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The Waning Importance Of Revisions To U.C.C. Article 2, Gregory E. Maggs Jan 2003

The Waning Importance Of Revisions To U.C.C. Article 2, Gregory E. Maggs

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

Article 2 of the Uniform Commercial Code governs contracts for the sale of goods. This article seeks to show that, however urgent the need to modernize Article 2 was in 1990, this need ironically has waned with the passage of time. Article 2 requires less change now than it did a decade ago to meet the requirements of modern commerce. The article supports this claim by looking at three very significant developments that have occurred since 1990: the growth of electronic commerce, the decision not to address software licenses in article 2, and the accumulation of a decade of precedents …


Book Review Of Frederic L. Borch, Judge Advocates In Combat: Army Lawyers In Military Operations From Vietnam To Haiti (2001), Gregory E. Maggs Jan 2003

Book Review Of Frederic L. Borch, Judge Advocates In Combat: Army Lawyers In Military Operations From Vietnam To Haiti (2001), Gregory E. Maggs

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This is a review of Frederic L. Borch, Judge Advocates in Combat: Army Lawyers in Military Operations from Vietnam to Haiti (2001). The book presents and supports a specific thesis. It shows that military attorneys over time gradually have assumed an important new duty in combat operations. Judge advocates, for example, now directly influence the planning and execution of military actions by drafting rules of engagement, aiding in the selection of targets, crafting policies to ensure compliance with the law of war, and even by advising on political matters in host nations. I have written a positive review of this …


On The Selection Of Judges In International Figure Skating, Michael B. Abramowicz Jan 2003

On The Selection Of Judges In International Figure Skating, Michael B. Abramowicz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This essay discusses the system that the International Skating Union (ISU) has long used to select skating judges for competitions and suggests that this system creates problems of partisanship, incentivizing national skating federations to pick judges who are most likely to favor the federation’s interests while also incentivizing skating judges to favor their national federations. I offer an alternative approach to the ISU’s present method of selecting judges, a tournament-like system that could be used to pick judges objectively by rating judges based on the correlation of their scores with those of other judges and allowing those with higher correlation …


Speeding Up The Crawl To The Top, Michael B. Abramowicz Jan 2003

Speeding Up The Crawl To The Top, Michael B. Abramowicz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

The literature on competition in corporate law has debated whether competition is a "race to the bottom" or a "race to the top.” This Article endorses the increasing scholarly consensus that competition improves corporate law but argues that the pace of innovation in corporate law is likely to be slow. Because benefits of corporate law innovation are not internalized, neither states nor firms will have sufficient incentives to innovate. That competitive federalism is “to the top" suggests that the model could be applied beyond the corporate charter context, for example to areas such as bankruptcy, but that benefits from such …


A Compromise Approach To Compromise Verdicts, Michael B. Abramowicz Jan 2003

A Compromise Approach To Compromise Verdicts, Michael B. Abramowicz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

Although one of the legal system’s most salient attributes is its insistence that a civil jury choose the story of one party over that of another, scholars have thus far paid almost no attention to the possibility of replacing the preponderance-of-the-evidence rule with an alternative that is not “winner-take-all.” This Article focuses on the issue of uncertainty about what the defendant did or whether the plaintiff was injured, offering an alternative to the extremes of all-or-nothing and compromise verdicts. It considers the possibility that, while sometimes an all-or-nothing verdict is appropriate, at other times a compromise verdict would be better. …


The Thin Line Between Love And Hate: Why Affinity-Based Securities And Investment Fraud Constitutes A Hate Crime, Lisa M. Fairfax Jan 2003

The Thin Line Between Love And Hate: Why Affinity-Based Securities And Investment Fraud Constitutes A Hate Crime, Lisa M. Fairfax

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

The Thin Line Between Love and Hate: Why Affinity-Based Securities and Investment Fraud Constitutes a Hate Crime, 36 U.C. Davis 1073 (2003) explores the parallels between the prototypical hate crime and affinity fraud - securities and investment fraud that targets identifiable religious, racial and ethnic groups - and asserts that those parallels justify treating affinity fraud as a hate crime.


