Law Commons^™

Weather Modification Legislation -- A Survey, T. E. Watts Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

Mark Twain's oft-quoted assertion that "Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it" was first disputed by reputable scientists during the mid-forties, when General Electric Corporation, in conjunction with the Armed Forces, began serious attempts at weather modification by "seeding" cumulus cloud formations with solidified carbon dioxide or "dry ice."' Now, after a decade of experimentation, scientists still cannot agree on the effectiveness of major weather modification attempts. However, it is generally conceded that under certain atmospheric conditions, precipitation can be artificially induced with a relatively high degree of success and accuracy in a given local area, …

Book Reviews, Robert J. Harris (Reviewer), E. M. Morgan (Reviewer)

Vanderbilt Law Review

Book Reviews

The Fifth Amendment Today By Erwin N. Griswold Cambridge)Mass.: Harvard University Press. Pp. vi, 82. $0.50

reviewer: Robert J. Harris

Handbook of the Law of Evidence By Charles T, McCormick St.Paul: West Publishing Co., 1954, pp. xxviii, 774.

reviewer: E. M. Morgan

Local Government In The Larger Scheme Of Things, Jefferson B. Fordham

Vanderbilt Law Review

The growing interest displayed by the law reviews in the legal problems of local government reflects a gratifying increase in research and scholarly activity in the field.' This interest on the part of law school scholarly media is especially noteworthy, since the world of legal education has a peculiar responsibility to identify and engage in thoughtful study of the great legal problems of contemporary society.

In this brief paper an effort is made to place the problem of making appropriate legal provision for local autonomy in more adequate perspective. That is a rather ambitious venture. One is moved by the …

Air Pollution: Its Control And Abatement, Harold W. Kennedy, Andrew O. Porter

Vanderbilt Law Review

The law has been concerned with air pollution for centuries. Smoke and fumes were considered a nuisance at common law, but not a nuisance per se. Thus, each case stood on its own facts. Very early in our history special statutes were enacted to give more adequate protection from air contaminants. As early as 1306 the use of "sea-coal" (as distinguished from charcoal) was forbidden on penalty of death. Queen Elizabeth is said to have forbade the burning of coal in London during sessions of Parliament. In 1661 John Evelyn wrote a book on air pollution; his plan was to …

The Validity Of Extraterritorial Municipal Zoning, Otis J. Bouwsma

Vanderbilt Law Review

A body of law does not suddenly spring up. A period of development is required during which there is a gradual evolution of a comprehensive and coherent body of law. So, the law of zoning did not go immediately from the one extreme of completely unregulated city development to the other extreme of closely restricted city planning and zoning. Throughout the years tremendous changes in living conditions were taking place; sign board regulation was developing; and cities were prohibiting noxious uses of property for the benefit of the whole community. These things paved the way for the holding in Village …

Area-Development Authorities: A New Form Of Government By Proclamation, Ross D. Netherton

Vanderbilt Law Review

Let it be understood in the very beginning that the views of this writer regarding Public Authorities are partisan. He believes that recent years have witnessed the emergence of a new instrumentality of local government, the species of which are sometimes called "port authorities," sometimes "toll commissions," sometimes "regional boards," but all of which are capable of being described generically as "area-development authorities." He submits that these instrumentalities, while offering a unique and efficient means of performing many of the special functions which local governments in our times are called upon to undertake, have been allowed to grow away from …

An Inquiry Into The Principles Of Municipal Responsibility In General Assumpsit And Tort, George K. Gardner, Leslie M. Geller, John F. Mcgrory, William B. Shaffer Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

This paper is written in the conviction that the world is governed by natural law. It is our ambition to describe an analytical method by which the true responsibility of a municipality in respect to any given claim in general assumpsit or tort may be ascertained. It is not pretended that the method which we shall offer will yield a result in harmony with every reported judicial decision and statute, nor even that it may not differ rather widely from the system of legal rules prevailing currently in many states. It is our hope to present an exposition of basic …

Municipal Power To Tax -- Its Constitutional Limitations, Chester J. Antieau

Vanderbilt Law Review

Throughout the United States a great many municipalities have found that in recent years their revenue from taxes has not kept up with their expenses. While inflation spiralled municipal costs, while demands for municipal services increased terrifically during the last few" decades, and while financial burdens, such as the three-platoon fire department, were readily imposed upon the municipal corporations by the state legislatures, the tax bases available to municipalities were too often insufficient to meet the expanding local requirements. Older taxes, such as the tax upon real property, have proved more and more inadequate as residents moved beyond city limits, …

