Law Commons^™

The Community Relations Service's Work In Preventing And Responding To Unfounded Racially And Religiously Motivated Violence After 9/11, Grande Lum

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

On the morning of September 11, 2001, New York City-based Community Relations Service (“CRS”) Regional Director Reinaldo Rivera was at a New Jersey summit on racial profiling. At 8:46 a.m., an American Airlines 767 crashed into the North Tower of New York City’s World Trade Center. Because Rivera was with the New Jersey state attorney general, he quickly learned of the attack. Rivera immediately called his staff members, who at that moment were traveling to Long Island, New York, for an unrelated case. Getting into Manhattan had already become difficult, so Rivera instructed his conciliators to remain on standby. At …

Mitigating The Legal Risks For Landlords Under The Rental Assistance Demonstration Program, Erica Mahoney

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

Public housing units are deteriorating while there are insufficient allocations for their renovation or maintenance. In 2012, Congress initiated the Rental Assistance Demonstration (“RAD”) in an attempt to save public housing without the need to apportion additional funds to housing assistance pro- grams. The RAD program converts public housing to mixed-income housing and transfers majority ownership to private developers. Current tenants of these public housing complexes are transferred to mixed-income apartment complexes owned by private landlords and developers who receive a portion of the rent from the tenant and additional rent from the local Public Housing Authority. The success of …

Algorithm-Based Recruiting Technology In The Workplace, Spencer Mainka

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

Traditional recruiting methods are inefficient and cost employers valuable time, money, and human resources. Additionally, traditional recruiting is subject to the biases and prejudices of a human recruiter. Machine learning, algorithm-based recruiting technology promises to be an efficient and effective solution to employee recruiting by utilizing 21st century technology to engage, screen, and interview top talent. While the promise of algorithm-based deci- sion-making is attractive to many business owners, the practical legal considerations of its use for an ordinary small-to-medium sized employer have not been discussed. Legal scholarship in the area of algorithm-based employment decision making has primarily focused on …

Guilty Until Proven Innocent: Rethinking Civil Asset Forfeiture And The Innocent Owner Defense, Luis Suarez

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

Law enforcement departments across the country use civil asset forfeiture as a method to fund the work of law enforcement departments under the guise of combatting the “War on Drugs.” Attorney General Jeff Sessions made in- creasing civil asset forfeiture a DOJ priority. If civil asset forfeiture continues to rise to the level that Attorney General Sessions would like to see it, then we will soon find ourselves fighting to keep what is rightfully ours. This Comment will argue that the government should be required to prove that the owner of forfeited property had actual knowledge that the property was …

The Forgotten Property Right: The Unconstitutionality Of The At Home Standard In Assertions Of General Personal Jurisdiction Over Corporations, Peter Kuylen

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

With its move to the “at home” standard in Goodyear, Daimler, and BNSF, the Supreme Court significantly restricted the exercise of general personal jurisdiction over nonresident corporation defendants. This restriction offers questionable actual benefits to corporate defendants, but its rigid focus on defendant’s rights has impacted the ability of certain plaintiffs to bring a cause of action against those defendants. Because the at home standard infringes on this group of plaintiffs’ ability to assert their property right of redress in violation of the Due Process Clauses of the Constitution (Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments), the Court should return to the previous …

Eminent Domain A Decade After Kelo: Are Takings To Build Professional And College Sports Stadiums In Texas A Valid Public Use?, Lauren Trimble

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

This Comment addresses the controversial Kelo v. City of New London decision and focuses on the state of Texas’ response to Kelo through its enactment of section 2206.001 of the Texas Government Code. This Comment discusses the implications of this statute in the realm of professional and college sports stadiums in Texas. Additionally, this Comment provides a background in the evolution of the eminent domain doctrine and prominent Supreme Court decisions expanding an authorized entity’s eminent domain power under a broadened definition of the entity providing a “public use.” The arguments are analyzed for whether Texas college and professional stadiums …

