Law Commons^™

The Law Of Nonmarriage, Albertina Antognini

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The meaning of marriage, and how it regulates intimate relationships, has been at the forefront of recent scholarly and public debates. Yet despite the attention paid to marriage—especially in the wake of Obergefell v. Hodges—a record number of people are not marrying. Legal scholarship has mostly neglected how the law regulates these nonmarital relationships. This Article begins to fill the gap. It does so by examining how courts distribute property at the end of a relationship that was nonmarital at some point. This inquiry provides a descriptive account to a poorly understood and largely under-theorized area of the law. …

Planned Parenthood: Adult Adoption And The Right Of Adoptees To Inherit, Richard C. Ausness

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This Article is concerned with the effect of adult adoptions on the inheritance rights (in the broad sense of that term) of adult adoptees. The Article contends many adult adoption statutes assume the existence of a parent-child relationship in which the adopter is the “parent” and the adoptee is a “child” even though this is not true of all adult adoption cases. In addition, legislatures and courts frequently fail to differentiate between “quasi-familial” adoptions and “strategic” adoptions, particularly where inheritance rights are concerned.

The Right To Vote Under State Constitutions, Joshua A. Douglas

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This Article provides the first comprehensive look at state constitutional provisions explicitly granting the right to vote. We hear that the right to vote is "fundamental," the "essence of a democratic society," and "preservative of all rights." But courts and scholars are still searching for a solution to the puzzle of how best to protect voting rights, especially because the U.S. Supreme Court has underenforced the right to vote. The answer, however, is right in front of us: state constitutions. Virtually every state constitution includes direct, explicit language granting the right to vote, as contrasted with the U.S. Constitution, which …

Bankruptcy Voting And The Designation Power, Christopher W. Frost

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code is the only form of bankruptcy that requires winning the consent of the creditor body. Creditors are given the right to vote based on an underlying assumption that they will cast their votes to maximize recovery on their claims. When creditors collectively vote to further these distributional goals, then the estate in turn should realize the maximum value for its assets. "Value maximization" is one of the fundamental goals of chapter 11, and voting in bankruptcy is an important way of achieving that goal.

The problem with these assumptions is that creditors sometimes vote …

Discouraging Election Contests, Joshua A. Douglas

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This essay offers a few proposals for discouraging losing candidates from contesting the certified result of an election. The ultimate goal in any election, of course, is to ensure that a state declares as the winner the person who actually received the most votes. But when an election is close, a candidate on the losing side might see an incentive to continue the fight in the courts on the off-chance that it would change the outcome. The candidate could challenge, for example, certain provisional or absentee ballot—even if the likelihood that the candidate will win is slim (but still theoretically …

Performing Discretion Or Performing Discrimination: An Analysis Of Race And Ritual In Batson Decisions In Capital Jury Selection, Melynda J. Price

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Research shows the mere presence of Blacks on capital juries--on the rare occasions they are seated--can mean the difference between life and death. Peremptory challenges are the primary method to remove these pivotal participants. Batson v. Kentucky developed hearings as an immediate remedy for the unconstitutional removal of jurors through racially motivated peremptory challenges. These proceedings have become rituals that sanction continued bias in the jury selection process and ultimately affect the outcome of capital trials. This Article deconstructs the role of the Batson ritual in legitimating the removal of African American jurors. These perfunctory hearings fail to meaningfully interrogate …

Pfo Law Reform, A Crucial First Step Towards Sentencing Sanity In Kentucky, Robert G. Lawson

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The purpose of this article is to engage in some analysis and discussion of the part of this sentencing law that cries out loudest for reform (the state's persistent felony offender law), reform that in short order would begin to deflate the population that has our prisons and jails grossly overcrowded. In this analysis and discussion, there is some brief consideration of the justifications used to support repeat offender laws (Part I), a segment on the history and evolution of Kentucky's law (Part II), an examination of a selection of repeat offender laws from other states (Part III), a report …

Cox, Halprin, And Discriminatory Municipal Services Under The Fair Housing Act, Robert G. Schwemm

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This Article deals with Cox v. City of Dallas, Halprin v. Prairie Single Family Homes of Dearborn Park Ass’n, and the issue of whether the Federal Fair Housing Act (FHA) should be interpreted to outlaw discrimination in the provision of services by local governments. Part I describes the Cox litigation and its connection with Halprin. Part II surveys the pre-Cox cases that have dealt with discriminatory municipal services. Part III analyzes the FHA's relevant provisions and their legislative history and concludes that Cox and Halprin were wrong to deny FHA protection to current residents. Part IV …

A New Look At Sexual Harassment Under The Fair Housing Act: The Forgotten Role Of §3604(C), Robert G. Schwemm, Rigel C. Oliveri

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Sexual harassment in housing is a significant national problem. Although less visible than the comparable problem in employment, sexual harassment in housing may be as prevalent and probably more devastating to its victims.