Domestic Violence, Child Custody, And Child Protection: Understanding Judicial Resistance And Imagining The Solutions, Joan S. Meier Jan 2003

Domestic Violence, Child Custody, And Child Protection: Understanding Judicial Resistance And Imagining The Solutions, Joan S. Meier

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This 2003 article seeks to take on what was then conventional wisdom, that myriad law reforms over the prior two decades have improved and corrected the law's response to domestic violence. It focuses on family courts' failure to credit and respond appropriately to protective mothers' - mostly battered women's - allegations that fathers are unsafe for the children. It unpacks several "neutral" principles that seem to guide family courts' responses to abuse allegations, arguing that they are mis-guided, and distort the realities of battering and child abuse in these cases. While not seeking to explain family court culture simply in …


Freedom Of Expression, Democratic Norms, And Internet Governance, Dawn C. Nunziato Jan 2003

Freedom Of Expression, Democratic Norms, And Internet Governance, Dawn C. Nunziato

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

Within a decade, the Internet has transformed into a global medium of mass communication and expression of all kinds. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the body that governs the Internet's infrastructure, assured the United States that it would govern the Internet's infrastructure democratically and would implement governance structures to take into account the interests of affected Internet users around the world. In particular, ICANN promised to employ deliberative and representative democratic structures in its decision-making bodies. Even though ICANN has (arguably) implemented such procedural democratic norms, it has failed to implement substantive norms of democratic governance, …


The Price Of Discrimination: The Nature Of Class Action Employment Litigation And Its Effects, Michael Selmi Jan 2003

The Price Of Discrimination: The Nature Of Class Action Employment Litigation And Its Effects, Michael Selmi

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This article analyzes the recent wave of large class action employment discrimination suits to determine their effects on the firms that are sued and the members of the plaintiff class. The first part of the paper includes an event study that measures the effect the lawsuits and their settlements have on stock prices of the companies that are sued, and the second part of the paper involves three case studies (Texaco, Home Depot and Denny's) to explore how the lawsuits actually change corporate practices. The study finds that the lawsuits do not generally affect stock prices, and rarely provide meaningful …


The Virtues Of Knowing Less: Justifying Privacy Protections Against Disclosure, Daniel J. Solove Jan 2003

The Virtues Of Knowing Less: Justifying Privacy Protections Against Disclosure, Daniel J. Solove

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This Article develops justifications for protections against the disclosure of private information. An extensive body of scholarship has attacked such protections as anathema to the Information Age, where the free flow of information is championed as a fundamental value. This Article responds to two general critiques of disclosure protections: (1) that they inhibit freedom of speech, and (2) that they restrict information useful for judging others.

Regarding the free speech critique, the Article argues that not all speech is of equal value; speech of private concern is less valuable than speech of public concern. The difficulty, however, is distinguishing between …


Adjudication, Antisubordination, And The Jazz Connection, Christopher A. Bracey Jan 2003

Adjudication, Antisubordination, And The Jazz Connection, Christopher A. Bracey

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

We live in the midst of a pervasive and sustained democratic crisis. Our society expresses a deep commitment to core notions of freedom, justice, and equality for all citizens. Yet, it is equally clear that our democracy tolerates a great deal of social and economic inequality. Membership in a socially disfavored group can (and often does) profoundly distort one's life chances and opportunities. Our constitutional democracy acknowledges this tension, providing for both majority rule and the protection of minority rights and interests. Although we seek to safeguard minority rights and interest through express legal prohibitions on the subordination of socially …


The American Worker: Junior Partner In Success And Senior Partner In Failure, Charles B. Craver Jan 2003

The American Worker: Junior Partner In Success And Senior Partner In Failure, Charles B. Craver

