Digital Commons Network^™

Regulating For Birth Justice, Jamille Fields Allsbrook

Lewis & Clark Law Review

Impacted persons have shared accounts of traumatic birthing experiences, and advocates have raised the alarm on the urgent need to advance birth justice. Despite this raised awareness, women and birthing people are still dying and suffering unnecessarily. Even more, systems are still structured to impede birthing choices, particularly those from marginalized communities such as Black and Indigenous women. Notably, over 80% of U.S. maternal deaths are preventable, according to federal government data. Ironically, the same laws and systems that have created, perpetuated, and tolerated birth injustices can be leveraged to move the country towards birth justice. On the national level, …

Catching The Forgotten: Repairing The Safety Net For Cofa Migrants In The United States, Brian Aguilar

Lewis & Clark Law Review

Citizens of the Freely Associated States—the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, and the Republic of Belau—are permitted to live and work in the United States without a visa under the Compacts of Free Association (COFA). Yet, for nearly three decades, COFA migrants were excluded from the federal public benefits safety net. This exclusion, a product of legislative oversight in the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, devastated communities like the Marshallese in Springdale, Arkansas, who endured dangerous working conditions, poverty, and severe health vulnerabilities without access to critical federal benefits programs. While …

Dischargeability Of Student Loan Debt In Bankruptcy Cases, Dean Van Noy

Bankruptcy Research Library

(Excerpt)

Student loan debt represents one of the largest categories of consumer debt in the United States. Currently, statistics show that there is $1.8 trillion in outstanding student-loan debt owed by approximately 42.5 – 45.8 million debtors. This statistic can be attributed to the fact that the cost of higher education has increased significantly. Department of Education data shows that average tuition prices have more than doubled at colleges and universities around the country over the last three decades. As a direct consequence of this continuously increasing cost of tuition, many debtors have struggled to pay back their student-loan debt, …

Corporate Structuring, Ip Holding Companies & Bankruptcy, Ava Sheftick

Bankruptcy Research Library

(Excerpt)

There are various ways in which the founders of a company may structure their business. While a key focus of corporate planning is how to maximize revenue and operate efficiently, minimizing the risk associated with financial distress is an equally important consideration. A corporation’s structure is made during a time of stability, but it must account for the ultimate financial distress—bankruptcy. Asset allocation is a critical step in the planning stage of a business enterprise, especially when considering creditors the company is going to take on. Companies’ intellectual property ("IP") may be highly valuable assets that must be considered …

Howell Thomas Heflin Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Howell Thomas Heflin Collection documents Heflin's years as legal reformer and Alabama State Supreme Court Chief Justice, as well as his tenure as United States Senator through press clippings, scrapbooks, speech files, audiotapes, videotapes, press releases and statements, newsletters and various printed materials, photographs, negatives, campaign materials, and memorabilia.

Frank Minis Johnson, Jr. Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Frank Minis Johnson, Jr. Collection consists of correspondence, scrapbooks, audiotapes, and videotapes from Judge Johnson's career. Johnson served the on United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama, United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.

Kenneth Allison Roberts Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Kenneth Allison Roberts Collection consists of documents, manuscripts, diaries, photographs, and artifacts deposited with the Bounds Law Library by the family of Congressman Roberts.

Corporate Cybersecurity Governance: Director Liability Under Europe’S Nis2 Directive And The Emerging Fiduciary Duty Of Proactive Cybersecurity Oversight, Stacey B. Barrack

American University Business Law Review

This Comment examines the implications of the European Union’s Network and Information Security 2 Directive (“NIS2”) on corporate cybersecurity governance, with a particular focus on the fiduciary duties of directors in multinational corporations operating in the United States. The NIS2 Directive, adopted in 2023 and currently being transposed into national law by EU member states, mandates that boards of directors must directly approve and oversee—and can be liable for—the cybersecurity risk management measures taken by their companies. 

