Digital Commons Network^™

Questioning Judicial Candidates: What Can Merit Selectors Ask?, Peter G. Fish

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Constitution Goes To Harvard, Henry Paul Monaghan

Faculty Scholarship

Doctrinal disorder haunts a generation of Supreme Court decisions construing and applying the strands of the fourteenth amendment. But in a confusion contest between the Court and academic writers on constitutional law, picking a winner would be no simple task. Those of us in the academy, despite our comparatively ample time for reflection, have long resisted discussion of fundamental issues.

Professors Tribe and Michelman, two of our ablest writers, illustrate my point in their provocative recent essays on National League of Cities v. Usery. Neither purports to erect more adequate scaffolding for the decision's federalism foundation. Rather, each attempts …

The Enduring Significance Of Neutral Principles, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

Almost twenty years have passed since Herbert Wechsler delivered his Oliver Wendell Holmes lecture, Toward Neutral Principles of Constitutional Law. Although no one piece fully conveys the richness and rigor of Professor Wechsler's conception of constitutional law and the role of the judiciary, Neutral Principles sets out starkly, eloquently, and courageously some of his fundamental beliefs about constitutional decisionmaking. Shifts in jurisprudential fashion, as well as marked changes in constitutional doctrine and the composition of the Supreme Court, would make this an apt time to review what is almost certainly the most cited and most controversial discussion of constitutional …

The Ideology Of Advocacy: Procedural Justice And Professional Ethics, William H. Simon

Faculty Scholarship

Conventional morality frowns at the ethics of advocacy. Public opinion disapproves of what it considers the lawyer's most characteristic activities. Popular culture can reconcile itself to him only by pretending that all his clients are virtuous. The lawyer's response takes the form of a dialectic of cynicism and naiveté. On one hand, he sees his more degrading activities as licensed by a fundamental amorality lying beneath conventional morality. On the other hand, he sees his more heartening ones as serving an institutional justice higher than conventional morality. The two moods divide the profession as a whole, and the division can …

The Repressed Issues Of Sentencing: Accountability, Predictability, And Equality In The Era Of The Sentencing Commission, John C. Coffee Jr.

Faculty Scholarship

The existence of disparities in the sentences imposed on equally culpable offenders has long been a subject of jurisprudential concern. The author provides a critique of recent efforts to objectify the sentencing process that rely on a matrix table prescribing guideline sentence lengths on the basis of offense severity and predictions of recidivism. With particular emphasis on the Sentencing Commission authorized by pending federal legislation, he urges the need for political accountability in the body that inevitably makes value judgments in the preparation and administration of such a guideline system. Finally, the author discusses the normative issues that surround the …

Evolution Of The Concept Of The Rights Of The Child In The Western World, D. Kelly Weisberg

Faculty Scholarship

The General Assembly of the United Nations has proclaimed 1979 to be the International Year of the Child. It is also the twentieth anniversary of the United Nations' Declaration of the Rights of the Child. The concept of the rights of the child is of relatively recent origin. This modern notion that a child is entitled to special protection, opportunities and facilities emanates from two historical sources. First, it reflects the culmination of the evolution of the concept of childhood. Second, it springs from the development in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries of the juristic concept of the child as …

Scientific Research With Children: Legal Incapacity And Proxy Consent, Leonard H. Glantz, George J. Annas, Barbara Katz

Faculty Scholarship

Before an investigator can use any person as a subject in biomedical or behavioral research, he must obtain that person's informed consent. This consent must be voluntary, competent, and understanding.¹ There are two questions that arise in regard to experimentation on children. First, is a child legally capable of giving an informed and understanding consent? Second, do parents have the legal capacity to consent to the performance of research on their children? This article will attempt to answer both of these questions.

The Disposition Process Under The Juveniles Justice Standards Project, Stanley Z. Fisher

Faculty Scholarship

The Juvenile Justice Standards Project volumes were publicly discussed for months prior to their publication. Unavoidably, much of the discussion was based upon rumor regarding their contents. In that context, critics charged that the proposed Standards would "destroy the nation's juvenile court system and replace it with a 'junior criminal system' "1 and claimed that the Standards substitute the philosophy of "just deserts" for the traditional rehabilitative goals of juvenile justice.' The news media described the Standards on disposition of delinquents as designed to "fit the penalty to the crime, no matter what the age of the perpetrator. '3 I …

Vietnam Amnesty – Problems Of Justice And Line-Drawing, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