The Merit System -- An Essential Of Good Government, Murray Seasongood

Vanderbilt Law Review

Burke, in the trial of Warren Hastings, observed, "Law and arbitrary power are in eternal enmity." The same irreconcilable conflict exists, in this country, between professional politicians and sponsors of the merit system. This is because the aims of the two camps are completely antagonistic. In no other place where the two party system obtains, is the filling of offices and positions on the basis of vote-getting service and strength and political contributions made or secured for the party,so predominant a part of political activity. Patronage is the backbone in the United States of the political parties in federal, state …

Consolidation Of County And City Functions And Other Devices For Simplifying Tennessee Local Government, Wallace Mendelson

Vanderbilt Law Review

The growth of urban population beyond the legal boundaries of our towns and cities presents problems that are not being handled effectively by existing agencies of local government. Essentially the difficulty is that, while the suburbanites are an integral part of the central city's social and economic life, they are beyond her legal jurisdiction. As a result county government, designed primarily for rural areas, finds itself bogged down with urban problems. To meet such incongruities suburbanites often seek satisfaction of their needs in a series of uncoordinated special service districts, or other public or semi-public agencies and often ultimately in …

Use Of Survivorship Clauses In Wills, Harold A. Bowron, Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

Today a draftsman of wills should consider the increased risks of multiple deaths resulting from the hazards of modern living in general and travel by airplane and automobile in particular. He should be aware of the possibility of the client's death with his intended beneficiary within a short period, in a common disaster, or under circumstances in which there is no evidence of survivorship. The failure to provide for these possibilities may lead to the frustration of a testamentary disposition, as a beneficiary must survive the testator in order to take under the testator's will.' Further, the advent of the …

Encouragement Of Employment Of The Handicapped, Howard D. Fabing, Roscoe L. Barrow

Vanderbilt Law Review

Six million Americans of employable age have a physical impairment which is sufficiently serious to hinder them in finding employment. Included among the handicapped are orthopedics, those having defective vision, hearing or speech, cardiacs, diabetics, epileptics, and others. Employment of handicapped persons is in the interest of society. Employed, the handicapped are tax-payers; unemployed, they are tax-spenders. If they are not given the employment which they desire the handicapped are forced to become a charge on society. To secure their employment, however, is a problem of great magnitude, requiring the cooperation of employers, employees, interested civic organizations and governmental agencies …

Conditions In The Law Of Contracts, Merton Ferson

Vanderbilt Law Review

Conditions Precedent. Assume that a contract obligation has been created. When must the obligor perform? In some cases the performances become due by the mere passing of time. But in many cases the performances are not due until and unless certain other events have occurred. These other events are called conditions precedent. Until they come to pass the obligor may omit performance with impunity. He has an excuse that will stay the hand of the obligee. The case of Shadforth v. Higgin' will serve to illustrate the immunity of an obligor when a condition precedent has not come to pass. …

Some Problems Arising Under The Workmen's Compensation Law Of Tennessee, R. Wayne Estes, Doris A. Dudney

Vanderbilt Law Review

Although there are many problems arising under the Workmen's Compensation Laws of Tennessee, it appears that here, as elsewhere, the most difficult questions are those arising out of the interpretation of the phrases "injury by accident," "arising out of," and "in the course of," employment. The present study is therefore limited to a consideration of these three particular problems, and does not purport to be a comprehensive treatment of the entire topic of Workmen's Compensation Law in Tennessee.

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Conflict of Laws--Jurisdiction to Modify Custody Decree after Child's Domicile Changes--Full Faith and Credit in Third State

Constitutional Law--Freedom of Speech--"Prior Restraint" of Motion Pictures

Corporations--Uniform Stock Transfer Act--Effect of Notice of Restriction on Transfer

Criminal Procedure--Contempt--Extent of Power of Trial Judge to Punish Summarily

Evidence--Post-Accident Statements--Theories of Admissibility

Insurance--Automobile Theft Policy--Meaning of "Possession" in Exclusionary Clause of Policy

Malicious Prosecution--No Recovery for Base Less Civil Action--Necessity of "Special Injury"

Malpractice--Negligent Prescription of Habit--Forming Drugs--Patent's Simulation of Pain as Contributory Negligenic

Book Reviews, John W. Wade

Vanderbilt Law Review

Cogitations on Torts

By Warren A. Seavey.

Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1954. Pp. 72. $2.00

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Selected Topics on the Law of Torts

By William L. Prosser

Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1953. Pp. xi, 627.

The Controversy Over Federal Regulation Of Independent Producers Of Natural Gas, Jerome M. Alper

Vanderbilt Law Review

The Natural Gas Act,' enacted in 1938, gives to the Federal Power Commission the power of comprehensive regulation over the transportation of natural gas in interstate commerce and over the sale in interstate commerce of natural gas for resale. Under this statute the Commission has regulated the activities of the interstate pipelines which link the distant market points with the producing fields. One of the most controversial questions arising in the administration of the Act has been whether the producers and processors which sell the natural gas to the interstate transmission lines are subject to the Act. The question remained …

The Place Of Unemployment Insurance Within The Patterns And Policies Of Protection Against Wage-Loss, Stefan A. Riesenfeld

Vanderbilt Law Review

The following paper deals with an intricate and perplexing subject, covering an enormous expanse. For modern society has produced income-maintenance schemes of infinite variety and tremendous complexity. Perhaps the most outstanding and important point is the fact that it has developed them at all. When, however, it comes to classifying the different existing systems and to unraveling and correlating their underlying policies, a task resembling the labor of the Danaides is assumed.

The Coverage Of Unemployment Compensation Laws, Alanson W. Willcox

Vanderbilt Law Review

The federal tax which induced the states to enact unemployment compensation laws set a pattern of coverage which the states were under pressure to meet, but which they were wholly free to exceed. With notable exceptions, state coverage is shaped to conform with federal law. In this matter, indeed, federal leadership is so far accepted that the charge of federal "dictation" has not, as it has in other aspects of unemployment compensation, prevented some expansion of the system by federal initiative.

Coverage of the Federal Unemployment Tax Act starts with the concept of "employment" as the determinant of tax liability, …

Eligibility For Benefits, Lee G. Williams

Vanderbilt Law Review

The various state unemployment compensation statutes measure eligibility for unemployment "benefits" or "insurance" or "compensation" by means of a variety of yardsticks. "In the Federal-State system of unemployment insurance established in this country under the Social Security Act, the individual states have been free to develop the particular program that seems best adapted to conditions prevailing within the State. Consequently no two state laws are alike; and the differences are increased by amendments from year to year."

The term "eligibility," as used in the unemployment compensation field, includes many statutorily prescribed factors which themselves differ from state to state. These …

The Labor Dispute Disqualification -- A Primer And Some Problems, Jerre S. Williams

Vanderbilt Law Review

Particularly in the last five years there has been a substantial maturing of the labor dispute disqualification of the various state unemployment compensation statutes. The unpredictable and vacillating administrative decision has given way to more authoritative court decision. In turn, the nonconforming court decision has tended to disappear as clear majority interpretations of the various questions arising under the disqualification begin to develop. Further, and perhaps most significantly, a number of states which have experimented with various nonconforming types of labor dispute disqualification provisions have tended to abandon these experiments and return to the more conventional pattern. Hence, with regard …

Experience Rating: Its Objectives, Problems And Economic Implications, Edwin R. Teple, Charles G. Nowacek

Vanderbilt Law Review

Within a decade, the system of rate differentiation which has become one of the distinctive characteristics of the unemployment insurance program in the United States spread from the North Woods to the shores of the Gulf of Mexico. The idea so vigorously advocated by Professors John R. Commons and Harold M. Groves, and their Wisconsin colleagues, having been first put into effect under the Wisconsin Law in 1938, was finally incorporated in the Mississippi Law in 1948. Though unknown to the older European systems, experience rating thus took a firm grip upon the program in this country.

