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Full-Text Articles in Law
Pressing Precaution Beyond The Point Of Cost-Justification, Gregory C. Keating
Pressing Precaution Beyond The Point Of Cost-Justification, Gregory C. Keating
Vanderbilt Law Review
Years ago, Bruce Ackerman contrasted two competing perspectives on law, that of the "ordinary observer" and that of the "scientific policymaker."' The perceptions and discourse of the "ordinary observer," Ackerman explained, start from the common practices and language of laymen. The "scientific policymaker" takes the realization of particular objectives-efficient precaution against risks of accidental injury and death, for example-as her end and uses the law as an instrument toward that end. Clashes between these two perspectives are endemic to our legal culture. Nowhere in the law of accidents is that conflict sharper than in cases where the risks imposed threaten …
What Atkins Could Mean For People With Mental Illness, Christopher Slobogin
What Atkins Could Mean For People With Mental Illness, Christopher Slobogin
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
This article, written for a symposium on Atkins v. Virginia - the Supreme Court decision that prohibited execution of people with mental retardation - argues that people with severe mental illness must now also be protected from imposition of the death penalty. In labeling execution of people with mental retardation cruel and unusual, the Atkins majority stressed that mentally retarded people who kill are less blameworthy and less deterrable than the average murderer, an assertion that can also be made about people with severe mental illness. As it had in previous eighth amendment cases, however, the Court also relied heavily …
Rethinking Legally Relevant Mental Disorder, Christopher Slobogin
Rethinking Legally Relevant Mental Disorder, Christopher Slobogin
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
The law insists on maintaining mental disorder as a predicate for a wide array of legal provisions, in both the criminal justice system and the civil law. Among adults, only a person with a "mental disease or defect" can escape conviction for an intentional, unjustified crime on grounds of cognitive or volitional impairment.' Only people with "mental illness" or "mental disorder" may be subjected to indeterminate preventive commitment based on dangerousness. Under the laws of many states, only people with a mental disorder are prevented from making decisions about treatment, criminal charges, wills, contracts, and a host of other important …