Digital Commons Network^™

Educational Policy Committee Meeting – Open Session Book 08/21/2025, Uc Law Sf

2025 Board of Directors Agenda and Materials

No abstract provided.

Embracing The Bot: Japan’S Love Affair With Ai Learning, Dan Rosen

UC Law SF International Law Review

No abstract provided.

Opportunities Lost: The Hidden Cost Of Public Education In Pennsylvania K–12 Schools, Center For Racial And Economic Justice

Center for Racial and Economic Justice

No abstract provided.

Faq: Remote Work Racial Discrimination, Center For Racial And Economic Justice

Center for Racial and Economic Justice

No abstract provided.

“Foreign-Related Rule Of Law” And The Belt And Road Initiative: A Chinese Legal- Economic Synergy, Sungmin Kim

UC Law SF International Law Review

No abstract provided.

Shielding From Culpability: The Responsibility System In Eu’S Asylum And Migration Policy, Bjarne Bachmann

UC Law SF International Law Review

No abstract provided.

Ai Governance In China: A Tale Of Three Digital Empires, Charles C. Wang, Siyi Lin, Xia Wu, Yiman Li

UC Law SF International Law Review

Since 2021, China has strategically expedited artificial intelligence (AI) legislation and refined algorithmic governance to compete with the US and the EU. The rapid growth of algorithm filing cases is a direct result of the “Made in China 2025” Initiative which prioritizes AI development driven by domestic leading tech companies like DeepSeek. As world-class digital powers, China, the US, and the EU diverge in their categorization of AI risks and adoption of regulatory measures. China’s centralized single-agency regulatory infrastructure differs from the multi-agency and decentralized governance models in the US and the EU, respectively. China does not impose the same …

The Legal Significance Of Gender Inclusive Language In The North Dakota Constitution, Paul Benjamin Linton

UC Law Constitutional Quarterly

No abstract provided.

To Insure Domestic Tranquility And Provide For The Common Defence: The Preamble’S Concern With Internal And External Threats, Stuart Ford

UC Law Constitutional Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Masthead

UC Law Constitutional Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Editor-In-Chief’S Foreword, Megan Stupi

UC Law Constitutional Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Default Is No Option: The Unconstitutionality Of The Debt Limit Law, Fred A. Slone

UC Law Constitutional Quarterly

This article demonstrates conclusively the unconstitutionality of a widely feared default on the public debt due to the debt limit.

First, we find that Article I of the Constitution granted Congress no power, express or implied, to provide for a default by the United States. Under the principles of constitutional law established by the Supreme Court in Marbury v. Madison (1803), any law outside the powers of Congress is void. Thus, the unconstitutionality of a default may be readily established pursuant to Article I, with additional support from the Tenth Amendment.

Furthermore, we find that the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments …

Reevaluating Fourth Amendment Protections In The Digital Age, Tiffany Benjamin

UC Law Constitutional Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Board Of Directors Quarterly Meeting - Open Session Book 06/12/2025, Uc Law Sf

2025 Board of Directors Agenda and Materials

No abstract provided.

A Post-Dobbs World: More Than One Right To Privacy Under Attack, Sarah Jane Catarozoli

UC Law SF Journal on Gender and Justice

No abstract provided.

Dobbs, State Policies, And Minors’ Interests In An Open Future, Lois A. Weithorn

UC Law SF Journal on Gender and Justice

The United States Supreme Court discarded five decades of established federal constitutional doctrine with its decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. Following Dobbs, legislators in some states rushed to restrict the decisions of pregnant persons. Litigation, executive actions, and voter initiatives, including attempts to amend state constitutions, quickly followed. At the time of this writing, access to abortion is severely restricted in large swaths of the country. Increasing numbers of pregnant persons have sought out-of-state services through telehealth or cross-border travel. Some states have created new forms of criminal or civil liability in an effort to prevent its …

The Income Tax As A Market Correction, Rebecca N. Morrow

UC Law Journal

I confess. As a tax professor, it has long hurt my feelings that economists label tax as a market distortion. My field is summed up as an impurity on the otherwise pristine complexion of the economist’s pure market. I like to think that tax scholars are not so disparaging of economics. We do not view economically motivated action as a distortion to our tax system, but as a component of it. It is tax planning. This Article proposes that tax should be viewed as a component of a market system. Just as tax scholarship acknowledges that an imagined world in …

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 …

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 …

“As Judged By Themselves”: Freedom, Transformative Experiences, Law, And Testimony, L. A. Paul, Cass R. Sunstein

UC Law Journal

One way to evaluate various legal interventions in people’s lives is to ask whether they make choosers better off by their own lights, or “as judged by themselves.” This criterion can be understood to borrow from the liberal political tradition insofar as it makes the judgments of choosers authoritative. If lawyers, judges, and policymakers give ultimate authority to choosers, this might be taken as respecting choosers’ own judgments and promoting their welfare (insofar as people are uniquely situated to know whether choices make them better off). But for certain decisions, the “as judged by themselves” criterion is indeterminate. In these …

