Law Commons^™

To Our Children's Children's Children: The Problems Of Intergenerational Ethics, Lawrence B. Solum

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This essay serves as the introduction to the Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review's symposium on intergenerational justice. The importance of this topic cannot be overstated. Intergenerational ethics bears on questions of environmental policy, health policy, intellectual property law, international development policy, social security policy, telecommunications policy, and a variety of other issues.

Part II, Clarifying the Problems of Intergenerational Ethics, is a first sketch of the scope and nature of intergenerational justice, introducing a variety of cases and contexts in which issues of intergenerational ethics arise and distinguishing between the political and moral dimensions of these issues. Part …

Can You Be A Good Person And A Good Prosecutor?, Abbe Smith

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Somehow, it is understood that prosecutors have the high ground. Most people simply assume that prosecutors are the good guys, wear the white hats, and are on the "right" side. Most law students contemplating a career in criminal law seem to think this. It could be that most practicing lawyers think this, as well.

Prosecutors represent the people, the state, the government. This is very noble, important, and heady stuff. Prosecutors seek truth, justice, and the American way. They are the ones who stand up for the victims and would-be victims, the bullied and battered and burgled. They protect all …

Out Of The Ordinary: Law, Power, Culture, And The Commonplace, Naomi Mezey

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Review of The Common Place of Law: Stories From Everyday Life by Patricia Ewick & Susan S. Silbey (1998).

Sometimes a work's intellectual influences reveal both its strengths and its shortcomings. This is certainly the case with Patricia Ewick and Susan Silbey's The Common Place of Law: Stories From Everyday Life, and its indebtedness to the thinking of Michel Foucault and Michel de Certeau. Taken together, Foucault and de Certeau's work suggests that investigations of law's power are most fruitful not at the level of legal institutions and the state but at the level of lived experience, where we …

A Vision Of Health And Human Rights For The 21st Century: A Continuing Discussion With Stephen P. Marks, Lawrence O. Gostin

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Professor Marks offers an eloquent vision of health and human rights in the 21st Century. As the Director of the Francois-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights, Professor Marks ably carries the torch that Jonathan Mann lit in the field until his tragic death on September 2, 1998. Professor Marks stands along with the leading figures in health and human rights - e.g., Audrey Chapman, Sofia Gruskin, Michael Kirby, Daniel Tarantola, Brigit Toebes, Katarina Tomasevski, and Virginia Leary.

Public Health, Ethics, And Human Rights: A Tribute To The Late Jonathan Mann, Lawrence O. Gostin

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The late Jonathan Mann famously theorized that public health, ethics, and human rights are complementary fields motivated by the paramount value of human well-being. He felt that people could not be healthy if governments did not respect their rights and dignity as well as engage in health policies guided by sound ethical values. Nor could people have their rights and dignity if they were not healthy. Mann and his colleagues argued that public health and human rights are integrally connected: Human rights violations adversely affect the community's health, coercive public health policies violate human rights, and advancement of human rights …

Free Exercise Rights Of Capital Jurors, Brian Galle

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The Supreme Court has said that the Constitution permits trial judges to exclude from the pool of potential capital trial jurors any persons whose views on the death penalty would likely substantially impair their ability to reach an impartial verdict. This Note argues that the Court's analysis to date is incomplete, in that it omits close evaluation of potential conflicts between such exclusions and the Free Exercise Clause. The Note argues further that a court should apply strict scrutiny to any state action, such as exclusion for cause, that burdens the use of religious beliefs in the mental processes of …

Secret Trials, David Cole

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Today, U.S. immigration authorities use secret evidence to lock up immigrants in deportation proceedings, to exclude aliens at the border, and to oppose applications for "relief from deportation," including asylum.

