Law Commons^™

Does It Hurt A State To Introduce An Income Tax?, David J. Shakow

All Faculty Scholarship

In an article in the Wall Street Journal, Arthur Laffer argued that, since 1960, the introduction of state income taxes reduced the relative size of a state’s gross state product and its relative per capita personal income. This paper criticizes Laffer’s conclusions on a number of grounds. 1. He uses incorrect figures for per capita income. In fact, relative per capita income rose in a majority of states that introduced an income tax since 1960. 2. The results are not clear when a state’s data is compared to other states in its region, rather than to the United States as …

No Student Left Behind: Ensuring The Accessibility Of Reading Technologies At Universities, Gary C. Norman

The Modern American

The author discusses the perspective of blind and vision impaired persons in relation to the introduction of emerging technologies. If they are not accessible to all students, such technology will impede an equal education of students with disabilities.

A Modern Twist On The Prison Industrial Complex, Isis Goldberg

The Modern American

The author discusses a new NPR article, “Prison Economics Help Drive Arizona Immigration Law,” that sheds light into the role that the private prison industry played in pushing forward Arizona´s controversial legislation, SB 1070. She relates this to the theory of prison-industrial complex postulated by Angela Davis, professor and former Black Panther member, and concludes that private corporations should not have influence or participate in drafting legislation because they do not have the public welfare at interest.

Prison Labor, Human Experimentation, & The Bp Oil Disaster, Zannie Carlson

The Modern American

The author argues that when BP hired prison labor to clean up the spill, corrections agencies failed to consider the impact of handling toxic chemicals on prisoner health.

Election Report: A "Heartland" Vote For Islamic Bigotry, Richael Faithful

The Modern American

The author discusses the legal community’s reaction to the Oklahoma referendum on November 1, 2010, in which voters approved a state constitutional amendment that bans the use of Islamic Law and international law in state court decisions.

In Drag On Drugs, Ibpp Editor

International Bulletin of Political Psychology

Since commentators generally assert that the war on illegal and illicit drugs has been a failure, we should evaluate the assertion and, then, opine on why there is a war, winnable or not.

America´S Access To Guns And The Effect It Has On American Gangs And Political Instability Abroad, Isis Goldberg

The Modern American

The author discusses the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms and how easy access to guns has triggered an epidemic of violence and murder in urban communities, increased insecurity in schools, and made gangs more dangerous.

Dadt, Doma And Fidelity To The Constitution, David Wexelblat

The Modern American

The author defends the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) decision to appeal the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT) ruling on constitutional grounds: The Executive Branch has a constitutional obligation to defend the laws duly enacted by Congress

A Reflection On Employment Challenges And Opportunities, Gary C. Norman

The Modern American

The author discusses President Obama’s reinstatement of Executive Order 13163 of the Clinton administration that required the federal government to be a model employer and to increase the numbers of targeted disabilities in the federal workforce.

It’S Still A Secret, But Not For Long: A Dadt Play-By-Play, Alexandra Manrique

The Modern American

The author discusses the zig-zag by Congress, the White House, and the Departments of Defense and Justice to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the policy prohibiting gay citizens to serve openly in the military.

High Heels In 2010?, Shailee Diwanji

The Modern American

The author discusses modern dress codes that require female employees to wear skirts and high heels, and which the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has generally held, and courts have ratified, that employers may establish varying dress codes for men and women without violating discrimination laws.

The Peregrinations Of A Post Graduate Law Student And Legal Professional With A Guide Dog, Gary C. Norman

The Modern American

The author offers two personal anecdotes involving a cafeteria worker and taxicab coordinator to illustrate that respect for persons with disabilities has a ways to go.

Education Everywhere: The Popular Awareness Surrounding Education Reform, Alexandra Manrique

The Modern American

The author applauds the extensive media and political coverage of education reform.

Amidst Ongoing Slavery In The South, One Group’S Efforts To Enforce The 13th Amendment, Zannie Carlson

The Modern American

The author lauds the advocacy of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) to prosecute Florida landowners engaged in forced labor and indentured servitude of workers.