Artificial Intelligence & Defamation Law: An Excuse To Do Away With The Infamously Controversial Section 230?, Kathryn Binder

UC Law Journal

With the growing prevalence of artificial intelligence (AI) in various aspects of our lives, it is not surprising that it has become a subject of legal disputes and controversy. In 2023, an individual filed the first defamation lawsuit against AI company, OpenAI, for its ChatGPT service, leaving many to speculate how the court will proceed. This Note assesses the viability of defamation actions against generative AI platforms and their broader effect on defamation law. Particularly, this Note considers how courts may characterize these platforms and how specific characterizations could further the controversy over an already polarizing and hotly debated piece …

Recent And Forthcoming

UC Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Advancement & Communications Committee Meeting - Open Session Book 05/22/2025, Uc Law Sf

2025 Board of Directors Agenda and Materials

No abstract provided.

Educational Policy Committee Meeting – Open Session Book 05/22/2025, Uc Law Sf

2025 Board of Directors Agenda and Materials

No abstract provided.

The Racial Justice Act: A Real Solution Or A Just Step In The Right Direction?, Addison Lyons

UC Law Journal of Race and Economic Justice

The American criminal legal system is built upon racism and inequality. Some effort has been made to critique and correct the impact of those legacies. Although many steps have been taken, racism is far from erased from the legal apparatus. It demands contemporary solutions to contemporary legal dynamics. One of the attempts is the California Racial Justice Act of 2020 (RJA). The RJA has sought to remedy these challenges with a more robust understanding of how racism operates within the criminal legal system. Although the RJA appears to reflect a more nuanced understanding of how race operates, I argue that …

The Inequitable Impacts Of Sea Level Rise: How East Palo Alto Serves As Both A Warning And Beacon Of Hope For Coastal Communities, Justin Capone

UC Law Environmental Journal

As sea level rise and coastal flooding continue to threaten communities globally, the impacts on shoreline residents will not be distributed equally. Projections of physical damage do not account for other environmental and socioeconomic contexts that overlap to disproportionately burden the most vulnerable communities. East Palo Alto, a city that regularly suffers from destructive flooding, is at high monetary and social risk from sea level rise due to a history of racially discriminatory practices that contributed to residents’ current socioeconomic disadvantage. This inequity poses a distinct environmental justice issue, requiring adaptation strategies that place the city’s environmental burden within past …

Rational Judicial Review: Constitutions As Power-Sharing Agreements, Secession, And The Problem Of Dred Scott, John Yoo

UC Law Journal

Scholars have engaged in a sharp argument over whether the judiciary should follow the original understanding in interpreting the Constitution. Recent criticism has argued that originalism fails because it does not advance a substantive moral or political good. This paper responds to this criticism by advancing an instrumental justification for originalism. It argues that a nation may fail to make a constitution because regions with differing policy preferences may not trust each other to obey the agreement after ratification. Constitution-makers can overcome this obstacle by committing to future enforcement of the agreement by an independent judiciary. To maintain the founding …

Ratemaking’S Trilemma And The Case For Time-Based Electricity Rates, Kyle J. Blasinsky

UC Law Environmental Journal

Ratemaking has a trilemma. How should utilities and policymakers balance the competing goals of ratemaking: sufficiency, efficiency, and equity? Sufficiency is principally a legal constraint that creates a revenue floor during ratemakings to address concerns about unconstitutional takings. The latter goals—efficiency and equity—have fewer legal limitations but compel important policy tradeoffs when designing rate structures for electricity consumers. Recently, technological ad-vancements and shifting social priorities have prompted a rebalancing of these seemingly conflicting goals. New technologies have made time-based electricity rates a viable means of demand response in many communities, reducing the need for expensive and polluting peaker plants and …

Hashtags, Handcuffs, And Hush Money: Inequitable Application Of The Fourth Amendment In Electronic Surveillance, Karina Devi Etminani

UC Law Journal of Race and Economic Justice

A wealthy executive buries misconduct behind corporate nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) and encrypted devices. Nearby, police wield geofence warrants to sweep the digital footprints of peaceful protesters demanding racial justice. Both scenarios hinge on the same Fourth Amendment but reveal a coin with two faces. For powerful abusers, privacy protections can conceal assault, intimidation, and corruption. For Black activists, rapidly emerging surveillance tools—including biometric scanners, phone “pings,” and social media mining—intensify a long legacy of racially targeted policing. As Jeannie Suk Gersen notes, two recent social movements– #MeToo and Black Lives Matter–reveal that “too much deference to privacy serves male entitlement, …

The Fda’S Role In Regulating Access To Gender-Affirming Care Medications, Ryan P. Knox

UC Law Journal

Over the last decade, many states have passed laws seeking to restrict or ban certain medications approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA). One of the most recent examples: gender-affirming care medications for transgender youth and young adults. As of January 2025, twenty-six states have passed laws banning or restricting the provision of genderaffirming care to minors. Proponents of these laws challenge the procedures and prescription drugs as “experimental,” while critics of these laws characterize both as best-practice medical care. In either case, these laws demonstrate a second-guessing of the FDA’s long-established authority in determining the safety …