Cook V. Gralike: Easy Cases And Structural Reasoning, Vicki C. Jackson

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In Cook v Gralike, the Court - unanimous as to result - struck down a Missouri initiative amending the state constitution to require that the failure of candidates for U.S. Congress to support a particular term-limits amendment to the United States Constitution be noted on the ballot. In an opinion joined by seven Justices, the Court held that the Missouri law exceeded the scope of states' powers to regulate the "time, place and manner" of holding congressional elections . . . The opinions are analyzed preliminarily in Part I. Part II below suggests that even if there were no Elections …

Civil Rights In The New Decade: The Geography Of Opportunity, Sheryll Cashin

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

It is truly an honor and a privilege to have been invited to return to my home state of Alabama to talk about the civil rights agenda in the new decade. Lest you think that I lack the appropriate credentials to speak on this issue, I will tell you that I did go to jail for the cause. At the age of four months, I was taken by my mother, Joan Carpenter Cashin, to a sit-in at a lunch counter in Huntsville, Alabama. When my mother was arrested, she insisted on taking me with her to jail. I am very …

What's So Bad About Bush V. Gore? An Essay On Our Unsettled Election, Louis Michael Seidman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

There is a chance that Bush v. Gore may begin a process of laying a more attractive and realistic foundation for constitutionalism than the Official Story provides. The very fact that the Court is not politically independent and that it could not settle the matter in a disinterested, apolitical fashion might set us down a path toward a more mature version of constitutional law. The politically tendentious character of the Coon's reasoning demonstrates that our core constitutional commitments are subject to political manipulation. Ironically, public understanding of this malleability makes our politics more, rather than less, inclusive. It does so …

The Bakaly Debacle: The Role Of The Press In High-Profile Criminal Investigations, Julie R. O'Sullivan

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Others have examined why prosecutors or law enforcement agents may be inclined to "leak" information regarding ongoing criminal investigations, documented the rules that govern federal prosecutors' interaction with the press in such circumstances, outlined the difficulties encountered in enforcing those rules, and critiqued the performance of Mr. Starr's office in this regard. In other words, the dynamic as it flows from governmental actors to the press has been scrutinized. I would like to suggest that a more searching examination be conducted of the press's role, and perhaps its responsibilities, in this context. Because I am neither a journalist nor a …

Constitution-Talk And Justice-Talk, Mark V. Tushnet

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Inside the courts, one might distinguish between constitution-talk and justice-talk on the ground that the former, but not the latter, results in enforceable legal judgments. So, inside the courts, we might interpret the Constitution with justice in mind, but what we do is produce legally enforceable judgments. Outside the courts, however, it might seem that all we do is interpret and talk. It is not immediately obvious that cloaking justice-talk as constitution-talk outside the courts has much rhetorical force. As I will argue, the fact that invoking the Constitution outside the courts, in the course of discussing justice, does have …

The Federal Income-Contingent Repayment Option For Law Student Loans, Philip G. Schrag

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Many idealistic law school graduates feel precluded from taking legal aid and other low-paying public service jobs because they have incurred high educational debt, often exceeding $100,000. In 1993, however, Congress created an "income-contingent" debt repayment option that was intended to enable high-debt, low-income graduates, including lawyers, to afford accepting public service positions. This program caps loan repayments at a reasonable percentage of the graduates' incomes, and it forgives any remaining balance at the end of twenty-five years. To date, this program has failed to meet the needs of public interest lawyers. It is rarely used. Law students are largely …

Hester Prynne, Lydia Bennet, And Section 306 Stock: The Concept Of Tainting In The American Novel, The British Novel, And The Internal Revenue Code, Stephen B. Cohen, Stephen B. Cohen

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Did Nathaniel Hawthorne's novel, The Scarlet Letter, inspire Section 306 of the Internal Revenue Code? This code provision adopts a peculiarly Hawthorne-like solution to a tax avoidance scheme known as the "preferred stock bailout." Section 306 taints the stock used in the scheme as "Section 306 stock." Special rules then govern all subsequent dispositions of the tainted stock. With its concept of a taint that can dog a stock from acquisition to disposition, Section 306 might have been designed by a novelist rather than a tax technician.

