Law Commons^™

The Digital Accountability And Transparency Act Of 2011 (Data): Using Open Data Principles To Revamp Spending Transparency Legislation, Jillian Raines '12

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Finding The Groove: A Path Forward On Terminations Of Sound Recording Transfers, Adam Rich '12

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Dodd-Frank And International Regulatory Convergence: The Case For Mutual Recognition, Nicholas W. Turner '12

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

President John Adams And Four Chief Justices: An Essay For James F. Simon, R.B. Bernstein

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Introduction, Peter J. Strauss

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Terminating Parental Rights Through A Backdoor In The Virginia Code, Dale Margolin Cecka

Law Faculty Publications

This article explores deficits in the statute, in light of constitutional law, other Virginia adoption and termination of parental rights statutes, and other states' codes and jurisprudence. Part II describes the history and practice of the statute. Part III describes the flaws of the statute, including Fourteenth Amendment violations and inherent conflicts of interest. Part IV calls for the revision of section 1202(H) based on recent precedent in which the Supreme Court of Virginia recognized the sanctity of the parent-child relationship and the state's interest in preserving it.

Dancing With The Derivatives Devil: Mutual Funds' Dangerous Liaison With Complex Investment Contracts And The Forgotten Lessons Of 1940, Kelly S. Kibbie

UC Law Business Journal

This Article examines the implications of the drastic increase in the use of complex derivative instruments by mutual funds and the inadequacy of the current statutory and regulatory framework to protect investors. With a series of derivatives disasters and with ninety-four percent of individual mutual fund investors saving for retirementemphasize the need for prompt reform. The 1940 Act was not designed to address complex derivative instruments utilized today and actually prohibits most derivative transactions by mutual funds. Further, the SEC has never engaged in any rulemaking with respect to derivatives transactions by mutual funds. Thus, reforms must be enacted to …

To Tax Or Not To Tax, That Is The Question: A Critique Of The United States’ Policy On Taxation Of Servers, Christopher Trester

UC Law Business Journal

The international tax authorities are struggling to create an effective scheme to generate revenue from electronic commerce (“e-commerce”). Currently, the United Stateshas no clear policy on the taxation of these transactions, which deters international companies from locating their servers within the United States based on the fear of high tax rates and uncertain results. The United States should adopt a domestic and international policy that focuses on a consumption-based approach to taxing e-commerce. However, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (“OECD”) and several member countries recommend using source-based concept of permanent establishment to tax the transactions based on the …

Occupy Information: The Case For Freedom Of Corporate Information, Roy Peled

UC Law Business Journal

Demands for oversight over government operations and the desire for citizens to become more engaged in the democratic process had helped usher in the Freedom of Information Act. This Article argues for extending a similar general duty of disclosure requirement to corporations, because corporations hold pertinent information required for democratic participation. This Article examines the justifications for this general duty of disclosure and reviews existing disclosure mechanisms employ by various countries.

Cloud Computing And State Sales Tax, Tuan Q. Ngo

UC Law Business Journal

Once a significant source of states’ revenue, the state sales tax systems in state public finance now face formidable challenges. Cloud computing brings to light the inherent flaw in a tax system. While some states have extended their sales taxes to apply to cloud computing services, others have explicitly determined that such services are not taxable. Drawing the distinction between tangible property versus service as the basis for imposing sales tax is no longer a workable framework for cloud computing services. Addressing the systemic problem of the sales tax system requires shedding this outdated paradigm. This Note examines the piecemeal …

Six Years On And Still Counting: Sifting Through The Mortgage Mess, Robert Hockett

UC Law Business Journal

U.S. primary and secondary real estate and mortgage markets reman one of the principal drags upon economic recovery. Upwards of 12 million new mortgages face foreclosure in the coming six years. The reason for this self-perpetuating slump is exceedingly complex, thanks to the large number of causal factors in play. After identifying the principal interests at stake and the constituencies that hold these interests, this article identifies the impediments thatprevent economic recovery and proposes a solution to remove them. The conclusion reached is that municipalities exercising their eminent domain powers in partnership with investors are best situated to move the …

Burning Man: A Case Study Of Altruism Thriving In A For-Profit Organizational Form And The Rationales For Llc-To-Nonprofit Conversion, Yuan Ji