The troublesome issue of pardon for crimes connected with the Vietnam War raises some of the most complex and difficult questions in the philosophy of law. What are the purposes of criminal punishment? Under what conditions is violation of obligations imposed by law morally justified? When, and on what conditions, is it proper to excuse those who have violated the law for conscientious reasons? How much should decisions whether to pardon turn on what offenders "deserve" and how much should they turn on what will be socially acceptable and promote future social harmony? How far should the desirability of dispositions …

Policy, Rights, And Judicial Decision, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

H.L.A. Hart has rightly been recognized as the outstanding contemporary figure in Anglo-American jurisprudence. His deep insight, penetrating analysis, lucid and graceful expression, and wise judgment have illumined every subject to which he has put his hand, and all who are interested in the philosophy of law have been affected by his work. It is a special privilege for me to participate in this issue devoted to publication of his Sibley lecture, because I am one of those who have been fortunate enough to have studied under him. My early efforts were exposed to his searching, but always tactful and …

The Homer Of The Pacific: Melville's Art And The Ambiguities Of Judging Evil, Lee C. Bollinger

Faculty Scholarship

It should not be surprising that Herman. Melville has an important message for students of the legal system, when one reflects for a moment on his biography and the subject matter of his writings. Melville had an intimate exposure to various legal systems ranging from the very crude to the more sophisticated, due in part at least to close personal ties with people who. were themselves connected with the law in one way or another. When Melville was thirteen years old his father declared himself bankrupt, then went mad and died. Melville's cousin had presided over a widely publicized and …

Scientific Reasoning Ability In Adolescence: Theoretical Viewpoints Andeducational Implications. Advancing Education Through Science-Oriented Programs ,Programs., David I. Levine, Marcia C. Linn

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The 1976 Amendments To The Act Governing Collective Bargaining Between Teacher Organizations And Boards Of Education In Connecticut: An Appraisal, Peter Adomeit

Faculty Scholarship

In 1976, the Connecticut General Assembly amended the Teacher Negotiation Act in several significant ways. This Article reviews these amendments.

Hines V. Anchor Motor Freight: Another Step In The Seemingly Inexorable March Toward Converting Federal Judges (And Juries) Into Labor Arbitrators Of Last Resort, Peter Adomeit

Faculty Scholarship

This Article, directed to the courts, and especially to the federal bench, carries this message: you are in danger of converting the federal judiciary into a panel of labor arbitrators. The advance sheets of the federal courts are beginning to read like Labor Arbitration Reports. The kinds of disputes that in the past were resolved by private arbitration are beginning to appear at an increasing rate on the dockets of the federal courts: Did the company have just cause when it discharged the grievants for allegedly falsifying their expense accounts? Did the company violate the agreement with the union when …

Constitutional Limits On Aid To Sectarian Universities, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

Because private colleges and universities have more and more difficulty keeping their heads above water financially, the possibility of government support increasingly is becoming a question of survival. Almost certainly the level of public support for private academic institutions will rise in the future, and any doubts about eligibility for this support are of vital concern for affected universities. The major issue regarding eligibility has been the status of sectarian universities. Given the stringent constitutional limits on government aid to religion, can universities that are connected to churches or are otherwise sectarian receive public assistance?

Beyond The Shut-Eyed Sentry: Toward A Theoretical View Of Corporate Misconduct And An Effective Legal Response, John C. Coffee Jr.

Faculty Scholarship

Like hard cases, festering scandals make bad law. As public perceptions shift so that conduct once tolerated becomes seen as illicit, political pressures develop that can result in hastily improvised responses by the legal system to fill the newly perceived vacuum. This generalization is advanced to question neither the inalienable right of the public to be scandalized, nor the need for corporate reform, but to approach a highly problematic dilemma: hurried, moralistic responses to a perceived evil often prove not only ineffective, but even counterproductive. The serious student of complex organizations may recognize this assertion as a slightly altered variant …

Justice Tobriner: Portrait Of The Judge As An Artist, Joseph R. Grodin

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Supreme Court In Current Literature, Jenni Parrish, Roy Mersky

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Regulation Of Electroconvulsive Therapy, Carol Sanger

Faculty Scholarship

Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is a psychiatric procedure that induces a convulsive seizure in the patient in order to treat severe depression. Recently, courts, legislatures, and the medical profession have paid increasing attention to the regulation of ECT. Their interest has been stimulated by the growing recognition of the rights of mental patients, the developing role of consent in medical transactions, and the results of recent scientific research on the efficacy and consequences of ECT.

