Digital Commons Network^™

Jay Wesley Murphy Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Jay Wesley Murphy Collection is comprised of personal and professional papers, including arbitration case files, audiotapes, notes, transcripts of classroom presentations and discussions, and books.

Law School Composite Photographs Collections, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Law School Composite Photographs Collection consists of copies of class composite photographs from the University of Alabama School of Law.

Pelham J. Merrill Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Pelham J. Merrill Collection includes personal docket books, scrapbooks, photographs, awards, and publications pertaining to Justice Pelham J. Merrill, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Alabama. The docket books span the years 1953-1976, and the scrapbooks span the years 1919-1985.

Thomas W. Christopher Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

This collection includes administrative items regarding UA's School of Law and various personal items and notes from Dean Thomas W. Christopher.

Boycott Lettuce Protest Button, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

A button by the United Farm Workers that includes their symbol, the Black Eagle, for the boycott of non-union lettuce during the Salad Bowl strike of 1970-1971.

H. L. Hall Docket Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

This docket book was owned by Justice of the Peace H.L. Hall and used between 1875 and 1882. In it is recorded cases he oversaw in Cumberland County, North Carolina, which include assault charges and disputes over property, money, and children.

Judge Porter King Ledger, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Judge Porter King Ledger collection contains six sheets from Perry County, Alabama listing costs in criminal cases between February 11th-19th, 1878. The sheets were written by a clerk of the circuit court and signed by Judge Porter King. The amounts on the ledgers represent fees and costs for issuing writs, serving subpoenas, committing prisoners to jail, etc. The named defendants are George Scott, murder; George Cannon, burglary; Henry Massey, concealed weapon; Warren Carter and Sid Weaver, concealed brass knuckles; Jennie Moore, forgery; Edinboro Taylor, grand larceny, and others. Edinboro Taylor is listed in 1904 as a State penitentiary inmate.

Masthead

Saint Louis University Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Artificial Intelligence And The Article 36 Legal Review, Russell Buchan

Saint Louis University Law Journal

This article examines the application of the Article 36 legal review obligation to new weapons, means, or methods of warfare that make use of artificial intelligence. This article assesses: the customary international law status of Article 36; who must conduct legal reviews; what must be reviewed; when a legal review must occur; the legal standards against which reviews must take place; and the conduct and nature of legal reviews. This article argues that, properly interpreted, legal reviews under Article 36 should be seen as a dyadic process that can help inform commanders as to how complex and high-powered technologies such …

Emerging Technologies And Targeting During Armed Conflict, Megan Hofstetter, Eric Talbot Jensen

Saint Louis University Law Journal

Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, cyber capabilities, autonomous weapons, and advanced robotics are reshaping the conduct of hostilities and, in particular, the process of targeting in armed conflict. Drawing on historical analogies of technological adaptation in warfare, this article applies a framework of “waning” and “emerging” factors to analyze the evolving relationship between the law of armed conflict (“LOAC”) and technological innovation. The discussion focuses on three critical dimensions of targeting: the places where conflict occurs, the actors engaged in conflict, and the means and methods employed. As traditional constraints rooted in geography, state-centric conflict, and kinetic weaponry decline …

Harnessing Your Superpower As A Lawyer, Rebecca Frank Dallet

Marquette Law Review

None

Reclaiming The Constitution: "For There Is Always Light, If Only We're Brave Enough To See It", Palma Joy Strand, Gregory J. O'Meara S.J.

Marquette Law Review

As citizens—and as lawyers—we are schooled to view the U.S. Constitution as what—indeed—“constitutes” us as a nation and as a people. As lawyers— and as citizens—we are also schooled to understand that the Constitution is law and that its meaning is to be ascertained through the process of law and by lawyers and judges. This Article builds on a popular constitutionalism frame to describe the profound limitations of restricting constitutional meaning-making to a legal enterprise performed primarily by judges—especially in regard to positive rights written into the Constitution but under-protected in constitutional law. In addition, litigation’s either–or mindset has come …

The First Amendment Right To Privacy, Alex Chemerinsky

Marquette Law Review

The First Amendment is often considered to be in tension with privacy. This

Article is about the contexts in which it is not.

