Digital Commons Network^™

The Fair City Production Line: An Examination Of Soap Opera’S Potential Contribution To The Public Sphere, Edward Brennan

Articles

Between December 2000 and February 2001 the Irish soap opera Fair City ran an unprecedented, risky and controversial abortion storyline. This came before a looming referendum on the legality of abortion. Here, Fair City was not just offering entertainment, but provoking debate and discussion on a divisive issue in Irish society. In this case, and many others, it appears that soap opera, by promoting such discussion, may contribute to the formation of public opinion in contemporary civil society. Heretofore, most academic studies have overlooked the possible consequences of soap opera for civil society, public opinion and the democratic process. This …

Power Coupling Between Two Step-Index Multimode Fibers Of Different Numerical Apertures With An Angular Misalignment, Cheng Gao, Gerald Farrell

Articles

Coupling efficiency between two step- index multimode fibers of different numerical aper- tures with an angular misalignment is calculated. The theory is presented using radiometry and geometrical optics. The limit case of the calculation is consistent with a previously published result. The results may be useful for applications such as power launching between two types of fibers with different numerical apertures for example silica fiber and plastic optical fiber(POF) and with an angular misalignment.

Purchasing Consortia And Electronic Markets: A Procurement Direction In Integrated Supply Chain Management, Bernd Huber, Edward Sweeney, Austin Smyth

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In supply chain management literature, there has been little empirical research investigation on purchasing consortium issues focusing on a detailed analysis of information and communication (ICT) based procurement strategies. Based on the exploration of academic literature and two surveys among purchasing organisations as well as e-Marketplaces / procurement service providers (PSPs) in the automotive and electronics industry sectors, the research methodology follows a positivistic approach in order to assess the overall statement: ‘Effective participation in electronic purchasing consortia (EPC) can have the potential to enhance competitive advantage. Implementation therefore requires a clear and detailed understanding of the major process structures …

When We Say UsTm, We Mean It!, A. Michael Froomkin

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No abstract provided.

Taming The Tail That Wags The Dog: Ex Post And Ex Ante Constraints On Informal Adjuciation Administrative Law Discussion Forum, Ronald J. Krotoszynski Jr.

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No abstract provided.

Free Speech And Valuable Speech: Silence, Dante, And The 'Marketplace Of Ideas', James Boyd White

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This Essay is a slightly expanded version of the inaugural Mellinkoff Lecture in Law and Humanities, presented at the UCLA School of Law last April in honor of the memory of Professor David Mellinkoff, the distinguished author of ground-breaking work on the nature of legal language. It addresses four related questions. What is the nature of the kind of speech and expression that realizes most completely the human capacity for finding and expressing meaning? How does our own world of public speech measure up to that standard? How, indeed, does our own talk in the law measure up, especially our …

Of Power And Responsibility: The Political Morality Of Federal Systems, Daniel Halberstam

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In comparative constitutional discourse, Americans are from Mars and Europeans from Venus; we eagerly tell our European counterparts about the U.S. constitutional experience, but rarely do we listen when they talk to us about their own. Whereas Europeans routinely examine U.S. constitutionalism as an illuminating point of comparison or contrast, as Americans, we seem convinced that we have nothing to learn from looking abroad. This Article challenges that assumption. In particular, it argues that American courts and scholars have overlooked an important alternative to the dominant interpretation of the division of powers in the United States by ignoring the theory …

Chevron And Preemption, Nina A. Mendelson

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This Article takes a more functional approach to reconciling preemption doctrine with Chevron when Congress has not expressly delegated preemptive authority to an agency, an approach that considers a variety of concerns, including political accountability, institutional competence, and related concerns. The Article assumes that federalism values, such as ensuring core state regulatory authority and autonomy, are important and can be protected through political processes." It argues that although Congress's "regional structure" might hint at great sensitivity to state concerns, it actually may lead Congress to undervalue some federalism benefits that are more national in nature. Meanwhile, executive agencies generally have …

Degrees Of Freedom: Building Citizenship In The Shadow Of Slavery, Rebecca J. Scott

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By seeing events in the past as part of a dynamically evolving system with a large, but not indefinite, number of degrees of freedom, we can turn our attention to the multiple possibilities for change, and to the ways in which societies that are initially similarly situated may go on to diverge very sharply. Thus it is, I will argue, with societies in the 19th century that faced the challenge of building citizenship on the ruins of slavery.