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This article explores the degree to which American workers are treated like second-class parties by corporate leaders. When business firms do well, share holders and managers obtain significant financial gains, but rank-and-file workers do not usually share in those gains. On the other hand, when firms do poorly, thousands of employees are laid off, while managers obtain bonuses for their forthright actions designed to curtail labor costs. These developments correspond directly to the decline of labor organizations in the United States. When unions represented 35 percent of private sector workers in the late 1950s and 1960s, wages and benefits were …


A Comment On China's Participation In The World Trade Organization, Steve Charnovitz Jan 2003

A Comment On China's Participation In The World Trade Organization, Steve Charnovitz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This comment discusses two papers presented at the US-China WTO Roundtable sponsored by the Institute of International Law of The Temple University James E. Beasley School of Law. The paper by Zhang Naigen examines treaty interpretation in dispute settlement under the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights. Professor Zhang observes that WTO panels will have to interpret the underlying provisions in non-WTO treaties, namely the intellectual property rights treaties overseen by the World Intellectual Property Organization. The paper by Yang Guohua points out the paradox that although the WTO permits governments to utilize import safeguards, in all …


More Statistics, Less Persuasion: A Cultural Theory Of Gun-Risk Perceptions, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan Jan 2003

More Statistics, Less Persuasion: A Cultural Theory Of Gun-Risk Perceptions, Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

What motivates individuals to support or oppose the legal regulation of guns? What sorts of evidence or arguments are likely to promote a resolution of the gun control debate? Using the survey methods associated with the cultural theory of risk, we demonstrate that individuals' positions on gun control derive from their cultural world views: individuals of an egalitarian or solidaristic orientation tend to support gun control, those of a hierarchical or individualist orientation to oppose it. Indeed, cultural orientations so defined are stronger predictors of individuals' positions than is any other fact about them, including whether they are male or …


States As Nations: Dignity In Cross-Doctrinal Perspective, Peter J. Smith Jan 2003

States As Nations: Dignity In Cross-Doctrinal Perspective, Peter J. Smith

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

In a series of recent decisions, the Supreme Court has asserted that the states' sovereign immunity from suit serves principally to protect the "dignity" of the states. This seemingly oxymoronic notion has perplexed and amused commentators, who have tended to dismiss it largely as rhetorical flourish without substantive content. Although the concept of state dignity is at best an unusual anchor for a doctrine that already has been roundly criticized as unfaithful to constitutional history, text, and structure, the notion of state dignity is not foreign to the law. This article argues that in relying on state dignity, the Court's …


The Parent-Child Privilege In Context, Catherine J. Ross Jan 2003

The Parent-Child Privilege In Context, Catherine J. Ross

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

The article argues that children cannot fully exercise their constitutional rights under the Fifth and Sixth Amendments without being able to confide freely in their parents and advocates for the creation of a parent-child privilege.


The Supremacy Clause As A Constraint On Federal Power, Bradford R. Clark Jan 2003

The Supremacy Clause As A Constraint On Federal Power, Bradford R. Clark

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

Today, it is widely accepted that the Constitution authorizes courts to review and invalidate state laws that conflict with federal statutes. At the same time, prominent commentators and even some judges maintain that courts should not seriously review the constitutionality of federal statutes alleged to exceed the scope of Congress' enumerated powers. In their view, the constitutional structure protects the states (and thereby reduces the need for judicial review of federal power), but establishes no comparable safeguards to deter states from interfering with federal prerogatives. Contrary to this position, there is an express textual basis for judicial review of federal …


Corporate Governance In China: An Overview, Donald C. Clarke Jan 2003

Corporate Governance In China: An Overview, Donald C. Clarke

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

Corporate governance (gongsi zhili) is a concept whose time seems definitely to have come in China. Chinese definitions of corporate governance in the abstract tend to cover the system regulating relationships among all parties with interests in a business organization, usually spelling out shareholders as a particularly important group (e.g., Liu, 1999; Yin, 1999). But Chinese corporate governance discourse in practice focuses almost exclusively on agency problems and within only two types of firms: state-owned enterprises (SOEs), particularly after their transformation into one of the corporate forms provided for under the Company Law,1 and listed companies, which must be companies …