This Comment delves into the intersection of NIS2 with Delaware corporate law and examines how NIS2 influences the fiduciary duty of oversight for …

Can Corporations Be Trusted? Voluntary Compliance And The Limits Of Non-Coercive Business Regulation, Yuval Feldman

American University Business Law Review

This Article extends the voluntary compliance framework developed in Can the Public Be Trusted? The Promise and Perils of Voluntary Compliance, to the corporate context. While recent scholarship has explored when states can rely on non-coercive regulatory approaches with individual citizens, comparatively little attention has been paid to whether these insights translate to business entities. This Article argues that corporations present both greater challenges and greater opportunities for voluntary compliance regimes. On one hand, the instrumental orientation of corporate decision-making, amplified by fiduciary duties and competitive pressures, may systematically undermine the intrinsic motivations that voluntary compliance frameworks depend upon. Drawing …

Preserving Platform Innovation With A Narrow Exception: Section 230(C)(1) Immunity For Algorithmic Recommendations, John "Jack" Di Masi

American University Business Law Review

This Comment examines Section 230(c)(1)’s immunity for online platforms that use machine-learning algorithms to recommend third party content and proposes a narrow exception for truly “bad-actor” cases. It reviews Section 230’s text, as well as its early cases, showing that Congress intended broad protection for editorial functions such as content organization. It then traces how recommendation algorithms evolved and how courts treat algorithmic sorting as a neutral tool. This Comment addresses conflicting interpretations and defends broad immunity for routine curation. This Comment argues that immunity should be stripped only after a balancing test under a three-factor “bad-actor” framework—one that evaluates …

Blame It On The Algorithm (But Sue Them Both): Joint Enterprise And Agency In Ai-Driven Hiring Discrimination, Khushi Palan

American University Business Law Review

The proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI) in hiring processes has created a significant accountability gap in employment discrimination law. While federal statutes like Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act focus on finding liability for traditional employers, they fail to adequately address the unique role of third-party AI vendors whose algorithms often drive discriminatory outcomes. This Comment examines the emerging legal landscape through the lens of Mobley v. Workday, where the District Court for the Northern District of California recognized that AI vendors can function as “agents” of …

Laudato Si' And The Limits Of Law: Reflections On The Vocation To Protect Integral Ecology, Lucia A. Silecchia

Scholarly Articles

In 2015, Pope Francis’s widely anticipated encyclical, Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home, was released. It was a wide-ranging commentary on the state of the world, with much to say to economists, ecologists, farmers, theologians, educators, architects, artists, and pastors. It may, however, have been of particular interest to lawyers eager to see what Pope Francis had to say about law’s particular role. 

On this question, Laudato Si’ painted an inconsistent portrait of law’s suitability to this task. Pope Francis spoke passionately about the need for law at all levels to tackle the complexities of caring for our …

Qui Tam Relators As Article Iv Officials, Chad Squitieri

Scholarly Articles

Since the earliest days of the republic, Congress has empowered private plaintiffs—called qui tam relators—to bring claims in court on behalf of the United States. Today, qui tam litigation accounts for billions of dollars in judgments and settlements each year. But despite qui tam’s modern significance and historical pedigree, its constitutionality has recently been questioned. To wit, several sitting Supreme Court Justices have suggested that qui tam violates the President’s Article II authority because it empowers private relators—who are neither appointed nor supervised by the President—to enforce federal law. Following similar logic, a lower federal court recently ruled a prominent …

Strict Scrutiny And The Viewpoint Continuum, A.G. Harmon

Scholarly Articles

Consider the following instances: A cell phone photograph picturing a man's left kneecap. A statement that the speaker thinks, "The name Josiah is really cool." A woman who runs her bicycle over a business owner in order to gain celebrity and increase attention for her new podcast. An intentional lie told to acquire a job. A student who insists on answering his math exam questions in runic symbols.

At one point or another, American courts have considered the merits found in favor of instances similar to these and other like circumstances as amounting to "viewpoints." As such, they …

Alabama Criminal Code Development Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Alabama Criminal Code Development Collection contains copies of the Criminal Code of Alabama, original drafts and edits, and email correspondence and meeting notes regarding creation.

Dental Professionalism In A Changing World: Challenges & Opportunities, Robert P. Iovino, Dds, Ma Dds, Ma

Journal of the American College of Dentists

This manuscript examines the erosion of traditional dental professionalism amid rising educational costs, declining membership in professional associations, and the growing influence of corporate ownership and private equity in dentistry. Drawing perspectives from economics, sociology, philosophy, law, and ethics, it traces the historical development of professional licensure and its role in safeguarding clinical autonomy, ethical integrity, and public trust. The analysis highlights how deregulation and profit-driven practice models challenge the profession’s social contract. The manuscript argues that preserving strong civic institutions, restrictive licensure standards, and humanities-informed education is essential to sustaining dentistry as a learned profession rather than a commodified …

Dampak Peraturan Daerah Terkait Kesehatan Terhadap Prevalensi Stunting Tingkat Kabupaten/Kota Di Indonesia, Cakra Yudi Putra, Teguh Dartanto