Although freedom of speech can pose challenges for privacy governance,

privacy is a core First Amendment value. Many important First Amendment decisions were motivated more by intuitions about privacy than any other interest. For each primary First Amendment liberty—the rights to speak, listen, associate, and practice religion—the Supreme Court has recognized not only a

substantive liberty but also the right to exercise it privately.

But although expressive privacy is an important First Amendment value, it

remains underrecognized, …

Re-Evaluating Deshany In An Era Of Gun Violence And Government Inaction, Bonnie Carlson

Marquette Law Review

In DeShaney v. Winnebago County Department of Social Services, the Supreme Court held that the State has no constitutional duty to protect individuals from violence committed by private third parties. An exception to this rule exists when the State has a special relationship to the plaintiff immediately preceding the harm. The DeShaney Court sharply proscribed the scope of the special relationship exception, holding that it only applies when the State has a plaintiff in custody. This effectively closes the door on relief for the vast majority of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 plaintiffs.

This Article proposes a new special relationship test …

Back To The Fourth Amendment, Shea Daley Burdette

Marquette Law Review

Does the Fourth Amendment protect against governmental seizures of an individual’s digital property? The answer depends on whether government action constitutes a meaningful interference with digital property. Back to the Fourth Amendment considers the Founders’ intentional choice to use two separate words, search and seizure, to protect against governmental overreach. The Article advances an approach to the seizure analysis that protects against governmental seizures of digital property—by encouraging the Court to look at whether the government access meaningfully interfered with an owner’s right

to exclude, historically recognized as a possessory interest.

The Fourth Amendment was adopted in response to “reviled …

Gerrymandering The Electoral College, Henry S. Noyes

Marquette Law Review

In Rucho v. Common Cause, the Supreme Court held that partisan gerrymandering is a nonjusticiable political question. The Court’s opinion admits that “[e]xcessive partisanship in districting leads to results that reasonably seem unjust.” The injustice is the ability of the majority party to use political gerrymandering to entrench itself as the governing party and to remain so, long after that party falls out of favor.

Although Rucho was an Elections Clause case, it is easily applicable to states’ exercise of their Electors Clause power. Republicans will wield this new, nonjusticiable power (and the concomitant political cover that it provides) …

Arbitrating Justice: The Rise Of Mandatory Clauses, The Evolution Of Case Law, And The Future Of The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau In A Shifting Legal Landscape, Florence Shu-Blankson

Marquette Law Review

Mandatory arbitration clauses have become a common fixture in consumer and employment contracts, requiring individuals to resolve disputes through private arbitration rather than in court. These provisions often preclude class actions and limit appellate rights, raising significant concerns about transparency, fairness, and access to justice. While advocates argue that arbitration offers efficiency and cost savings, critics contend it erodes legal protection and disproportionately favors corporate interests. This Article explores the legal evolution of mandatory arbitration, focusing on key U.S. Supreme Court decisions—including Gilmer v. Interstate/Johnson Lane Corp., AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, and Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis—that have progressively …

Standalone Frisks, Elias Neibart, Bobby Levine

Marquette Law Review

We all think we understand Terry v. Ohio. But we don’t. In fact, for decades, we’ve taken the wrong doctrinal lesson from Terry and its progeny.

Even though Terry discussed the constitutional standards surrounding “stop-and-frisks,” many of us have interpreted Terry as only permitting a “stop-and-then-a-frisk”—that is, a police officer is permitted to stop an individual on the suspicion that he is about to engage in criminal activity, and then, and only then, can that officer frisk the individual if he believes the suspect is armed and dangerous. But that’s not right. The Terry Court never said that. And …

Decoding The Path Of Constitutional Exclusion In Wisconsin Digital Evidence Cases, Amelia Boruch

Marquette Law Review

Criminal cases involving novel digital evidence warrants often raise constitutional and suppression issues. As these constitutional issues become harder to resolve, resolution of the suppression issues becomes easier to predict. Where officers obtain warrants to use cutting-edge investigative techniques in the absence of any legal authority, it is unlikely that evidence obtained pursuant to those warrants will be suppressed under the exclusionary rule. Even if the exclusionary rule were “triggered,” the good faith exception would likely apply to preclude suppression. Either way, the outcome is clear: suppression is unlikely.