Implementing Constitutional Rights For Juveniles: The Parent-Child Privilege In Context, Catherine J. Ross Jan 2003

Implementing Constitutional Rights For Juveniles: The Parent-Child Privilege In Context, Catherine J. Ross

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This article advocates for the creation of a parent-child privilege by focusing on the parental contribution to raising their children. The article argues that children cannot fully exercise their constitutional rights without being able to confide freely in their parents and consult them before waiving rights and while working with their attorneys. I begin by describing the current state of privilege law and suggest that there is already a “de facto” tendency to observe a parent-child privilege. I show that courts have failed to distinguish among three distinctive kinds of confidences: (1) testimony concerning confidences from a minor child to …


Including Law In The Mix: The Role Of Law, Lawyers, And Legal Training In Child Advocacy, Catherine J. Ross Jan 2003

Including Law In The Mix: The Role Of Law, Lawyers, And Legal Training In Child Advocacy, Catherine J. Ross

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This chapter describes the recent trends in family law scholarship, training, and practice. The first section of this chapter provides an overview of the scope of modern family law and the range of skills brought by lawyers. The second section considers the legal profession’s interest in using its collective talents to improve children’s lives in context of the broader intellectual trends in thinking about family issues. In the third section, I describe the current goals of legal education, explain why law schools should offer interdisciplinary training to students who plan to work in family law, and discuss some innovative multidisciplinary …


Perfecting Patent Prizes, Michael B. Abramowicz Jan 2003

Perfecting Patent Prizes, Michael B. Abramowicz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

A number of commentators in recent years have suggested permitting holders of intellectual property rights to give up these rights in exchange for cash prizes from the government. In this Article, Professor Abramowicz shows that each of the proposals has significant flaws that would make implementation impractical and argues that no single perfect formula or algorithm for determining the size of prizes exists. A prize system is nonetheless worth pursuing because it could increase social welfare significantly by eliminating deadweight loss. Professor Abramowicz recommends a relatively simple approach that would complement rather than replace the patent system. The proposal is …


The Negotiation Process, Charles B. Craver Jan 2003

The Negotiation Process, Charles B. Craver

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This article explores the six formal stages of the negotiation process to demonstrate to readers how structured bargaining encounters are. During the Preparation Stage, negotiators have to acquire critical information and determine: (1) their bottom lines; (2) their goals; and (3) their opening offers. During the Preliminary Stage, they should work to establish rapport with opponents and to create positive negotiating environments that will be more conducive to cooperative bargaining. During the Information Stage, negotiators must ask open-ended questions designed to discover what items are available for division - value creation. During the Distributive Stage, the participants vie for the …


The Impact Of Economic Globalization On Compliance, Dinah L. Shelton Jan 2003

The Impact Of Economic Globalization On Compliance, Dinah L. Shelton

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

The introductory chapter of this book begins by defining globalization and the novel notion of the “common concern of humanity” and describes the ethical, cultural, and economic considerations underlying protection of the biosphere. The chapter describes the evolution of the common concern of humanity in depth and describes the increased presence of international organizations. Next, the chapter introduces the Marrakesh Charter and its corresponding economic principles. The chapter concludes that there exists the need to create an international liability system for both states and individuals for environmental degradation caused by international trade.


Which Ties Bind? Redefining The Parent-Child Relationship In An Age Of Genetic Certainty, Naomi R. Cahn, June Carbone Jan 2003

Which Ties Bind? Redefining The Parent-Child Relationship In An Age Of Genetic Certainty, Naomi R. Cahn, June Carbone

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This article addresses the role of the genetic tie in the parent-child relationship through three lenses. First, we argue that the legal system recognizes children's rights not by treating children as autonomous actors, but by identifying the individuals and institutions most likely to promote children's interests and encouraging their success. Second, we examine the existing empirical and socio-biological literature that considers the importance of biological relationships, and concludes that it demonstrates not a single set of answers, but a set of tradeoffs. The well-being of young children, particularly in societies less prosperous than our own, may depend on the mother's …


Taiwan And The Wt0, Steve Charnovitz Jan 2003

Taiwan And The Wt0, Steve Charnovitz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

This paper is about Taiwan and the World Trade Organization. It discusses the history of Taiwan's involvement in the world trading system and the accession to the WTO. The paper then notes some unique features of Taiwan's membership and discusses the current political tension with China in the WTO. The paper ends with a discussion of the implications of Taiwan's membership in the WTO for potential Taiwanese membership in other international organizations.