The New "Chain" Of Title: How Blockchain Will Affect Land Title Research, Recordation, And Insurance, Matt Koronczok

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

Blockchain has recently driven a financial revolution in the realm of virtual currencies, smart contracts, and escrow services. Over the last year, the technology has also been mentioned as a harbinger of change in real estate transactions and land title research. Speculation about the technology’s likely impact in various industries is more warranted in some instances than others. Goldman Sachs, for its part, has suggested that, like other industries which have benefitted from the transparency and efficiency of blockchain technology, the title insurance industry will experience a dramatic boost in the near future. This suggestion, however, fails to recognize both …

Courts React: Popularity Of Youtube's Reaction Video Genre Sparks New Discussion On Fair Use Defense, Gretchen L. Casey

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

Over the past few years, the rise in popularity of a genre of You- Tube videos known as “reaction videos” has resulted in controversy for various reasons. The United States District Court in Hosseinzadeh v. Klein, a landmark case for the genre, described the “reaction videos” as “a large genre of YouTube videos . . . [that] vary widely in terms of purpose, structure, and the extent to which they rely on potentially copyrighted material.” According to the Hosseinzadeh opinion, “[s]ome reaction videos. . .intersperse short segments of another’s work with criticism and commentary, while others are more akin to …

Enough To Hang Your Hat On: Regulating Binding Arbitration Of Insurance Disputes In Texas, Timothy Azevedo

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

Texas law is currently silent on the issue of whether insurance companies may sell insurance policies that require policyholders to bring coverage disputes to an arbitrator rather than the courts. As incentives increase for insurance companies to avoid costly litigation and for consumers to cut ever- increasing premiums, this creates a situation where a hasty, ill-considered proposal to allow such policy terms could shake the insurance market and public policy in the state for years to come. Rather than taking a reactive position, the Texas legislature should work with the Department of Insurance and stake- holders to affirmatively decide: (1) …

Executive Order 13563 Creates Access To Affordable Child Support Orders For Incarcerated Parents, Cory Holifield

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

Former President Barack Obama issued Executive Order 13563: Improving Regulation and Regulatory Review in his last month of presidency, prohibit- ing States from treating incarceration as voluntary when considering a par- ent’s request for a modification of his or her child support order. Although fully expected to, President Donald Trump has yet to act on the executive order, which right-wing politicians fought vehemently against for two years. This Comment argues that the President should leave the order in action be- cause it will promote payment of child support and relationships between non- custodial parents and their children, as well as …

Biologics Under A New Nafta: How Tpp Fixed Nafta's Intellectual Property Provisions But Not Its Investment Provisions, Jordan Jensen

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

Scientific developments, such as biologics and personalized medicine, have created an entirely new category of pharmaceutical drugs that were not considered when the North American Free Trade Agreement (“NAFTA”) was adopted in 1994. However, the rise of biologics has increased demand for a reconfigured NAFTA, particularly with respect to Chapter 17, which outlines NAFTA’s robust intellectual property standards, as well as Chapter 11, which both lays out the framework for foreign investment under NAFTA and introduces a controversial mechanism referred to as the investor-state dispute settlement mechanism (“ISDS”). The intellectual property provisions of the original NAFTA should be revised to …

High-Speed Rail: An Opportunity For Texas Eminent Domain Reform, Aaron Mitchell

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

With the Texas Central’s high-speed rail fast approaching in Texas, legislators have been presented with an opportunity to reform Texas’ eminent domain laws. The controversial urban-versus-rural project has brought eminent domain policy to the limelight. The Texas Legislature can capitalize on lessons learned from the State’s bout with the Trans-Pecos Pipeline by protecting condemnees and incentivizing good faith efforts by condemnors.

