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Full-Text Articles in Law
Theorizing Yes: An Essay On Feminism, Law, And Desire, Katherine M. Franke
Theorizing Yes: An Essay On Feminism, Law, And Desire, Katherine M. Franke
Faculty Scholarship
In this Essay, Professor Franke observes that, unlike feminists from other disciplines, feminist legal theorists have neglected to formulate a positive theory of female sexuality. Instead, discussions of female sexuality have been framed as either a matter of dependency or danger. Professor Franke begins her challenge to this scheme by asking why legal feminism has accepted unquestionably the fact that most women reproduce in their lifetimes. Why have not social forces that incentivize motherhood – a dynamic she terms repronormativity – been exposed to as exacting a feminist critique as have heteronormative forces that normalize heterosexuality? Furthermore, she continues by …
Copyright And Control Over New Technologies Of Dissemination, Jane C. Ginsburg
Copyright And Control Over New Technologies Of Dissemination, Jane C. Ginsburg
Faculty Scholarship
The relationship of copyright to new technologies that exploit copyrighted works is often perceived to pit copyright against progress. Historically, when copyright owners seek to eliminate a new kind of dissemination, and when courts do not deem that dissemination harmful to copyright owners, courts decline to find infringement. However, when owners seek instead to participate in and be paid for the new modes of exploitation, the courts, and Congress, appear more favorable to copyright control over that new market. Today, the courts and Congress regard the unlicensed distribution of works over the Internet as impairing copyright owners' ability to avail …
The Property/Contract Interface, Thomas W. Merrill, Henry E. Smith
The Property/Contract Interface, Thomas W. Merrill, Henry E. Smith
Faculty Scholarship
This Article explores the distinction between in personam contract rights and in rem property rights. It presents a functional explanation for why the legal system utilizes these two modalities of rights, grounded in the pattern of information costs associated with each modality. To test this theory, the Article examines four legal institutions that fall along the property/contract interface – bailments, landlord-tenant law, security interests, and trusts – in order to determine how the legal doctrine varies as the underlying situation shifts from in personam, to in rem, to certain relations intermediate between these poles. With respect to each institution, we …
Frictions As A Constraint On Tax Planning, David M. Schizer
Frictions As A Constraint On Tax Planning, David M. Schizer
Faculty Scholarship
The government often uses narrow tax reforms to target specific planning strategies. Sometimes the targeted transaction is stopped. But in other cases, taxpayers press on, tweaking the deal just enough to sidestep the reform. The difference often lies in transaction costs, financial accounting, and other 'frictions, " which are constraints on tax planning external to the tax law.
This Article contributes a methodology for determining whether frictions will block end runs, and illustrates the effect of frictions by comparing the constructive sale rule of section 1259 with the constructive ownership rule of section 1260. These reforms use the same statutory …
Moral Pluck: Legal Ethics In Popular Culture, William H. Simon
Moral Pluck: Legal Ethics In Popular Culture, William H. Simon
Faculty Scholarship
Favorable portrayals of lawyers in popular culture tend to adopt a distinctive ethical perspective. This perspective departs radically from the premises of the "Conformist Moralism" exemplified by the official ethics of the American bar and the arguments of the proponents of President Clinton's impeachment. While Conformist Moralism is strongly authoritarian and categorical, popular culture exalts a quality that might be called "Moral Pluck " – a combination of resourcefulness and transgression in the service of basic but informal values. This Essay traces the theme of Moral Pluck through three of the most prominent fictional portrayals of lawyers in recent years …
Second Generation Employment Discrimination: A Structural Approach, Susan Sturm
Second Generation Employment Discrimination: A Structural Approach, Susan Sturm
Faculty Scholarship
The judiciary's traditional rule-based approach has been successful in reducing overt discrimination against women and people of color. It has been less effective in addressing more subtle and complex forms of workplace inequity. These second generation forms of bias result from patterns of interaction, informal norms, networking, mentoring, and evaluation. Drawing on the potential of recent Supreme Court decisions, Professor Sturm proposes a structural regulatory solution to this problem of second generation employment discrimination. Her approach links the efforts of courts, workplaces, employees, lawyers, and mediating organizations to construct a regime that encourages employers to engage in effective problem solving. …
Remarks At Memorial Service For Professor Kellis E. Parker, Kendall Thomas
Remarks At Memorial Service For Professor Kellis E. Parker, Kendall Thomas
Faculty Scholarship
Seventeen years ago, I came to New York and Columbia University to begin a career in the legal academy. Seventeen years ago, I met Kellis Parker. The two moments run together in my mind, quite simply because my life in New York and at Columbia are inseparable from my relationship with Kellis Parker. If I had the time, I'd stand here and testify. I'd testify about the man who was my colleague, my mentor, my model, and my big-brother-in-the-law. I'd testify about the Kellis Parker who was my careful and generous critic. If I had time, I'd testify about Kellis, …
William Warren, Lance Liebman
William Warren, Lance Liebman
Faculty Scholarship
Don Rapson, then graduating from Columbia Law School and preferring not to be a foot-soldier in Korea, went to Dean Warren. The Dean said: "Go to General X in the Pentagon, tell him I sent you, and he will hire you as an Army lawyer." Don went to the Pentagon (it was probably easier to stroll in fifty years ago). The General said: "I never heard of Dean Warren." But after a lively talk Don was hired and supplied good professional service to his country.