Dissecting The Pieces From A New Study, Picked Apart: The Hidden Struggles Of Migrant Women In The Maryland Crab Industry, Richael Faithful

The Modern American

The author discusses the findings of the recent report produced by the American University Washington College of Law Immigrant Justice Clinic, “Picked Apart: The Hidden Struggles of Migrant Working Women In The Maryland Crab Industry.”

Help The Homeless -- Is It Enough?, Shailee Diwanji

The Modern American

The author discusses the increase in violence against homeless people and state and federal initiatives to pass legislation designating violence against the homeless as a hate crime.

Immature Citizens And The State, Vivian E. Hamilton

Faculty Publications

Citizens are born, but they are also made. How its citizens come to be—whether the educations they receive will expand or constrain their future options, whether the values they assimilate will encourage or dissuade their civic engagement, etc.—fundamentally concerns the state. Through the power it wields over a vast range of policymaking contexts, the state can significantly influence (or designate those who will influence) many of the formative experiences of young citizens. Young citizens’ accumulated experiences in turn can significantly influence the future mature citizens they will become. The state insufficiently considers the cumulative nature of its citizens’ development, however. …

The New Financial Deal: Understanding The Dodd-Frank Act And Its (Unintended) Consequences, David A. Skeel Jr.

All Faculty Scholarship

Contrary to rumors that the Dodd-Frank Act is an incoherent mess, its 2,319 pages have two very clear objectives: limiting the risk of the shadow banking system by more carefully regulating derivatives and large financial institutions; and limiting the damage caused by a financial institution’s failure. The new legislation also has a theme: government partnership with the largest Wall Street banks. The vision emerged almost by accident from the Bear Stearns and AIG bailouts of 2008 and the commandeering of the bankruptcy process to rescue Chrysler and GM in 2009. Its implications for derivatives regulation could prove beneficial: Dodd-Frank will …

Sex V. Race, Again, Tracy A. Thomas

Akron Law Faculty Publications

In this book, feminists speak out on race and gender in the 2008 presidential campaign. Who should be first? With Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton as frontrunners, the 2008 Democratic primary campaign was a watershed moment in U.S. history. Offering the choice of an African American man or a white woman as the next Democratic candidate for president, the primary marked an unprecedented moment—but one that painfully echoed previous struggles for progressive change that pitted race and gender against each other. Who Should Be First? collects key feminist voices that challenge the instances of racism and sexism during the presidential …

Sex V. Race, Again, Tracy A. Thomas

Tracy A. Thomas

In this book, feminists speak out on race and gender in the 2008 presidential campaign. Who should be first? With Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton as frontrunners, the 2008 Democratic primary campaign was a watershed moment in U.S. history. Offering the choice of an African American man or a white woman as the next Democratic candidate for president, the primary marked an unprecedented moment—but one that painfully echoed previous struggles for progressive change that pitted race and gender against each other. Who Should Be First? collects key feminist voices that challenge the instances of racism and sexism during the presidential …

Preservation Ethics In The Case Of Nebraska’S Nationally Registered Historic Properties, Darren Michael Adams

Department of Geography: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This dissertation focuses on the National Register of Historic Places and considers the geographical implications of valuing particular historic sites over others. Certain historical sites will either gain or lose desirability from one era to the next, this dissertation identifies and explains three unique preservation ethical eras, and it maps the sites which were selected during those eras. These eras are the Settlement Era (1966 – 1975), the Commercial Architecture Era (1976 – 1991), and the Progressive Planning Era (1992 – 2010). The findings show that transformations in the program included an early phase when state authorities listed historical resources …

Through The Looking Glass: Finding And Freeing Modern-Day Slaves At The State Level, Michelle L. Rickert

Faculty Publications and Presentations

This article delves into the interaction between federal and state laws prohibiting human trafficking. The article advocates for comprehensive human trafficking laws at the state level, including police training, victim aftercare, forfeiture, and prosecution as essential elements. It looks comprehensively at the existing state laws prohibiting human trafficking. Additionally it examines the five existing models for state law and suggests benefits and potential improvements for each model. The article concludes y advocating a holistic law prohibiting human trafficking in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

The Modern Irrationalities Of American Criminal Codes: An Empirical Study Of Offense Grading, Paul H. Robinson, Thomas Gaeta, Matthew Majarian, Megan Schultz, Douglas M. Weck