The Constitutional Structure And The Jurisprudence Of Justice Scalia, Bradford R. Clark Jan 2003

The Constitutional Structure And The Jurisprudence Of Justice Scalia, Bradford R. Clark

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

Commentators generally regard federalism and separation of powers as distinct features of the constitutional structure. In reality, these doctrines were designed to work together to further the same goals: to avoid tyranny and to preserve individual liberty. Professor Thomas Merrill overlooks this connection in a recent attempt to explain the Supreme Court's decision making process under Chief Justice William Rehnquist. Professor Merrill maintains that there have been two Rehnquist Courts: one from 1986 to 1994, and another from 1994 to the present. In Professor Merrill's view, the first Rehnquist Court focused on social issues - such as abortion, affirmative action, …


Professor Hudec's Contribution To World Order, Steve Charnovitz Jan 2003

Professor Hudec's Contribution To World Order, Steve Charnovitz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

For over three decades, Professor Robert E. Hudec shaped the field of international trade law, and inspired students, colleagues, and policy-makers around the world. Professor Hudec was a spirited, witty, unassuming, kind, and honest man. He enjoyed having his ideas contested by others, and was willing to spend time to help colleagues and students think through their ideas. This tribute to Professor Hudec collects a series of stories and acknowledgments from his peers and colleagues.


Assessing The Ilo's Efforts To Develop Migration Law, Steve Charnovitz Jan 2003

Assessing The Ilo's Efforts To Develop Migration Law, Steve Charnovitz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

The world community has increasingly recognized the movement of people as an issue of global policy rather than an exclusive sovereign preserve of individual governments. In considering whether a good case exists for establishing a World Migration Organization, policymakers and stakeholders should look at whether existing international organizations can be better used to enhance international cooperation on migration policy. One such organization may be the International Labour Organization (“ILO”), a UN specialized agency that has worked on migrant issues from its beginning. This article analyzes the work of the ILO in international migration as prolegomena to assessing whether its role …


The World Trade Organization And Law Enforcement, Steve Charnovitz Jan 2003

The World Trade Organization And Law Enforcement, Steve Charnovitz

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

Increased threats from transborder criminal activity are leading to stronger governmental and intergovernmental responses in the military, judicial, and regulatory arenas. These efforts, particularly the non-military efforts, raise a new issue in international economic law: the intersection between trade and law enforcement. This paper provides an overview of this “trade and law enforcement” linkage in four areas: (1) security, (2) health, (3) human rights, and (4) environmental protection. To explain the linkage between trade and law enforcement, I present the taxonomy of how trade measures are usable for law enforcement, and I offer a synopsis of the WTO provisions relevant …


Beyond The Multiple Punishment Problem: Punitive Damages As Punishment For Individual, Private Wrongs, Thomas Colby Jan 2003

Beyond The Multiple Punishment Problem: Punitive Damages As Punishment For Individual, Private Wrongs, Thomas Colby

GW Law Faculty Publications & Other Works

The practice of using punitive damages to punish a tort defendant, in a single case brought by a single one of many victims, for the full scope of societal harm caused by its entire course of wrongful conduct has become increasingly common in modern tort cases. This practice presents the troubling possibility that more than one victim will recover punitive damages awards that were each designed to punish the defendant fully for the same course of wrongful conduct, resulting in unjustly severe cumulative punishment. Many courts and commentators have responded to this "multiple punishment" problem with complex and far-reaching proposals …