Digital Commons Network^™

Streamlining Wildlife Regulation, Robert L. Fischman

Articles by Maurer Faculty

A recent burst of revisions in the bedrock regulations governing projects that may adversely affect wildlife represents a generational shift in policy. Streamlining federal decision -making drove much of this reform. Streamlining offers a path to address climate change without abandoning a longstanding commitment to wildlife conservation. The conservation community recognizes the need to build new infrastructure to reduce the rate of climate change through air emissions. The most urgent priority is decarbonizing the electrical ~rid through renewable energy generation and a better transmission network. Adaptation to the "new abnormal" of climate-driven environmental disruption demands federal approvals for a host …

Facial Recognition Technology And The First Amendment, Joseph A. Tomain

Articles by Maurer Faculty

The growing ubiquity of facial recognition technology (FRT) is a problem. While much has been written on harmful government use of FRT, little has been written regarding harmful private actor use. This Article helps fill a gap in the literature by providing a detailed analysis of the First Amendment interests at stake when private actors use FRT. Specifically, this Article analyzes whether laws that limit the use of publicly available photographs to create faceprints for inclusion in FRT databases violate the First Amendment rights of private actors.

In May 2025, a multidistrict litigation against Clearview AI, an FRT company, offered …

Climate Change And Corporate Law In The United States: Not "Woke" But Eyes Open., Cynthia A. Williams

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Essay discusses the evidence that climate change and nature loss create financially material risks for corporations that must be carefully considered by officers and directors pursuant to their fiduciary duties of loyalty and care. This analysis concludes that under the current state of fiduciary duty law and the known financial risks presented by climate change and nature loss, officers and directors of corporations may breach their fiduciary duties by failing to implement and monitor a robust system to identify and manage each type of industry-specific climate-related and nature related risk. Risk of breach is particularly acute for entity-specific compliance …

Person-Centered Pluralism About Contract Theory, C. Scott Pryor

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

2024 Annual Survey: Recent Developments In Sports Law, Joseph A. Delia, Sydney A. Hardy

Marquette Sports Law Review

No abstract provided.

Seeking Safety And Losing The Self: Affirmative Action Bans And The Whitening Of Mexican American Identity, Bella Bennett

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.

Paternity, Protection, And Pirates: A Queer Theory Analysis Of Intellectual Property Metaphors, Eden Sarid

IP Theory

Intellectual Property and queer theory share a fundamental concern with the interplay between private and public, tangible and intangible, and language and form. Queer theory emphasizes how language impacts the construction of identity and belonging, highlighting that discourse plays a pivotal role in structuring gender, sexuality, and normativity. Intellectual Property is often portrayed as strictly neutral, laser-focused on spurring creativity and innovation. However, is this portrayal reflective of reality? And does this purported neutrality hold up in IP’s rhetoric? By examining two principal IP terminologies through a queer lens – the term “protection” to describe IP legal privilege, and the …

The Mathematics Of Regulatory Fragmentation: Understanding The Multiplicative Costs Of State-Level Platform Requirements, Amanda Reid

IP Theory

The recent wave of state-level social media regulation represents an unprecedented experiment in territorial control of digital platforms. While constitutional questions around state authority remain central to these debates, this article examines a distinct but complementary concern: the mathematical reality of how overlapping technical requirements multiply compliance burdens. These laws aim to protect youth online through technical mandates, yet they create a regulatory patchwork that generates multiplicative rather than additive costs. Following combination theory [N(N-1)/2], each new state regulation creates conflict points with existing requirements.

This article analyzes how this regulatory multiplication affects platform architecture, user experience, and safety outcomes. …

Mandatory Fertilizer Regulations: A Survey Of State And Federal Laws, S. Emily Grams, James Rehwaldt

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

The Environmental Protection Agency describes nutrient pollution as “one of the most widespread and challenging environmental problems faced by our nation.” Despite this acknowledgment, federal and state governments impose little to no mandatory laws to regulate the application of synthetic fertilizers to farmland, the primary source of nutrient pollution. Further, emissions from agriculture play a key role in global emissions; failing to address them could prevent the global attainment of the 1.5 degrees Celsius and 2 degrees Celsius climate change goals. In an attempt to shed light on the issue, this Article describes the significant climatic and environmental impacts of …

Trading Places: The Intersection Of Lgbtq Rights And Zionist Rights Under Federal Civil Rights, Marc A. Greendorfer