This Article proposes five possible reforms for eminent domain law in Texas. First, the Texas Legislature should protect condemnees by aligning their appraisal disclosure requirements with condemnors, who have no duties to disclose appraisals. Second, legislative changes would allow …

Bloody Hell: How Insufficient Access To Menstrual Hygiene Products Creates Inhumane Conditions For Incarcerated Women, Lauren Shaw

Texas A&M Law Review

For thousands of incarcerated women in the United States, dealing with menstruation is a nightmare. Across the country, many female prisoners lack sufficient access to feminine hygiene products, which negatively affects their health and rehabilitation. Although the international standards for the care of female prisoners have been raised in attempt to eliminate this issue, these stan- dards are often not followed in the United States. This Comment argues that denial of feminine hygiene products to female prisoners violates human de- cency. Additionally, this Comment considers possible constitutional violations caused by this denial, reviews current efforts to correct this problem, and …

Beyond The Ethical Boundaries Of Solidarity: Increasing Vaccination Rates Through Mandatory Education To Solidarity, Nili Karako- Eyal Dr.

Texas A&M Law Review

Mandatory vaccination laws require children to be vaccinated against certain communicable diseases to attend school. These laws also provide exemptions to school vaccination requirements.1 All states exempt children from vaccination requirements for medical reasons, and most states also provide an exemption for religious and/or other personal reasons.2 Seven states include an educational component in their religious or philosophical exemption process, requiring that parents receive information regarding the benefits of vaccination and the risks of not being vaccinated.3 Of these seven states, five require that information regarding the social benefits of vaccination will be provided to parents.4

This type of legislation …

Strategic Institutional Positioning: How We Have Come To Generate Environmental Law Without Congress, Donald J. Kochan

Texas A&M Law Review

The administrative state has emerged as a pervasive machine that has become the dominate generator of legal rules—despite the fact that the U.S. Constitution commits the legislative power to Congress alone. When examining legislation authorizing administrative agencies to promulgate rules, we are often left asking whether Congress “dele- gates” away its lawmaking authority by giving agencies too much power and discretion to decide what rules should be promulgated and to determine how rich to make their content. If the agencies get broad authority, it is not too hard to understand why they would fulsomely embrace the grant to its fullest. …

Treating Apples Like Oranges: The Benefits Of Exempting Community Banks From The Volcker Rule, Gregory Butz

Texas A&M Law Review

In response to the Financial Crisis of 2008 and the Great Recession that followed, Congress passed the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Con- sumer Protection Act in 2010. The Volcker Rule is a controversial section of the Dodd–Frank Act that prohibits all banks, no matter their size, from pro- prietary trading and entering into certain relationships with private equity funds. But the Volcker Rule forces banks to incur significant costs to ensure compliance. While Big Banks have the capital and infrastructure to comply with the Volcker Rule, small Community Banks often do not. This gives Big Banks an unfair competitive …

Managing Hurricane (And Other Natural Disaster) Risk, Robert Jerry Ii

Texas A&M Law Review

With the data showing that hurricanes are the most likely and serious of all of these disasters, we return to Hurricane Harvey. No one living in Texas—especially in the cities of Houston, Port Arthur, Bridge City, Rockport, Wharton, Conroe, Port Aransas, and Victoria, or more generally in the counties of Harris, Aransas, Nueces, Jefferson, Orange, Victoria, Calhoun, Matagorda, Brazoria, Galveston, Fort Bend, Montgomery, and Wharton—needs to be told that the U.S. needs a better approach to managing hurricane and other natural disaster risk, both in terms of pre-disaster planning and post-disaster recovery. Texans are not alone, as survivors of Hurricanes …

You Gotta Fight For Your Right To Repair: The Digital Millennium Copyright Act’S Effect On Right-To-Repair Legislation, Daniel Moore