Regulation of ECT has generally focused on whether the patient or his representative effectively consented to the treatment. The highly intrusive nature of ECT and the …

Freedom Of The Press And Public Access: Toward A Theory Of Partial Regulation Of The Mass Media, Lee C. Bollinger

Faculty Scholarship

During the past half century there have existed in this country two opposing constitutional traditions regarding the press. On the one hand, the Supreme Court has accorded the print media virtually complete constitutional protection from attempts by government to impose affirmative controls such as access regulation. On the other hand, the Court has held affirmative regulation of the broadcast media to be constitutionally permissible, and has even suggested that it may be constitutionally compelled. In interpreting the first amendment, the Court in one context has insisted on the historical right of the editor to be free from government scrutiny, but …

The Definition Of Disability In Social Security And Supplemental Security Income: Drawing The Bounds Of Social Welfare Estates, Lance Liebman

Faculty Scholarship

Federal aid to the disabled is a vast enterprise; over nine billion dollars are annually paid to five million beneficiaries. In this Article, Professor Liebman points out how the ad hoc nature of social welfare legislation and programming has resulted in a system that produces inconsistent and sometimes inequitable determinations of disability. The present system, he argues, draws significant economic and social distinctions among the disabled, as well as distinctions between the disabled and the unemployed, that have been inadequately explained and justified. By focusing on worker expectations generated by the administration of our disability programs, and on the structural …

Recent Developments In The Law Of Equal Educational Opportunity, Betsy Levin

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

When You Enter The Hospital Check Your Rights At The Door, George J. Annas

Faculty Scholarship

Civil libertarians have little difficulty appreciating the plight of prisoners or mental patients. But tell the average civil libertarian that there are significant and unnecessary restrictions on the individual rights and liberties of patients in general hospitals, and you are likely to encounter a blank stare. There are a number of reasons for this lack of attention to hospitals. One is the general misconception that the problems are minor, or that certain temporary restrictions on individuals are essential if hospitals are to treat sick people properly. An unconscious desire not to perceive ourselves as being at risk may be another …

On Justifying Enforced Requirements: A Reply To Baier, David B. Lyons

Faculty Scholarship

There are limits to the possible subjects of justification. Typically, it concerns human behavior and things that human intervention can affect. Failing special circumstances, it makes no sense to speak of justifying the weather. There may be other limits to the class of possible subjects for justification; for example, it is sometimes said that a thing cannot be justified unless it has been indicted, though it is not clear how this claim should be taken. For there simply may be no point in bothering to justify something that is not suspect in some way, and the relevant condition can generally …

The Future Of Sentencing Reform: Emerging Legal Issues In The Individualization Of Justice, John C. Coffee Jr.

Faculty Scholarship

The dilemma of the American sentencing judge is qualitatively unique. Because our system of criminal justice has embraced to a degree unequaled elsewhere the rehabilitative ideal that punishment should fit not the crime, but the particular criminal, the sentencing judge must labor to fulfill the dual and sometimes conflicting roles of judge and clinician. Entrusted with enormous discretion, he is expected to "individualize" the sentence he imposes to suit the character, social history, and potential for recidivism of the offender before him. Yet, because of the general absence in our Sentencing Reform system of meaningful procedures for the appellate review …

The Victim's Role In Criminal Prosecutions In Ethiopia, Stanley Z. Fisher

Faculty Scholarship

The purpose of this paper is to review developments which have occurred in the victim’s role in criminal prosecutions under Ethiopian law. In contrast to the penal laws of modern Western states, which define a wide range of wrongful conduct as offensive to the state itself, the traditional Ethiopian law of wrongs viewed relatively few offenses thus. For the most part, the state confined itself to legitimating and assisting the victim’s own efforts to obtain redress.

Law And Medicine: Myths And Realities In The Medical School Classroom, George J. Annas

Faculty Scholarship

The goal of legal education in a nutshell is to get the student to "think like a lawyer." The goal of medicolegal courses in medical schools, on the other hand, has often seemed to be to get the medical student to think bad things about lawyers. While the total solution to the legendary distrust between these two professions may not be an understanding of methodology, this article will suggest that one way to increase cooperation between the professions is to teach law in medical schools in a way that emphasizes methods of approaching problems and which seeks to dispel the …

Coupling, Parenting And The Presence Of Others Intimate Relationships In Communal Households, D. Kelly Weisberg, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Dennis Jaffe

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Unbundling Of Higher Education, William K.S. Wang

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Haunting Shadows From The Rubble Of Roe’S Right Of Privacy, Jacqueline Nolan-Haley

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.