Jurnal Ekonomi dan Pembangunan Indonesia

Stunting remains a major public health challenge in Indonesia with long-term impacts on health, cognition, and productivity. This study examines whether health-related regional regulations (Peraturan Daerah or Perda) reduce stunting prevalence across 338 districts/municipalities in 2007 and 2013. Using Difference-in-Differences (DiD) and DiD with Propensity Score Matching (DiD-PSM) on secondary data from Riskesdas, Statistics Indonesia (BPS), and the Legal Documentation and Information Network (JDIH), we find no statistically significant causal effect of cumulative health Perda on stunting reduction, although OLS shows a negative association. Sanitation significantly reduces stunting in eastern Indonesia. Findings highlight the need for evidence-based, multisectoral, measurable, implementable, …

Inside, Outside, And In Between: Black Homeplace As A Blueprint For Privacy Law, Nina-Simone Edwards

Library Scholarship

This essay reimagines the meaning of home and privacy for Black Americans by interrogating the legal and technological systems that routinely collapse the sanctity of the homeplace. Using the no-knock warrant as a central case study, this essay illustrates how state-sanctioned intrusions transform a space of rest, memory, and self-making into a site of violence. Although Fourth Amendment doctrine purports to guard against unreasonable searches, its prevailing binary framework–distinguishing only between “inside” and “outside” the home–renders Black domestic spaces uniquely vulnerable. Drawing from Critical Race Theory, particularly its social construction thesis, this essay shows how race, law, and technology co-produce …

Timing Whistleblowing, Andrew K. Jennings

Faculty Articles

Whistleblower programs (WBPs) expose hidden corporate wrongdoing. They do so by offering retaliation protection and financial bounties to those who bring original information to law enforcement about unseen, and often complex, misconduct. Under a standard account, whistleblowing serves the public interest by increasing the ex post detection of illegal activity and the ex ante risk of its exposure. That standard view—which centers whistleblowing on detecting wrongdoing—is incomplete, however. To present a fuller view, this Article introduces a complementary model that refocuses whistleblowing as preventing wrongdoing. Working together, these models show that a WBP can do more than enable detection at …

Excluded At The Root: Health Insurance Discrimination Against Hair Loss Conditions, Stacey A. Tovino, Tracy Hresko Pearl

Faculty Articles

No abstract provided.

Marital Status And Human Rights, Jessica Tueller

Faculty Articles

Although human rights law has established a clear prohibition on discrimination based on marital status, this prohibition is vastly underutilized. This Article argues that increased attention to human rights law's prohibition on marital status discrimination, accompanied by clearer, more consistent, and more robust analysis of this phenomenon, is needed to ensure that everyone whether they choose to remain unmarried or to marry, whether they file for divorce or are widowed-continues to have and enjoy the same human rights and fundamental freedoms as any other person throughout their lifetime. This Article specifically recommends a focus on harmful marital status stereotypes that …

Generative Ai And The Purpose Of Legal Scholarship, Michael L. Smith

Faculty Articles

What does generative artificial intelligence mean for the future of legal scholarship? The topic has been the talk of the town around academic watercoolers. Some legal scholars have tried their hand at producing legal scholarship using generative Al. The accompanying commentary is varied, but advocates for the technology suggest that generative Al may become a common tool for legal scholars, leaving those who refuse to adapt at a severe disadvantage.

In this article, I contemplate a world in which legal scholars routinely use generative Al to produce academic writing. I argue that an instrumental view of legal scholarship's value-a view …

Certiorari Transparency, Alexandra L. Klein, Michael L. Smith

Faculty Articles

Amid increasing controversy over the Supreme Court’s amassing of power, rejection of precedent, reliance on the shadow docket, and Justices’ undisclosed acceptance of lavish gifts, legal scholars, commentators, and politicians have called for bold and far-reaching reforms to the Court, including term limits for Justices, stripping the Court of jurisdiction in certain cases, and adding Justices to the Court. This Article proposes a more subtle reform to the Court’s proceedings: the Court should make its certiorari de-terminations, in which it decides which cases to take up and review, public. Currently, the Court exercises near-complete discretion over the cases it decides …

Michael Scott Is Not A Juror: The Limits Of Ai In Simulating Human Judgment, Sean Harrington, Hayley Stillwell