UC Law Business Journal

Burning Man is a temporary city of over 50,000 citizens that exists for one week every year in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert. It is best known in popular culture for its celebration of interactive art, gift economy, and ritualistic burning of a large wooden structure in the shape of a man. The case study of Burning Man illustrates that an altruistic, not profit driven, organization can thrive in a for-profit legal form without abandoning its mission. Nevertheless, this article discusses the theories on nonprofit formation and suggests rationales for Burning Man’s conversion to a nonprofit structure. This articlealso makes specific …

Avic International A Success: How Regulatory Changes To Cfius Has Limited Political Interference And Empowered Chinese Investors To Obtain A Successful Review, Amrietha Nellan

UC Law Business Journal

Chinese businesses are wary of merging or acquiring United States companies due to a perceived hostile environment. The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (“CFIUS”) may deny the transaction or make recommendations to the President to divest a completed deal if a risk is found. After a string of highly public failed CFIUS reviews against Chinese acquirers, the process seemed insurmountable for Chinese investors.The recent success of a Chinese aviation firm, AVIC International, in acquiring a U.S. based aviation companyindicates that the United States is not an impenetrablemarket for Chinese investors. In particular, AVIC International’s use of the …

Defending Patagonia: Mergers Andacquisitions With Benefit Corporations, J. Haskell Murray

UC Law Business Journal

The timeliness of financial reporting has been an important topic in the accounting literature for decades. There is a trade-off between the timeliness of reporting and the value of the information being reported. Prior to the advent of the internet, reporting had to be done using print media. However, now that many companies post their annual and quarterly reports on the internet, it is possible to report in a more timely fashion than has previously been possible. The problem is that companies in some countries do not make full use of this disclosure tool. They sometimes take many months to …

Gatekeeping Post-Uniloc: Expert Testimony In Multi-Component Patent Litigation, Erika Mayo

UC Law Business Journal

In recent years, the Federal Circuit has made an effort to rein in excessive or unfounded patent damages awards. In Uniloc v. Microsoft, the Federal Circuit granted a motion for retrial on the issue of damages, rejecting the validity of plaintiff’s damages expert testimony. This note advocates a broad reading of Uniloc and encourages trial courts to take a greater role in providing juries with sound methodology for assessing damages. Specifically, this article encourages the use of court-appointed damages experts to restore predictability in the U.S. patent system.

Franchise Goodwill: Take A Sad Song And Make It Better, Robert W. Emerson

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The end of a franchisor-franchisee relationship is often like a divorce, with the parties engaged in a heated battle over the ownership of the franchise goodwill. In this debate, the same franchisors or franchisees often change their positions on goodwill ownership depending on current needs. This Article analyzes cases in many areas of franchise law to determine why franchisors and franchisees engage in such inconsistent reasoning, what the consequences are for franchising, and if there are ways to produce a more logical and efficient form of analysis and debate. In addressing the most contentious issues of franchising, adherence by litigants …

An Insurance Structure To Encourage Investment In Preventative Health Care, Nicholas Georgakopoulos

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The incentives for investments in Americans' health are poorly aligned. Health insurers are not sufficiently motivated to invest for the long term. The structure of health insurance does not compensate insurers for investments in lasting health, such as measures preventing chronic disease. If an American changes insurers, the new insurer reaps the benefits of the good health the prior insurer's investment produced. This Essay explores insurers' incentives to invest in health, illustrates how those incentives fail, explores possible improvements, and shows that subsequent insurers should have an obligation to compensate the prior insurer for the averted expenses of expected diseases …

Past The Pillars Of Hercules: Francis Bacon And The Science Of Rulemaking, Daniel R. Coquillette

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The parallels between Bacon's career and that of Edward H. Cooper are, of course, obvious. Bacon was one of the great legal minds of his day. Unlike the common-law judges who formed the law by deciding cases, Bacon expressed his greatness in writing brilliant juristic treatises and, as Lord Chancellor, drafting one of the first modern rule systems, the Ordinances in Chancery (1617-1620). Indeed, my thesis is that Bacon invented modern, scientific rulemaking by fusing his new theories of inductive, empirical research with the traditions of equitable pleading and is, in fact, the intellectual forbearer of the likes of Charles …

Shoes That Did Not Drop, Richard Marcus

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

I take "Shoes That Did Not Drop"' as my topic because I appreciate, by now, that what the Advisory Committee on Civil Rules does not do is, in some ways, as important as what it does. Similarly, the decision not to do something is equally important as, and may be more difficult than, the decision to do something. It may sometimes seem that amending the Rules is too easy. Greg Joseph once said that they are amended as often as the telephone book. Some even think that it was a mistake to create a Rules Committee.3 These reactions are overstated, …