Texas A&M Law Review

Consumers are keeping their electronic devices longer today than in the past because the prices of the devices have increased. Increased prices have culminated in more consumers needing their devices repaired. In turn, manufacturers use the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a federal law, and digital rights management to force consumers to get their devices repaired by either the device manufacturer or one of its authorized repairers. In response, states have considered right-to-repair laws which require manufacturers to make repair tools, equipment, and software available to device owners and independent repair shops. While almost half of the country’s state legislatures have …

Honoring Innocent Until Proven Guilty: Switching The Default Rule From Pretrial Detention To Pretrial Release In Texas's Bail System, Stephen Rispoli

Texas A&M Law Review

Texas’s current prison population consists of far more pretrial detainees than convicted criminals. Despite United States and Texas constitutional protections, the default rule in many jurisdictions, including Texas, detains misdemeanor and non-violent felony defendants unless they can post a monetary bond or get a surety to post the bond for them (“bail bond”) to obtain their release. Most pretrial detainees remain detained due not to their alleged dangerousness, but rather because they simply cannot afford to post bail (or get someone to post it for them). As a result, many pretrial detainees find themselves choosing between hamstringing their financial future …

Whose Land Is It Anyway? Navigating Ghana's Complex Land System, Aimee Kline, Élan Moore, Elizabeth Ramey, Kevin Hernandez, Lauren Ehrhardt, Megan Reed, Morgan Parker, Samantha Henson, Taylor Winn, Taylor Wood

Texas A&M Law Review

This Article dives into Ghana’s complex land-registration system, which is influenced by both statutory and customary law. Section II discusses Ghana’s statutory land laws. Section III provides a brief overview of Ghana’s customary land laws. Section IV discusses several obstacles within Ghana’s land-administration system.

Data Exclusivities In The Age Of Big Data, Biologics, And Plurilaterals, Peter K. Yu

Texas A&M Law Review

The past decade has seen many new developments impacting the intellectual property system. The introduction of big data analytics has transformed the fields of biotechnology and bioinformatics while ushering in major advances in drug development, clinical practices, and medical financing. The arrival of biologics and personalized medicines has also revolutionized the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries. In addition, the emergence of bilateral, regional, and plurilateral trade agreements have raised serious, and at times difficult, questions concerning the evolution of domestic and international intellectual property standards.

One topic linking all three developments together concerns the establishment of international standards to protect clinical …

Reefer Madness: The Constitutional Consequence Of The Federal Government's Inconsistent Marijuana Policy, Zachary Ford

Texas A&M Law Review

In the past twenty years, the United States has witnessed over half of its states create marijuana laws that expressly contradict the federal government’s complete ban of the drug. Nine states have completely legalized marijuana for recreational use in the past five years alone. Meanwhile, much of the country remains staunchly opposed to legalization in any form. This difference between state and federal law has the largest negative impact on noncitizens, namely lawful permanent residents whom reside in states that follow the federal government’s complete ban. Congress’s Immigration and Nationality Act broadly defines “conviction,” so even minor drug convictions under …

Building A Better Bar Exam, Marsha Griggs

Texas A&M Law Review

In the wake of declining bar passage numbers and limited placement options for law grads, a new bar exam has emerged: the UBE. Drawn to an allusive promise of portability, thirty-six U.S. jurisdictions have adopted the UBE. I predict that in a few years’ time, the UBE will be administered in all states and U.S. territories. The UBE has snowballed from an idea into the primary gateway for entry into the practice of law. But the UBE is not a panacea that will solve the bar passage problems that U.S. law schools face. Whether or not to adopt a uniform …

Genetic Data Privacy Solutions In The Gdpr, Kristi Harbord

Texas A&M Law Review

The intersection of healthcare and technology is a rapidly growing area. One thriving field at this intersection involves obtaining, processing, and storing genetic data. While the benefits have been great, genetic information can reveal a great deal about individuals and their families. And the information that can be conveyed from genetic data appears limitless and is constantly growing and changing. Many entities have begun storing, processing, and sharing genetic data on a very large scale. This creates many privacy concerns that the current regulatory framework does not account for. The line between patient data and consumer data is blurred; many …