And Now A Word About Secular Humanism, Spirituality, And The Practice Of Justice And Conflict Resolution, Carrie Menkel-Meadow

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The papers presented in this Dialogue raise very important and moving questions about the relationship of spirituality, moral values, and religion to the practice of law generally, and the practice of conflict resolution specifically. In this Commentary, I want to focus on two related questions: First, where do our moral values, spirituality, and sense of communion or connection come from? And second, how do values derived from various sources of secular humanism inform our practices? For some of us, organized religion is not the primary source of our commitment to the "moral" values that inform our legal and conflict resolution …

Seeking Sunlight In Santa Fe's Shadow: The Sec's Pursuit Of Managerial Accountability, Donald C. Langevoort

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

My aim in this paper is not to justify at length an expansive "new corporation law" perspective, though I do believe in it. Nor do I want to try to resolve a controversial question that the new learning admittedly leaves open: which jurisdictional body should set the disclosure and antifraud standards insofar as they are designed to promote better corporate governance? To say that corporate and securities law are largely unitary does not necessarily mean that centralization of authority in the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC or Commission) is the right choice. Perhaps the states, foreign countries, or stock exchanges …

Faulty Adversarial Performance By Criminal Defenders In The Crown Court, Peter W. Tague

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Who is the more able advocate, the lawyer in the United States or the barrister in England and Wales? Answering that question is extremely difficult because of a multitude of differences in the procedural regimes in which each works and in the scope of each's responsibility. Yet, one facet stands out, like a full moon in a dark sky: The comparative number of defenders who on appeal have been accused of having provided inappropriate representation in the process leading to conviction . . . Part 1 discusses the procedural hurdles that make challenging the trial barrister's conduct more difficult than …

Secrecy, Guilt By Association, And The Terrorist Profile, David Cole

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In this essay, I will argue that the use of secret procedures and guilt by association in immigration trials is not only unconstitutional but counterproductive. I will begin with a case study, then discuss in turn the practices of secret evidence and guilt by association, and finally conclude with a consideration of how these two tactics perpetuate invidious stereotypes about Arabs and Muslims.

Why Doesn't She Leave? The Collision Of First Amendment Rights And Effective Court Remedies For Victims Of Domestic Violence, Laurie S. Kohn

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Despite the persistence of the question, social science literature is replete with reasons why a victim does not or cannot leave a battering relationship. Commonly cited explanations include lack of financial resources; fear of physical retribution; lack of access to information about options for escape; enduring love for the batterer and belief he will change; learned helplessness; and depression. This Article, however, focuses on a pervasive and previously unexamined reason: the victim's fear that the batterer will publicize truthful confidential information that will hurt her. If the victim were to seek the court's protection, most state courts have the authority …

Defending Congress, Seth P. Waxman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Every year the Solicitor General must decide, one case at a time, what the interests of the United States are with respect to several thousand different cases in the federal and state courts. Should the United States appeal, or seek rehearing, or petition for certiorari, or file a brief amicus curiae, or intervene? What issues should the United States raise, and what arguments should it make? How should the law be interpreted or the doctrine applied? The goal is for the United States to speak with one voice - a voice that reflects the interests of all three branches of …

Law As Culture, Naomi Mezey

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This Essay is an attempt to theorize the relationship of law to culture and culture to law beyond the intuitive, commonplace sense that law partakes of culture - by reflecting it as well as by reacting against it - and that culture refracts law. It proposes a theory of law as culture that, in detailing the mutually constitutive nature of the relationship, distinguishes itself from the way law and culture have been conceived by realist and critical legal scholars, as well as by social norms writers. The Essay concludes by speculating about one possible method by which this theorizing might …

A Conversation On Federalism And The States: The Balancing Act Of Devolution, Peter B. Edelman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

If you consider whether there might be a national definition of benefit levels in welfare, you might well ask whether there is a state-by-state difference in people's needs. There are some regional differences in cost of living, but, otherwise, you eat, you need shelter, and so on. The history of disability policy is very interesting in this regard because from 1935 until 1972 (apart from the addition of social security disability in the 1950s), disability was handled as a welfare category. There were separate welfare programs for the aged, blind, and the disabled, and they were structured the way Aid …

The Sex Discrimination Argument In Gay Rights Cases, Nan D. Hunter

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The argument that laws that discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation in fact discriminate on the basis of sex is not new. Advocates have been pressing this claim for almost thirty years. Simply put, the argument is that a statute that bars a sexual relationship between two women or two men discriminates on the basis of sex because either partner could have had the same relationship with a person of the opposite sex.