Confidence in the outcome of these suppression issues has seemingly taken …

Howell T. Heflin Memorabilia Collection, University Of Alabama School Of Law

Manuscript Collections

The Howell T. Heflin Memorabilia Collection consists of framed and desktop memorabilia from the former Howell T. Seminar Room at the Birmingham-Southern College Library.

Analyzing Best Practices In Reintegration, Education, Restorative Justice, And Reentry, Sergio Grossi

Open Educational Resources

This collaborative assignment in SOC 301 (Penology) requires students to critically examine best practices in reintegration, prison education, rehabilitation, and restorative justice through comparative international case studies, such as APAC, Bastøy Prison, or the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program. Working in groups, students analyze at least five peer-reviewed sources to assess both documented benefits (e.g., reduced recidivism, improved reintegration) and key challenges (e.g., scalability and sustainability). The scaffolded structure—proposal, draft, final paper, and presentation—strengthens research skills, critical thinking, and evidence-based academic communication.

Are Judges Influenced By Dollar Amounts? Evidence From Tax Law, Jonathan Farrar, Thomas Farrar, Harjot Mehmi

Dalhousie Law Journal

We investigate whether idiosyncratic features of numbers in dollar amounts unconsciously bias judges. If so, appellants’ likelihood of success could depend on the dollar amount under dispute. Specifically, we examine the following: whether the first digit in a dollar amount follows the frequency distribution predicted by Benford’s Law, and, accordingly, whether the likelihood of appellants’ success varies with the first digit of their disputed dollar amount; round number bias, which is the psychological tendency to prefer round numbers (ending in 0) over other numbers; and even-odd number bias, which is the psychological tendency to ascribe different characteristics to even numbers …

Af-Xray: Visual Explanation And Resolution Of Ambiguity In Legal Argumentation Frameworks, Yilin Xia, Heng Zheng, Shaun Bowers, Bertram Ludäscher

Computer Science Faculty Scholarship

Argumentation frameworks (AFs) provide formal approaches for legal reasoning, but identifying sources of ambiguity and explaining argument acceptance remains challenging for non-experts. We present AF-XRAY, an open-source toolkit for exploring, analyzing, and visualizing abstract AFs in legal reasoning. AF-XRAY introduces: (i) layered visualizations based on game-theoretic argument length revealing well-founded derivation structures; (ii) classification of attack edges by semantic roles (primary, secondary, blunders); (iii) overlay visualizations of alternative 2-valued solutions on ambiguous 3-valued grounded semantics; and (iv) identification of critical attack sets whose suspension resolves undecided arguments. Through systematic generation of critical attack sets, AF-XRAY transforms ambiguous scenarios into grounded …

Leadership In The Law: Perspectives From The Nyc Law Department's Family Court Division, Jennifer Gilroy Ruiz

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Law And Leadership In Times Of Crisis: The New York City Experience, James E. Johnson

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Managing Through Crisis At The Nyc Law Department: Lessons Learned From The Covid-19 Pandemic, Hon. Asim Rehman

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Asylum Seekers: Reflections On New York City's Response, Hon. Sylvia Hinds-Radix

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Personal Memory Of The New York City Law Department's Response To 9/11, Marjorie Landa

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Neutral By Title, Professional By Practice: Ethics As Our Guiding Compass, Justice Tanya R. Kennedy

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

What Can Court-Appointed Neutrals Learn From Dispute Resolution Ethics?, Kristen M. Blankley

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.