All Faculty Scholarship

The Model Penal Code made great advances in clarity and legality, moving most of the states from a mix of common law and ad hoc statutes to the modern American form of a comprehensive, succinct code that has served as a model around the world. Yet the decades since the wave of Model Code-based codifications have seen a steady degradation of American codes brought on by a relentless and accelerating rate of criminal law amendments that ignore the style, format, and content of the existing codes. The most damaging aspect of this trend is the exponentially increasing number of offense …

Spot Off: The Gao Takes On The Tsa’S Behavior Detection Program, Ibpp Editor

International Bulletin of Political Psychology

The United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) has recently Issued Efforts to Validate TSA’s Passenger Screening Behavior Detection Program Underway, but Opportunities Exist to Strengthen Validation and Address Operational Problems (May 2010, GAO-10-763). This IBPP article will describe and comment on the main GAO findings and additional data on which the findings are based. The article will end with some basic challenges to behavior detection as a useful security measure.

Contesting The Dinosaur Image: The Labor Movement’S Search For A Future, Richard W. Hurd

Richard W Hurd

[Excerpt] But the increased effectiveness of labor's political activities has not resulted in major improvements legislatively, and now there is a hostile President who opposes nearly every aspect of the union policy agenda. The promise for the future lies in the demonstrated ability to mobilize at the grassroots. But there are recent signs that national unions are breaking ranks and pursuing narrow self interest. The USWA joined with the steel industry to persuade the Bush administration to restrict imports, and even hinted at a possible endorsement for his reelection in 2004 (Murray). The UMWA has praised the president's energy policy, …

Think Outside The Cell: Are Binding Detention Standards The Most Effective Strategy To Prevent Abuses Of Detained Illegal Aliens?, Federico D. Burlon

Political Science Honors Projects

In the last twenty years the U.S. government has increasingly utilized detention to control illegal immigration. This practice has become controversial because it has caused numerous in-custody abuses and deaths of immigrants, asylum seekers, refugees and even citizens. Immigrant rights advocates have called for the passage of binding detention standards to prevent in-custody abuses. This thesis’s policy analysis reveals, however, that while they may finesse the practice of immigration detention, such binding standards would be ineffective in protecting immigrants’ rights. Instead this policy analysis calls for and explains the feasibility of discontinuing the practice of mass immigrant detention.

Global Agricultural Price Supports: The Political And Economic Forces That Drive Unsustainable Agricultural Protectionism Policy, John Francis Hays

Dissertations

Agricultural tariffs and price supports are the last bastion of US and European protectionism. While all other areas of commerce have embraced change and welcomed open-market international commerce, agriculture has remained the lone holdout.

The small farmers for whom these support programs were designed no longer exist. Yet governments appropriate billions of dollars annually for the continued support of these outdated programs.

The fact that these governmental agencies resist change, even in an age of economic crises, record national debt, and one of the highest negative trade balances in history, is testimony to American civic indifference.

Public apathy precludes timely …

May Roundtable: The Downfall Of Human Rights? Introduction

Human Rights & Human Welfare

An annotation of:

“The Downfall of Human Rights” by Joshua Kurlantzick. Newsweek. February 19, 2010.

A Positive View Of The Trajectory Of The Human Rights Movement, David Akerson

Human Rights & Human Welfare

In 1988, during the waning days of apartheid in South Africa, I was a young American lawyer working for South African Lawyers for Human Rights in Pretoria. On one occasion, I accompanied some of my African colleagues to a conference, the purpose of which was to begin visualizing post-apartheid South Africa. While the apartheid regime was still in power, it was clearly in hasty retreat, and it was equally clear that its days were numbered. The African majority would soon be taking over the reigns of power, and they were excited to begin visualizing what freedom and human rights might …

Hope, Despair, And Human Rights, James Pattison

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Joshua Kurlantzick's “The Downfall of Human Rights” in Newsweek makes for a sobering read. The major Western states, he argues, are no longer interested in the promotion of human rights, but are instead focused on rebuilding themselves after the global recession. Kurlantzick notes further that the Obama administration avoids strong criticism of China, Russia, and other human rights violators because of its desire to demarcate itself from the previous administration's moralizing democracy promotion. To add to Kurlantzick's case for the West's lack of concern about human rights, one could cite the recent and blatantly human rights-violating anti-terror laws of several …