Touro Law Review

While antidiscrimination laws have a long history at both the federal and state levels, the scope of coverage for these laws has evolved based on nuanced interpretations of terms that previously had established, static meanings. Many antidiscrimination laws prohibit discrimination on the basis of generic categorizations such as sex, religion or ethnicity but such terms are undergoing a rapid change in the way society understands and uses them. For example, sex, which historically has referred to biological gender at birth, now encompasses gender as well as sexual orientation. This article focuses on a recent Supreme Court decision relating to the …

Enhancing The Uniform Partition Of Heirs Property Act: The Need For Broader Use And Essential Modifications, Donna Arzanipour

Touro Law Review

The Uniform Partition of Heirs Property Act (“UPHPA”) seeks to address complex and inequitable conflicts that arise when partitioning heirs property. This Note explores the legislative history of the UPHPA, along with the legal and societal significance of the UPHPA, which provides mechanisms to prevent forced sales of family-owned property. Through a comparative analysis of states that have adopted their versions of the UPHPA, this Note considers the law’s potential to protect family land, reduce the risk of displacement, and promote longterm economic stability for communities, especially those in rural and minority populations. While recommending that all states should adopt …

Fundamental Alteration Limits On Disability Rights: Spread, Specifications, And The Quality Of Education, Adam M. Samaha

Touro Law Review

Fundamental alteration limits are now remarkably prevalent in disability rights law, even if the underpinnings of those limits are not well understood. This article explores the spread, specification, and normative problematics of those limits on disability accommodation and modification claims, with special attention to claims involving education. Often legal sources are vague regarding the content of fundamental alteration limits, but the article suggests that leading options include preservation of a program’s (1) nature, (2) details, (3) purposes, or (4) quality, including training and competition. Although several of these options seem unproductive, directing attention to quality training and fair competition among …

The Systematic Devaluation Of Legal Scholarship In Criminology And Criminal Justice, Henry F. Fradella

Touro Law Review

Certain bibliometrics have become important indicators of scholarly impact despite their many weaknesses. This Article presents data demonstrating the shortcomings of using citation counts and journal impact factors for law-based scholarship. Moreover, the Article argues that reliance on these flawed metrics is just one example of how scholars in criminology and criminal justice (“CCJ”) systematically devalue legal scholarship.

The Article begins by offering quotations from social scientists that provide insights into the negative ways they view legal scholars and their work. It also quotes from interviews conducted with CCJ scholars who hold a law degree and either earned or are …

America’S Turning Point: Religious & Free Speech Rights Transcend The Authority Public School Districts Think They Possess, Robert L. Coleman

Touro Law Review

What is the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about the First Amendment? I would argue that most people either say “Religion” or “Free Speech.” Arguably two of the most important and humane values inherent in a functioning democratic society are safeguarded by the First Amendment. But are they? Imagine this situation. You and your spouse have a child and send him to the local public school. One day, he comes home and says that his fourth grade teacher instructed the class that each student must refer to classmates by the pronouns of that student’s choice. Your child …

Evaluating Competitive Equality: The Department Of Education’S Regulations And Impact On Title Ix In Women’S Sports, Lola-Marie Pyros

Touro Law Review

Title IX was enacted to guarantee women equal opportunities in athletics by preserving competitive fairness. That objective has been challenged by evolving policies on transgender participation in women’s sports. Proponents of inclusion frame the issue as a matter of civil rights, while opponents emphasize physiological differences between the sexes that remain even after medical transition. Shifting interpretations by the Department of Education, influenced by changes in presidential administrations, have created legal uncertainty, culminating in Tennessee v. Cardona, which rejected an expansive definition of “sex” to include gender identity. This Note argues that maintaining the integrity of women’s athletics requires recognition …

Facial Recognition Technology And The First Amendment, Joseph A. Tomain

Michigan Technology Law Review

The growing ubiquity of facial recognition technology (FRT) is a problem. While much has been written on harmful government use of FRT, little has been written about harmful use by private actors. This Article helps fill that gap in the literature by providing a detailed analysis of the First Amendment interests at stake when private actors use FRT. Specifically, this Article analyzes whether laws that limit the use of publicly available photographs to create “faceprints” for inclusion in FRT databases violate the First Amendment rights of the private actors creating these databases.