Promoting Equality Through Empirical Desert, Ilya Rudyak

Texas A&M Law Review

According to empirical desert theory, good utilitarian grounds exist for distributing criminal punishment pursuant to the (retributive) intuitions of the lay community on criminal liability. This theory’s insights, based on original empirical research and informed by social science, have significantly influenced contemporary criminal law theory. Yet, ostensibly, the theory is hampered by serious limitations, which may have obstructed its progress and its potential to guide criminal justice reform. Chief among them: it draws from community intuitions, and community intuitions—as the theory acknowledges—are sometimes immoral. In addition to these “immorality objections,” (commonly illustrated by alluding to the antebellum South and Nazi …

Taking Stock Of The Benefit Corporation, Ronald J. Colombo

Texas A&M Law Review

Almost a decade ago, the “benefit corporation” first appeared on American soil. Its supporters proclaimed that this would usher in a new era of corporate social responsibility. Its detractors complained that the benefit corporation would facilitate managerial abuses that corporate law had worked so hard to curb. After nearly ten years of experience with the benefit corporation, who was the more accurate prognosticator? Moreover, has the benefit corporation given rise to developments, whether beneficial or negative, that were not expected or foreseen?

This Article traces the history of the benefit corporation, with a focus on the promise that its early …

Robots Are Coming: A Discussion Of Choice-Of-Law Issues And Outcomes In Telesurgical Malpractice, Megan Cloud

Texas A&M Law Review

New technology frequently emerges that challenges the legal status quo. Early adopters must then grapple with uncertainty over how the law will apply to novel legal quandaries. There is no better example of this than in medicine; however, the health care field is notoriously risk averse. Despite this, the practice of medicine stands to gain tremendously from these technological advancements. One such advancement is the relatively new ability to perform robotic surgery in which the surgeon is remote from the patient. Widespread use of this technology would improve rural access to surgical care, as well as improve access to more …

Unintended Consequences, Loopholes, And Gibberish: Why There Are Still Securities Act Class Actions In State Courts, Brian Elzweig

Texas A&M Law Review

This Article examines Congress’s decades-long attempt to ensure that securities class action lawsuits of national importance are litigated in federal courts. The intent is limiting strike suits. Congress attempted to curtail strike suits through the enactment of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act (“PSLRA”). The PSLRA required heightened pleading requirements to ensure the validity of federal securities class actions. Instead of solving the dilemma, plaintiffs circumvented the PSLRA by bringing fraud cases as state law claims. To combat the circumvention of the PSLRA, Congress enacted the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act (“SLUSA”). SLUSA federally preempted state law claims based on …

Sharkfests And Databases: Crowdsourcing Plea Bargains, Kay L. Levine, Ronald F. Wright, Nancy J. King, Marc Miller

Texas A&M Law Review

In this Essay, we dive deeper into this final dimension to discuss the influence of professional networks on plea negotiations. In particular, we examine the effects of crowdsourcing tactics in the negotiation setting. We describe, for example, what happens when lawyers bargain in public, benefitting from an audience that provides information about past practices and deals. And then we speculate about what might happen if that audience were instead a widely shared database that documents plea practices in the jurisdiction. We offer a few preliminary thoughts about the potential influence of such techniques, as we are not in a position …

Murphy V. Ncaa: The Constitutionality Of State-Authorized Sports Gambling, Shane Landers

Texas A&M Law Review

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Thus, “Congress may not simply ‘commandee[r] the legislative processes of the States by directly compelling them to enact and enforce a federal regulatory program.’” In Murphy v. NCAA, the United States Supreme Court held that a federal law that prevents States from legalizing sports gambling “violates the anticommandeering rule.” The Supreme Court’s decision in Murphy reemphasizes a fundamental principle of dual sovereignty—Congress is prohibited from “issu[ing] direct orders to the governments of …