Mutual Assent Versus Gradual Ascent: The Debate Over The Right To Retract, Omri Ben-Shahar

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I ended Contracts Without Consent: Exploring a New Basis for Contract Liability with a reminder that the analysis was "lacking in rigor and in nuance" and that "[i]t remains for future work to explore the extent to which the approach developed. . . has the horsepower to resolve pragmatically the problems that have proven difficult for current doctrine and to examine whether these solutions advance the various social objectives associated with contract formation." Such "future work" arrived sooner than I expected. I have now had the privilege to read the three commentaries that the University of Pennsylvania Law Review solicited, …

Should Issuers Be On The Hook For Laddering? An Empirical Analysis Of The Ipo Market Manipulation Litigation, Adam C. Pritchard, Stephen J. Choi

Articles

On December 6, 2000, the Wall Street Journal ran a front-page story exposing abuses in the market for initial public offerings (IPOs). The story revealed "tie-in" agreements between investment banks and initial investors seeking to participate in "hot" offerings. Under those agreements, initial investors would commit to buy additional shares of the offering company's stock in secondary market trading in return for allocations of shares in the IPO. As the Wall Street Journal related, those "[c]ommitments to buy in the after-market lock in demand for additional stock at levels above the IPO price. As such, they provide the rocket fuel …

The Confrontation Clause Re-Rooted And Transformed, Richard D. Friedman

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For several centuries, prosecution witnesses in criminal cases have given their testimony under oath, face to face with the accused, and subject to cross-examination at trial. The Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees the procedure, providing that ‘‘[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right . . . to be confronted with the witness against him.’’ In recent decades, however, judicial protection of the right has been lax, because the U.S. Supreme Court has tolerated admission of outof- court statements against the accused, without cross-examination, if the statements are deemed ‘‘reliable’’ or ‘‘trustworthy.’’ …

Adjusting To Crawford: High Court Decision Restores Confrontation Clause Protection, Richard D. Friedman

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In Crawford v. Washington, 124 S. Ct. 1354 (2004), the U.S. Supreme Court radically transformed its doctrine governing the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Craitiord is a very positive development, restoring to its central position one of the basic protections of the common law system of criminal justice. But the decision leaves many open questions, and all lawyers involved in the criminal justice process will have to adjust to the new regime that it creates. This article outlines and summarizes the problems with the law as it stood before Crait/brd. It then explains the theoretical …

Copyright And Information Theory: Toward An Alternative Model Of Authorship, Alan L. Durham

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Both literary scholars and students of copyright law have challenged the romantic model of authorship a model emphasizing individual genius and creation ex nihilo Authorship they argue is actually a collaborative effort Authors assemble their works from the fragments of their cultural environment transforming as much as creating Copyright law however still champions the rights of authors and it requires a coherent theory of what authorship is An alternative to the romantic model of authorship can be found in information theory a branch of mathematics dealing at a very fundamental level with all forms of communication Authorship could be defined …

Restyling The Civil Rules: Clarity Without Change, Edward H. Cooper

Articles

Devoted fans and casual users of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure will feel mixed emotions on contemplating the Style Project that aims to rewrite every rule from Rule 1 to the end. Well they might. The Style Project's purpose is simply stated. The Civil Rules, created in an inspired fit of creativity, have been amended repeatedly over the years. Experience has shown that even inspired initial drafting could not avoid all misadventures and that amendments drafted by successive generations wielding different drafting tools do not always fit well. The present rules can be reworked to say more clearly what …

Postscript: Another Look At Patane And Seibert, The 2004 Miranda 'Poisoned Fruit' Cases, Yale Kamisar

Articles

Some months after I finished writing an article that, inter alia, discussed the lower court opinions in Patane and Seibert (an article that appears elsewhere in this issue of the Journa),1 the Supreme Court handed down its decisions in those cases.2 In Patane, a 5-4 majority held admissible a Glock pistol located as a result of a failure to comply with Miranda. In Seibert, a 5-4 majority agreed with the state court that a "second confession," one obtained after the police had deliberately used a two-stage interrogation technique designed to undermine the Miranda warnings, was inadmissible. 3 In Patane, Justice …

Contracting Under Amended 2-207 (Freedom From Contract Symposium), James J. White

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Amended Section 2-207 of the Uniform Commercial Code1 (the Code) states new contract rules. I call these "contract rules" to avoid the labels of contract formation and contract interpretation. These new rules cure many of the problems presented by current Section 2-2072 and remind courts that the purpose of Section 2-207 is to interpret a contract that has been made, not to see if a contract exists. One is tempted to label current Section 2-207 as a contract formation provision-and to some extent that would be right-but most of this Section's work has been in contract interpretation, not in contract …

Contracts Without Consent: Exploring A New Basis For Contractual Liability, Omri Ben-Shahar

Articles

This Essay explores an alternative to one of the pillars of contract law, that obligations arise only when there is "mutual assent "--when the parties reach consensus over the terms of the transaction. It explores a principle of "no-retraction," under which each party is obligated to terms it manifested and can retract only with some liability. In contrast to the all-or-nothing nature of the mutual assent regime, where preliminary forms of consent are either full-blown contracts or create no obligation, under the no-retraction regime, obligations emerge gradually, as the positions of the negotiating parties draw closer. Further, the no-retraction liability …

'Agreeing To Disagree': Filling Gaps In Deliberately Incomplete Contracts, Omri Ben-Shahar

Articles

Incomplete contracts have always been viewed as raising the following challenge for contract law: does the incompleteness-or, "indefiniteness," as it is usually called-rise to such a level that renders the agreement legally unenforceable? When the indefiniteness concerns important terms, it is presumed that the parties have not reached an agreement to which they intend to be bound. This "fundamental policy" is the upshot of the view that "contracts should be made by the parties, not by the courts."' When, in contrast, the indefiniteness concerns less important terms, courts supplement the agreement with gap fillers and enforce the supplemented contract.