Nevertheless, relatively little attention has been paid to this issue or to the law that should govern it. Indeed, the law of sexual harassment in housing developed well after and in virtual lock-step with the law of sexual harassment in employment. Thus, courts have simply interpreted the Fair Housing Act (FHA) to prohibit sexual harassment to the same degree—and only to the same degree—as it is prohibited …

Burdine V. Johnson -- To Sleep, Perchance To Get A New Trial: Presumed Prejudice Arising From Sleeping Counsel, James M. Donovan

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Few images slice as deeply into our self-image as a fair society than that of a defendant on trial for his very life depending upon the services of an attorney who naps throughout the proceedings. Although this scenario is not new, the courts have yet to resolve definitively how they should respond to a defendant burdened with snoozing counsel. This note discusses the outcome of the latest attempt. UPDATE: While a conscious lawyer is presumably a requirement of due process, some jurisdictions make no similar demand that judges remain awake: see http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/nsw/NSWCCA/2007/273.html

Discriminatory Housing Statements And §3604(C): A New Look At The Fair Housing Act’S Most Intriguing Provision, Robert G. Schwemm

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Today, more than three decades after the 1968 Fair Housing Act ("FHA") banned such behavior, blatant discrimination—often accompanied by racist slurs and other explicitly discriminatory statements—continues to plague America's housing markets. The FHA not only outlawed discrimination in most housing transactions on the basis of race, color, religion, and national origin, but also contained a specific prohibition, § 3604(c), banning all discriminatory housing statements. Unlike the FHA's more traditional prohibitions against discriminatory refusals to deal and discriminatory terms and conditions, § 3604(c)'s ban on discriminatory statements has not been the subject of much litigation or debate.

Part I of the …

The Overwhelming Case For Elimination Of The Integration Doctrine Under The Securities Act Of 1933, Rutheford B. Campbell Jr.

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The thesis of this Article is that the Securities and Exchange Commission should entirely eliminate the integration doctrine from the Securities Act of1933. Under the integration doctrine, a single "offering" or "issue" of securities cannot be split. The doctrine is expensive for society and furthers no valid policy of the 1933 Act. More specifically, the doctrine does not promote investor protection but does retard capital formation, an outcome that is contrary to the presently articulated purposes of the 1933 Act.

Part II of this Article traces the history of the adoption of the integration doctrine both by the Commission and …

The Enforcement Of Prisoners’ Rights In The United States: An Access To The Courts Issue, Roberta M. Harding

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This article examines how the development and status of the rights of incarcerated people is significantly effected by their ability to access the judiciary; specifically the federal judicial system. The relatively recent explosion in the American prison population provided the impetus for researching this topic. The objective was to examine whether this tremendous rise in the number of people incarcerated in U.S. penal facilities had impacted the posture of the rights afforded to these individuals. One conclusion reached was that the rise in the prison population had harshly eroded the right of access to the courts. The exploration of the …

Treasury Regulations And Judicial Deference In The Post-Chevron Era, David A. Brennen

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Analysis of several post-Chevron cases indicates that every major Supreme Court case since 1984 involving the validity of a Treasury regulation is consistent with Chevron. Indeed, since 1984 every challenged Treasury regulation interpreting a statute in which Congress failed to address a specific tax issue has been upheld by the Court. In fact, no Supreme Court case since 1984 could be discovered in which the Court invalidated a Treasury regulation on the grounds that it was an unreasonable interpretation of a statute. Several post-Chevron Supreme

Court decisions, however, rejected the Treasury's application of a tax regulation to …

A Positive Analysis Of The Common Law Of Corporate Fiduciary Duties, Rutheford B. Campbell Jr.

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The purpose of this Article is to offer a positive analysis of the common law of corporate managers' fiduciary duties. The Article attempts to explain the present shape of these corporate fiduciary duties by reference to Pareto criteria.

A particular state of affairs ("state B") is considered to be Pareto superior to another state of affairs ("state A") if at least one person in state B is better off than he or she is in state A and no one in state B is worse off than he or she is in state A. Since in a move from state …

Direct Liability For Hazardous Substance Cleanups Under Cercla: A Comprehensive Approach, Michael P. Healy

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

In enacting the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation & Liability Act (CERCLA), Congress intended to impose liability for hazardous substance cleanups on all parties responsible for a site's use and contamination. However, in implementing the CERCLA liability scheme, courts have issued opinions offering unclear and misguided explanations of their decisions. The author suggests that, to properly assure CERCLA's proper operation, the basis for the imposition of liability must be clarified. To this end, the author examines the prescribed liability for individuals, parent corporations and secured creditors and explains the appropriate grounds for the responsibility of each.

Confessions Of An Ethics Chairman, Richard H. Underwood

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This article responds to the critics of state bar ethics committees. Indirectly, it raises some questions about the need, or at least the extent of the need, for yet another law-related cottage industry (the for hire legal ethics consultant). It also provides some friendly advice for those well-meaning types in every jurisdiction who are perennially "reforming" or "energizing" their bar associations and demanding for the "membership" a dazzling new array of services. It discusses practical problems that have gone unmentioned in the limited literature, just as it takes issue with many of the assertions that have been made in that …

Compensatory Damages In Federal Fair Housing Cases, Robert G. Schwemm

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The federal fair housing laws became effective in 1968. Since then, courts have often awarded damages to victims of housing discrimination, but their decisions have provided little guidance for assessing the amount of such awards. There is a great range of awards, with some courts awarding only nominal damages of $1 and others setting awards of over $20,000. Compounding the problem is the difficulty of measuring the principal element of damages claimed by most plaintiffs in fair housing cases, noneconomic emotional harm or other forms of intangible injury.

Rarely is the basis for the amount of the court's award satisfactorily …

Pendent Jurisdiction - The Problem Of "Pendenting Parties", William H. Fortune

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Federal courts have generally discouraged the joinder of a third party solely on the basis of a claim pendent to a federal cause of action. They have, however, been more liberal in allowing joinder in diversity cases. The author reviews the case law and argues that a more liberal attitude toward joinder should be adopted, except in diversity cases where, he believes, liberal joinder erodes the requirement of complete diversity.