A Symposium On Unemployment Insurance - Foreword, Stuart Rothman -- General Counsel, Federal Security Agency

Vanderbilt Law Review

Any statutory program which has such an impact on our economic life is worth consideration by law students and lawyers. More and more, workers and employers will need to consult with lawyers about their rights under the unemployment insurance laws. An increasing number of unemployment insurance cases are being appealed to the courts and an increasing amount of unemployment insurance legislation is being introduced in state legislatures. This symposium will give law students, lawyers, judges and legislators some background information, as well as a discussion of significant legal problems; it will help all to a better understanding of the unemployment …

Administrative Law Problems In The Unemployment Insurance Program, Reginald Parker

Vanderbilt Law Review

"A good government," Albert Einstein said recently, "not only gives its citizens a maximum amount of liberty and political rights but also provides for a certain amount of economic security."' Our Constitution provides for political rights and liberties but not for economic security. Unlike foreign federal constitutions it neither provides for it directly nor delegates social legislation to the states; nor does the Constitution expressly prohibit this type of law. As, however, the Constitution authorizes the states to exercise powers not reserved to the central government, it may be deduced that unemployment relief legislation is within the competence of the …

Book Reviews, Lloyd P. Stryker, Howard J. Graham (Reviewer)

Vanderbilt Law Review

Book Reviews

The American Lawyer

Albert P. Blaustein Charles O. Porter with Charles T. Duncan Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,1954. Pp. xiii, 360. $5.50.

reviewer: Lloyd Paul Stryker

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American Business Corporations Until 1860; with Special Reference to Massachusetts

By Edwin Merrick Dodd. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1954. Pp. xix, 524. $7.50

reviewer: Howard Jay Graham

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

RECENT CASES

Criminal Law--Insanity--Test of Irresponsibility

Criminal Procedure--Continuances--Delay of Trial Because of Crowded Civil Docket

Elections--Underage Candidate--Power of Judiciary over Names Appearing on Ballot

Federal Rules of Civil Procedure--Impleader--UnderRule 14(a)--Effect of Judgment between Plaintiff and Third-Party Defendant

Husband and Wife--Expenses of Last Illness--Husband's Right to Reimbursement under Wife's Will

Joint Tort Feasors--Release of One as Release of All--Application of Rule when First Tort Feasor is not Legally Liable

Restraint of Trade--Employee's Covenant Not to Compete--State-Wide Restraint

Specific Performance--Conveyance of Leased Premises upon Lessee's Exercise of Option to Purchase--Defense of Hardship

Unemployment Compensation--"Suitable" Employment--Refusal of Sabbath on Religious Grounds

Wrongful Death--Unborn …

Book Note, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Book Note

Tax Planning for Estates (1955 Revision)

By William J. Bowe

Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 1955. Pp. 98. $3.00

Disqualification For Unemployment Insurance, Paul H. Sanders

Vanderbilt Law Review

Our public arrangements in this country for compensating unemployment (including the aggregate of federal and state legislation to that end) are quite properly referred to as an "insurance" program.' Study of the elements of coverage in an insurance policy will be found instructive, therefore, in the matter of eligibility and disqualification for unemployment benefits. A contract of insurance is designed to transfer certain defined risks from the insured to the insurer. The risks selected for this process in a particular policy will be described or stated affirmatively in its provisions. Certain exclusions from the risk may be specified for even …

Federal Standards In Unemployment Insurance, Frank T. De Vyver

Vanderbilt Law Review

Some of the most vigorous arguments during meetings of the Federal Advisory Council of the Bureau of Employment Security have concerned federal standards.' "Federalizers" was the name attached by industry groups to those advocating change in existing standards, and labor groups strongly denounced industry members of the Council for insisting that existing federal standards are sufficient. Nor did industry members hesitate to condemn the Secretary of Labor, the Director of the Bureau of Employment Security and other Bureau employees for suggesting legislation to strengthen federal standards. Discussions of the subject at Council meetings were never free from emotion. Yet an …

The Guaranteed Annual Wage And Unemployment Compensation, Ernest J. Eberling

Vanderbilt Law Review

The recent demands of the CIO unions for the guaranteed annual wage have aroused considerable interest in this issue among those concerned with labor-management relations. Several factors have accentuated this interest. First, during 1954 when these demands were being pressed with considerable vigor, a recession had developed,resulting in a considerable increase in unemployment levels. Second, these demands were made on mass production industries manufacturing durable goods which are subject to wide variations in demand and output during periods of cyclical change. Third, the recent proposals are taking a form quite different from the existing plans, namely, they propose an integration …