In May 2025, a multidistrict litigation against Clearview …

Child Abuse In The Name Of Free Speech: Against Protecting Conversion Therapy As Free Speech, Siobhán Nolan

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Algorithmic Selection Of Iconic Constitutions, Tejas Ramdas, Patrick Chung-Chia Huang, Nuno Garoupa, Martin T. Wells, Yun-Chien Chang, Tom Ginsburg

Public Law and Legal Theory Working Papers

This chapter examines the influence of pre-20th century constitutions using a quantitative approach, comparing expert-selected “iconic” constitutions with those identified algorithmically. In prior work, human experts identified four influential constitutions: the U.S. 1791, France 1791, Spain 1812, and France 1848. Here, we employ a genetic algorithm and Document Term Matrix (DTM) analysis to assess which one or four of 180 pre-1899 constitutions had the greatest textual impact on 581 post-1900 constitutions. Two criteria guide the selection: coverage and originality. Through iterative optimization, the algorithm identifies the most textually influential constitutions, allowing for a direct comparison with expert selections. This chapter …

Legal Practice Practicums: Making A Case For Change: A Way Forward, John O. Sonsteng, Michael Sonsteng, Kenneth Rubenzer

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Scrutinizing Sex, Jessica A. Clarke

University of Chicago Law Review

Critics of the Supreme Court’s equal protection jurisprudence despair that the Court conceives of discrimination as the mere classification of individuals on for- bidden grounds, such as race and sex, rather than systemic patterns of subordination. On the Court’s anticlassification theory, affirmative action, which relies on overt racial or gender classifications, is generally forbidden. Anticlassification rules are insensitive to context: a classification is a classification, no matter how well intentioned it might be, no matter what effects it might have, and no matter if it treats members of various groups in ways that are substantively equal. Whether a classification might …

Visitation As Family Regulation, Laura Matthews-Jolly

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Dead In The Water: A Critique Of The Fourth Circuit’S Major Questions Analysis In North Carolina Coastal Fisheries Reform Group V. Capt. Gaston Llc, Dylan T. Silver

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Customary Corruption, Ani B. Satz, Liza Vertinsky

Faculty Articles

For over a hundred years, it has been well-accepted among tort scholars that physicians—as one of the legally recognized professions— determine their own customary practices. Within tort law, and medical malpractice more specifically, customary practice establishes whether physicians breach or uphold the required standard of care toward their patients. The results of our hand-coded examination of decided cases and statutes show a more complex picture. While some states have endeavored to shift the standard away from professional custom, it continues to play a critical, and in many cases a determinative, role in establishing physician liability in most states.

Using illustrative …

หลักประโยชน์สูงสุดของเด็กตามกฎหมายระหว่างประเทศ: ศึกษากรณีการทดลองทางการแพทย์ในเด็ก, สุภาภรณ์ แสงก่ำ

Chulalongkorn University Theses and Dissertations (Chula ETD)

ความเจริญก้าวหน้าทางการแพทย์นั้นได้พัฒนาอย่างต่อเนื่อง โดยกลไกสำคัญก็คือการทดลอง ทางการแพทย์ ไม่ว่าจะเป็นการทดลองทางด้านการผลิตยารักษาโรค การทดลองเกี่ยวกับขั้นตอนวิธีการรักษา การทดลองเกี่ยวกับการตรวจวินิจฉัยโรค เป็นต้น โดยเฉพาะสถานการณ์ที่มีการแพร่ระบาดของโรคติดเชื้อไวรัสโคโรนา (COVID-19)จะเห็นได้ว่าการทดลองทางการแพทย์เกี่ยวกับวัคซีน ยารักษาโรคและวิธีการรักษา เป็นสิ่งที่สำคัญอย่างยิ่งในการรักษาชีวิตผู้คนมากมายทั่วโลก การทดลองทางการแพทย์ในเด็ก ซึ่งเด็กเป็นผู้มีความสามารถอย่างจำกัด ด้วยเหตุที่สติปัญญาและร่างกายยังเจริญเติบโตไม่เต็มที่ ไม่สามารถปกป้องตัวเองได้อย่างสมบูรณ์ ไม่สามารถทำความเข้าใจในข้อมูลเกี่ยวกับการทดลองที่ได้รับได้อย่างถ่องแท้ จึงจักต้องได้รับความคุ้มครองเป็นพิเศษ และในทางระหว่างประเทศได้รับการคุ้มครองตามอนุสัญญาว่าด้วยสิทธิเด็ก (Convention on the Rights of the Child) ซึ่งมีหลักการที่สำคัญในการให้ความคุ้มครองตามหลักประโยชน์สูงสุดของเด็ก (The Best Interest of the Child) ในมาตรา 3(1) นั้น การทดลองทางการแพทย์ที่ด้วยวัตถุประสงค์ไม่ก่อให้เกิดประโยชน์ต่อผู้ถูกทดลองโดยตรง อีกทั้งเป็นการกระทำที่กระทบต่อร่างกาย มีโอกาสเกิดความเสียหายและผลกระทบต่อสุขภาพร่างกายของผู้เข้าร่วมทดลองโดยตรง เมื่อพิจารณาตามหลักประโยชน์สูงสุดของเด็กแล้ว การทดลอง ทางการแพทย์ในเด็กขัดกับหลักการดังกล่าวหรือไม่ และมีแนวทางในการคุ้มครองเด็กในการทดลองทางการแพทย์อย่างไร เพื่อป้องกันมิให้เกิดการละเมิดสิทธิเด็กตามกฎหมายระหว่างประเทศว่าด้วยสิทธิมนุษยชน

