roles in governance — checking, guiding, approving, repudiating—without offering an account of how public preferences are formed or how they exercise influence on questions of interest.

This Article seeks to identify and call attention to the foundational dilemmas underlying this disconnect, to clarify their normative contours and …

Crip Time, Castoriadis, And Transcending The Duty To Accommodate In The Workplace, Ravi Malhotra, Jacqueline Moizer

Dalhousie Law Journal

Disabled people often experience time in a manner that is distinct from able-bodied individuals. Disabled people may have shorter careers, have difficulty maintaining full-time employment, and may be forced to work part-time due to the impact of their impairments. Many disabled people face considerable barriers every day in accessing services to participate fully in the workplace, including accessible transportation and attendant services. These underfunded services are often late if delivered at all, wreaking havoc on the ability of workers with disabilities to plan their day and make firm commitments. Yet disability scholars have attempted to reclaim this experience as one …

Federal Income Taxation, Andrew Todd

Mercer Law Review

In 2024, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit issued only one published opinion, Green Rock LLC v. Internal Revenue Service, and a handful of unpublished opinions involving U.S. federal income tax issues. Green Rock presented an issue of first impression in the Eleventh Circuit: the validity of an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Notice that designated transactions as “listed transactions” without following the notice and comment rulemaking procedures prescribed by the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). This Article surveys that opinion.