Forward [To Freedom From Contract Symposium], Omri Ben-Shahar

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This Symposium explores freedom from contract. When I was preparing to travel from my home in Ann Arbor to the University of Wisconsin where this Symposium was to be held, my 9-year-old son asked where I was headed. I explained that a bunch of people and I were going to meet and talk about freedom from contract, but the boy seemed unsure what this exchange was going to be about. I tried to translate: "It is about making promises that you don't really have to keep." This sounded surprising to him. He raised an inquisitive brow, and I knew he …

The Immense Rumor, Peter Goodrich

Articles

The article explores the intersection of friendship and law, particularly through the lens of Jacques Derrida's theory, which posits that the concept of friendship is inherently paradoxical and shaped by legal and theological frameworks. Derrida argues that the "immense rumor" of friendship reflects a historical inability to articulate amity publicly, leading to a repression of friendship in the public sphere. This repression is rooted in the humanist tradition, which draws from Graeco-Roman and Judeo-Christian influences, emphasizing the primacy of political or communal bonds over individual friendships. The analysis reveals that legal discourses have imposed prohibitions on the role of friendship, …

The Inevitable Failure Of Nuisance-Based Theories Of The Takings Clause: A Reply To Professor Claeys, Stewart E. Sterk

Articles

Rejecting the proposition (advanced by Professor Eric Claeys) that the Rehnquist Court's conservatives have missed an opportunity to transform takings law, this commentary demonstrates that a nuisance-based theory cannot provide a comprehensive basis for takings clause jurisprudence. The commentary further establishes that no plausible vision of originalism supports a nuisance based theory, and concludes by arguing that judicial scrutiny of state and local land use practices is less deferential than it was at the inception of the Rehnquist Court.

A Law And Social Work Clinical Program For The Elderly And Disabled: Past And Future Challenges, Toby Golick, Janet Lessem

Articles

This Article tells the story of our effort to establish an interdisciplinary law and social work program at Cardozo Bet Tzedek Legal Services (“CBT”), a law clinic at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law. The program is predicated on the belief that law and social work collaboration will benefit clients as well as students. The Article is primarily descriptive—telling what we did, why we did it, why we were disappointed with it, and how we changed the program. The Article also attempts to continue a constructive critique, on the assumption that even if something is not broken, it can be …

The Rehnquist Court And Administrative Law, Michael Herz

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No abstract provided.

Images Of Health Insurance In Popular Film: The Dissolving Critique, Elizabeth Pendo

Articles

Several recent films have villainized the health insurance industry as central elements of their plots. This Article examines three of those films: Critical Care, The Rainmaker, and John Q. It analyzes these films through the context of the consumer backlash against managed care that began in the 1990s and shows how these films reflect the consumer sentiment regarding health insurance companies and the cost controlling strategies they employ. In addition, the Article identifies three key premises about health insurance in the films that, although exaggerated and incomplete, have significant factual support. Ultimately, the author argues that, despite their passionately critical …

Distracting Or Desperately Needed?, Marigold Bethany

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No abstract provided.

Sober Camp 2004 Was Heart Warming, Jeff Rubin

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No abstract provided.

Increased Frequency Of The Mthfr A1298c Mutation In An Irish Population, Cathal Mccarthy, Fergus Ryan, Joseph Vaughan

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No abstract provided.

Flawed Justice: Limitation Of Parental Remedies For The Loss Of Consortium Of Adult Children, William S. Bailey

Articles

This article presents the inherent contradiction between a parent-child relationship that has steadily evolved from the early 20th Century to the present and the multitude of court decisions on damages that remain studiously ignorant of this shift.

Part I of the article will set forth the common law origins of restrictions on recovery for wrongful death within the context of a shifting view of children from economic units to objects of adoration. Part II will examine the devastating impact that the loss of an adult child has on parents both from their perspectives and from now existing research.

In the …

Architectural Registration And It's Diversity Vortex., Shannon Chance

Articles

Architects: take a serious look at your demographics. While other professions are making strides to represent the diversity of America's population, yours lags markedly behind. Most U.S. architecture schools began admitting women and minorities between 1965 and 1972, but many who completed architecture degrees in the interim haven't yet received professional licensure. The ranks of licensed architects remain mainly white and mainly male, which denies society fair representation in shaping the built environment. Consider that African-American females comprise roughly 7% of the U.S. population but less than 0.2% of licensed architects; they've achieved proportionally higher success in law, medicine, and …