Protect Transgender Kids: What Is “Protection” In Light Of Bans On Gender-Affirming Care?, Patricia B. Barnett

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

This Note examines the growing legal and constitutional conflict surrounding state laws that ban or restrict gender-affirming care for transgender minors. At the heart of the issue lies the clash between state authority and the constitutionally protected rights of parents under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Drawing on medical consensus that affirms the necessity and efficacy of gender-affirming care, the Note argues that these laws not only endanger the well-being of transgender youth but also infringe on parents' fundamental rights to direct their children’s medical treatment. The analysis highlights how some states mischaracterize gender-affirming care as a …

Special Immigrant Juvenile Status And Expanding Relief To Prevent Family Separation, Elaine Ouyang

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

This Note will begin by providing a brief overview of Special Immigrant Juvenile Status and the Congressional intentions behind the creation of this classification and its subsequent amendments, primarily the 2008 TVPRA. It will then delve into the decade after the 2008 TVPRA enactment to explore the overall viability of family unity within the context of the United States’ immigration policy. To do so, this Note will look at cases from 2009–2018 before the Supreme Court of the State of New York and Appellate Division Second Judicial Department involving “one-parent cases,” where a biological parent is granted guardianship as part …

The Interchangeable-Part Structure Of Food And Drug Law, Adam I. Muchmore

FIU Law Review

This Article demonstrates that nested tiers of interchangeable parts serve as the foundation for the regulatory programs administered by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Core interchangeable parts used in FDA-administered programs include product categories, prohibitions on adulteration and misbranding, agency-registration requirements, current good manufacturing practices, product standards, marketing authorization requirements, postmarket requirements, and user fees. In each of these areas, Congress or the FDA has engaged in interchangeable-part lawmaking (IPL). IPL occurs when a government takes a portion of its law in one subject area and uses it as a model for its own law in another subject area. …

Benefits Washing, Samantha Prince

Faculty Scholarly Works

Employee benefits often comprise between 24% and 26% of an employee’s total compensation. As such, it is important that people know what benefits companies actually offer. Unfortunately, instead of being transparent, numerous companies engage in what this author calls “benefits washing.” Benefits washing occurs when companies provide vague or misleading information about their employee benefits in an effort to make their benefits appear better than they are. The practice occurs in three primary ways: detail omission, attention deflection, and deceptive manipulation.

This Essay elaborates on what constitutes benefits washing. It presents numerous examples of America’s largest employers engaging in benefits …

Refundable Tax Credit Design: Cohabitating Parents And Gender Presumptions, Michelle Lyon Drumbl

Scholarly Articles

This Essay is meant to encourage further thinking to improve upon design options for unmarried cohabitating parents. Are there better ways to recognize the needs of unmarried co-parents (whether living together or not) and to provide support for shared parenting? The policy considerations for providing support to unmarried cohabitating parents are different than those for supporting married couples, given that these individuals lack the financial protections of a formal partnership.

One solution is to have a default rule whereby the CTC is awarded to the primary caregiver. Canada’s gender presumption provides a degree of administrative simplicity, but the IRS could …

Bailing Out Biometrics, Chinmayi Sharma, Elijah Gordon

Faculty Scholarship

In 2023, hackers breached 23andMe and extracted the biometric and genealogical data of nearly seven million people. By 2025, that data-originally offered up in the spirit of medical discovery and consumer empowerment-was being auctioned off in bankruptcy court as a corporate asset. The breach exposed more than technical lapses or governance failures. It revealed a structural gap in how the law understands, regulates, and protects biometric identity. Biometric data is intimate, immutable, and implicates human dignity and autonomy. And yet, the legal frameworks most often tasked with protecting it-tort, contract, and even modern privacy statutes-have consistently failed to impose meaningful …