Law Commons^™

Hypnotic Memories And Civil Sexual Abuse Trials, Jacqueline Kanovitz

Vanderbilt Law Review

In the next few paragraphs, the reader will eavesdrop on a psycho- therapy session. During this session, the therapist uses hypnosis, a common technique in clinical practice today. In the past, the legal system has paid little attention to the memory retrieval techniques used in psychotherapy because statutes of limitations have prevented patients from using memories of childhood wrongs uncovered in adult psycho-therapies to bring suit. However, recent changes will force the legal system to examine whether the memory restoring techniques used in psychotherapy can produce memory that is trustworthy enough for the legal system to accept. What follows is …

Prospective Overruling And The Judicial Role After "James B. Beam Co. V. Georgia", K. David Steele

Vanderbilt Law Review

Was there ever such a profession as ours anyhow? We speak of ourselves as practicing law, as teaching it, as deciding it, and not one of us can say what law means."' Justice Cardozo's observation about the elusive nature of the American legal system lies at the heart of the controversy over retroactivity. Questions about whether judges may prospectively overrule the law raise fundamental issues concerning the nature of law and the proper role for the judiciary.

In 1991, the Supreme Court issued its latest opinion on prospective overruling and judicial rulemaking. In James B. Beam Distilling Co. v. Georgia, …

A Reevaluation Of The Canons Of Statutory Interpretation, Joseph H. Bates

Vanderbilt Law Review

This Symposium has its genesis in the Vanderbilt Law Review's inaugural symposium, A Symposium on Statutory Construction, published in 1950.' Although the 1950 Symposium included a Foreword by Justice Felix Frankfurter and contributions by several preeminent scholars in the field, Karl Llewellyn's clumsily titled but succinctly written Remarks on the Theory of Appellate Decision and the Rules or Canons About How Statutes are to be Construed has eclipsed the Symposium which brought it to light and has persevered as a highly influential, if not definitive, critique of the canons of statutory construction.

Llewelyn's article, in general, attacks legal formalism and …

The Presumption Of Reviewability: A Study In Canonical Construction And Its Consequences, Daniel B. Rodriguez

Vanderbilt Law Review

The much-maligned canons of statutory construction stubbornly have survived, largely on the strength of the assertion that whatever the aim of the statute's interpretation, an interpretive canon will improve the chances that the statute's aim will be realized. Canonical construction serves two different functions. Some of the canons ostensibly are designed as short-cuts to the discovery of the legislature's "true" intent. Professor Geoffrey Miller has explained how the canons may reflect the judicial articulations of conversational conventions that help courts understand otherwise vexing statutory language.' Canons may also serve as surrogates for other, better evidence of legislators' intent. In this …

The Canons Of Statutory Construction And Judicial Constraints: A Response To Macey And Miller, Lawrence C. Marshall

Vanderbilt Law Review

Professors Jonathan Macey and Geoffrey Miller claim to have set out to provide a positivist explanation for why judges ever invoke canons in the course of interpreting statutes.' In truth, though, their question is a far broader one. What they really seek to explain is why judges ever use any interpretive tools in the course of interpreting statutes. Why, Macey and Miller want to know, don't judges simply decide what result in the case will best promote a good outcome on the grounds of public policy, intrinsic fairness, economic efficiency or wealth maximization? This question is perplexing to Macey and …

Where Have You Gone, Karl Llewellyn? Should Congress Turn Its Lonely Eyes To You?, Stephen F. Ross

Vanderbilt Law Review

Over forty years ago, in the Symposium we commemorate today, Professor Karl Llewellyn wrote a devastating critique of the canons of statutory construction. For virtually every canon of construction, he demonstrated that there was another canon that could be employed to reach the opposite result. His point was not to be critical, but to argue proscriptively that the process of statutory construction requires an interpretation in light of a judicial determination of "some assumed purpose."'

Other commentators, both before and after the publication of Llewellyn's magnificent contribution to the Vanderbilt Law Review, have taken a different approach. These observers have …

The Practice And Problems Of Plain Meaning: A Response To Aleinikoff And Shaw, Frederick Schauer

Vanderbilt Law Review

The attention so many of the participants in this Symposium have paid to my thoughts about the role of plain meaning in statutory interpretation' is both gratifying and surprising. Among those scholars finding my ideas worthy of note are Professors Aleinikoff and Shaw, and my aim is both to comment on their contribution here and to respond more generally to what others have said about my views on the role of plain meaning. By continuing the discussion I hope to clarify some of the claims I have made about plain meaning, and in doing so to foster a better appreciation …

Modern Statutes, Loose Canons, And The Limits Of Practical Reason: A Response To Farber And Ross, Edward L. Rubin

Vanderbilt Law Review

Daniel Farber' and Stephen Ross, in separate contributions to this Symposium, raise the most crucial question in modern statutory interpretation, a question that exposes the profound triviality of the canons of statutory construction that Karl Llewellyn so effectively attacked. Ross points out that the legislature can control, or at least attempt to control, the judicial use of the canons by the way it drafts the statute and by effective use of supplementary materials such as mark-ups, committee reports, and floor debates. Farber, in his critique of formalism, demonstrates that formalist interpretation is an impediment to effective statutory drafting. Inherent in …

Coalition Formation And The Presumption Of Reviewability: A Response To Rodriguez, Robert K. Rasmussen

Vanderbilt Law Review

Professor Dan Rodriguez's paper The Presumption of Reviewability: A Study in Canonical Construction and Its Consequences' makes several important contributions to the literature on statutory interpretation in the modern regulatory state. It provides a coherent explanation for the curious review provisions of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), and analyzes the continuing battle over judicial review of agency action as part of a continuing dialogue among Congress, the courts, and the President. Rodriguez recognizes that those who study statutory interpretation must take account of both the existence of administrative agencies and the fact that interpretive practices have the potential to affect …