Open Access And The First Amendment: A Critique Of Comcast Cablevision Of Broward County, Inc. V. Broward County, David Wolitz

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

To what extent does the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment bar the adoption of “open access” regulations? Open access (or “net neutrality”) refers to a policy that would require broadband Internet providers, such as cable and phone companies, to allow competitive Internet Service Providers (ISPs) onto their broadband lines at nondiscriminatory rates. A federal district court in Florida recently held Broward County’s open access ordinance unconstitutional on the grounds that it would force speech – in the form of Internet content – on to the local cable company. If the district court’s analysis is correct, then open access …

The Original Meaning Of The Commerce Clause, Randy E. Barnett

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The U& Supreme Court, in recent cases; has attempted to define limits on the Congress's power to regulate commerce among the several states. While Justice Thomas has maintained that the original meaning of "commerce" was limited to the "trade and exchange" of goods and transportation for this purpose, some have argued that he is mistaken and that "commerce" originally included any "gainful activity." Having examined every appearance of the word "commerce"in the records of the Constitutional Convention, the ratification debates and the Federalist Papers, Professor Barnett finds no surviving example of this term being used in this broader sense. In …

Highways And Bi-Ways For Environmental Justice, Richard J. Lazarus

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The purpose of this essay is to discuss the past, present, and future of the environmental justice movement as illustrated by the highway between Selma and Montgomery in Alabama and the highway system surrounding the City of Atlanta in neighboring Georgia. The essay is divided into three parts. The first part describes environmental justice, seeking both to place it in a broader historical perspective and to discuss how it relates to civil rights law and environmental law. The second part undertakes a closer examination of the challenges presented by efforts to fashion positive law to address environmental justice norms. This …

Legislative Constitutional Interpretation, Neal K. Katyal

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This is an Essay about "the how" of constitutional interpretation. Much attention has been devoted to the question of how the Constitution is interpreted in courts. Rather little attention has been devoted to the question of how the Constitution is interpreted elsewhere in the government. The Constitution tells us that Congress, the President, and state legislators and courts must adhere to its terms, but it does not tell us how much interpretive power each actor should have, nor does it prescribe rules for each actor to use when interpreting the text. I argue that constitutional interpretation by Congress is, and …

Stability And Development In Canon Law And The Case Of "Definitive" Teaching, Ladislas M. Örsy

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Stability is an essential quality of any good legal system because a community's laws are an expression of its identity, and there is no identity without permanency. Many times we hear in the United States that we are a country held together by our laws. Although the statement cannot be the full truth, it is obvious that if our laws ever lost their stability, the nation's identity would be imperiled. In a religious community where the source of its identity is in the common memory of a divine revelation, the demand for stability is even stronger. Fidelity to the "Word …

Joseph In Lawyerland, Robin West

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

As Alice wanders through Wonderland in an unreal space in real time-a dream-learning backward truths from illogical creatures who speak in paradoxes, so Joseph figuratively wanders through lawyerland in an unreal time, but in a very real space-Manhattan-conversing with his thinly fictionalized friends, all of whom happen to be lawyers, about their lives and practices in law. As Joseph's lawyers talk with him about the law they practice, they uncover, through White Rabbit and Cheshire Cat-like illogical precision, a chaotic, unkempt, unconscionably reckless, often cruel, and sometimes pathological legal wilderness. The legal terrain these lawyers occupy is not an inviting …

Race And Discretion In American Medicine, Maxwell Gregg Bloche

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The author’s focus in this article is on racial disparities in medical care provision--that is, on differences in the services that clinically similar patients receive when they present to the health care system. Racial disparities in health status, which is not greatly influenced (on a population-wide basis) by medical care, are beyond his scope here. Disparities in medical care access-potential patients' ability, financial and otherwise, to gain entry to the health care system in the first place, are also outside his focus. The author begins this article by putting the problem of racial disparities in medical care provision within the …