Faculty Articles

Can AI replace human jurors? More specifically, can large language models predict how jurors interpret evidence and reach decisions based on legally salient facts and demographic characteristics? As legal scholars and practitioners increasingly explore AI-generated jury simulations, this Article offers the first empirical test of whether models like GPT-4, Claude, and Gemini can faithfully replicate juror reasoning. The answer, for now, is no. Across a series of mock trial scenarios involving redacted confessions, GPT- 4, Claude, and Gemini repeatedly failed to replicate how real jurors interpret evidence or exercise judgment. Their errors were not random, but systematic. Hidden prompts, built-in …

Meat Is Dead, Melissa D. Mortazavi

Faculty Articles

The legal and cultural landscape surrounding meat in the United States is evolving as plant-based alternatives, GMO farm animals, and cell-cultivated meat move from test tube to table. While global demand for meat rises amid environmental, ethical, and resource challenges, cell-cultivated meat emerges as a scientifically viable alternative, offering identical nutritional value without the drawbacks of conventional livestock production. Despite federal regulatory approval from USDA and FDA, multiple states have enacted unusually restrictive laws—including bans— targeting cell-cultivated meat. These are motivated largely by economic protectionism, but also deeper cultural anxieties tied to tradition and identity. This Article argues that food …

Species Of State Constitutional Lockstepping, Michael L. Smith

Faculty Articles

When interpreting state constitutional provisions, state courts frequently take a "lockstep" approach by adopting the United States Supreme Court's interpretation of analogous federal constitutional provisions. Critics often portray lockstep interpretation as misguided and have identified varieties of lockstepping, including unreflective, reflective, prospective, and methodological lockstep interpretation. This Article contributes to these discussions by identifying several additional forms of lockstep interpretation that have thus far gone undiscussed: lazy, mandatory, atextual, and sticky lockstepping.

Several of these variations highlight distinct failures of state courts to independently interpret state constitutions. This includes lazy lockstepping, where state courts tend to engage in repeated, thoughtless …

What Is Terrorism?, Karl T. Muth, Alice Locatelli

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Is Gotham's Joker a terrorist? What about a school shooter? As we approach the twenty-fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the United States still lacks a monolithic legal definition of 'terrorism,' creating a dangerous 'motive gap' between federal statutes. This Article analyzes the friction between the motive-heavy definition of 'domestic terrorism' in Title 18 (which includes a mens rea aspect) and the conduct-focused definition of 'terrorist activity' in Title 8 (which focuses on overt acts). Using the hijacking of Flight 93 and the Columbine shootings as case studies, we demonstrate how Title 18's political requirement creates a coverage void for …

Not Quite Fit To Fly: A Reflection On Due Process And Agency Rulemaking In The Faa’S Approach To Pilot Certification, Emily Ryter

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Judicial and legislative involvement in agency rulemaking is a relevant and particularly salient topic. The authority of an agency to make sound policy with flexibility and discretion often comes into conflict with the judiciary’s duty to prevent arbitrary regulations, which lack solid evidence or convincing rationale. Considering that more than three million passengers fly every day, it is no surprise that establishing a robust certification process for pilots is among the Federal Aviation Administration’s top priorities. The courts and the Legislature have also recently made notable strides to exert more control over the standards for medical certification. In July, the …

Decluttering The Orbital Commons: A Proposal For The Regulation Of Privately Created Space Debris, Rose W. Cobey

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Space is one of the only resources shared by every person in every country at all times. The problem of space debris is therefore one that affects everyone living on our planet. Scientists and politicians have warned about crowding, collisions, and murky liability for decades, and each of these issues will only worsen without intervention. Space debris has caused damage on Earth since the Space Race, and it now endangers people and property in orbit. We are at an ever-increasing risk of building a wall around our planet and locking ourselves inside. In the last ten years, a new wrinkle …

Void In Space: How Loper Bright And The Major Questions Doctrine Affect The Federal Communications Commission’S Regulatory Authority Of Orbital Debris, Hernan Valles

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Since the dawn of the space race, countries have been reaching for the stars. Recently, companies have joined the race. The space race and technological advancement of near-Earth orbital satellites have caused a buildup of debris in near-Earth orbit. The exponential increase of orbital debris in Earth’s orbit threatens the environmental system of the planet, the safety of astronauts aboard the International Space Station, the structure of other spacecraft, and modern economies relying on operational satellites to provide rapid communication, navigation, and weather forecasting information.

Yet there is a void among U.S. regulators in setting rules that mitigate orbital debris …