Thinking, Big And Small, Stephen B. Burbank

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Reading Kahneman's book and thinking about a tribute to Ed Cooper that has more substance than a bouquet have caused me to reflect on a phenomenon within the world of legal scholarship. I would call it a cognate phenomenon, but that would dishonor the empirical basis of Kahneman's work by suggesting a firmer basis for my reflections than the power of analogical reasoning. The phenomenon is the view that the goal of legal scholarship is or should be big ideas, particularly if they can claim the mantle of theory, rather than small ideas, particularly if they can be tarred with …

Is Now The Time For Simplified Rules Of Civil Procedure, Paul V. Niemeyer

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Unfortunately, any objective evaluation of current federal civil process will inevitably lead to the conclusion that the process is functioning inadequately in its purpose of discharging justice speedily and inexpensively. One need only ask any trial lawyer whether he can try a medium-sized commercial dispute to judgment in a federal court in less than three years and at a cost of less than six figures. Is the iconic appellation of "making a federal case out of a dispute" not the ultimate condemnation of current judicial process in federal courts? Can we understand the private bar's flight from federal courts to …

The Twelve-Person Federal Civil Jury In Exile, Thomas D. Rowe Jr.

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In the mid-1990s, the Advisory Committee on Civil Rules, with Fifth Circuit Judge Patrick Higginbotham as Chair and our honoree, Professor Ed Cooper, in the early years of his long service as Reporter, unanimously (coincidentally, by a 12-0 vote) proposed an amendment to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 48 that would have required the seating of twelve-member juries in federal civil trials. The requirement of a unanimous verdict, unless waived by the parties, and the abolition of alternate jurors would have been unaffected; attrition could reduce a jury's size below twelve members, with a floor of six unless the parties …

Professor Ed Cooper: Zen Minimalist, Linda S. Mullenix

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In celebration of his twentieth year as the Reporter for the Advisory Committee on Civil Rules, I write to contribute some modest reflections on Professor Cooper's tenure as Advisory Committee Reporter. My comments are those of an academic who had the opportunity to observe the Advisory Committee for nearly a decade, but they are largely the comments of an outsider. Readers might be disappointed to find that there is no dish or inside baseball here.

What Ed Cooper Has Taught Me About The Realities And Complexities Of Appellate Jurisdiction And Procedure, Catherine T. Struve

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this brief essay, I will describe some of what I have learned from Ed Cooper as a fellow participant in the rulemaking process and as a coauthor of two volumes of his Federal Practice and Procedure treatise. To describe everything that Ed has taught me would require much more than the length of this essay. So instead, I will try to offer some representative examples-or, as Ed might say, some "sketches." Because others will discuss Ed's expert guidance of the Rules Committees' consideration of key issues concerning the Civil Rules, my discussion of Ed's scholarship and reporting work will …

Patricia Nelson Limerick With James L. Hanson, A Ditch In Time: The City, The West, And Water, Sarah J. Mcgrath

Water Law Review

No abstract provided.

Blood, Sweat, And Years: The Colorado River Cooperative Agreement Allocates Limited Water Supplies, Adam Thiessen

Water Law Review

No abstract provided.

Client Counseling Competition For Excellence In The Lawyering Process 1972–2013, Notre Dame Law School

Student, Faculty, and Staff Awards

Notre Dame Law School Client Counseling Competition

For Excellence in the Lawyering Process

Volume 4 Issue 2 (2013), Case Western Reserve Journal Of Law, Technology And The Internet

Journal of Law, Technology, & the Internet

No abstract provided.

Christian Parking, Hindu Parking: Applying Established Civil Rights Principles To Rluipa's Nondiscrimination Provision, Roman P. Storzer, Blair Lazarus Storzer

Richmond Journal of Law and the Public Interest

This article is divided into three parts. First, it explores certain issues inherent in a Nondiscrimination claim, including how the Nondiscrimination provision has been mistakenly conflated with other RLUIPA land use provisions, whether a showing of direct hostility toward a particular faith by governmental actors is required, and what might qualify as adequate comparators in a case where a claimant asserts that it was treated differently and worse than similarly situated applicants. Second, the article proposes application of the reasoning in McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green to some Nondiscrimination claims. This would be achieved by burden shifting; after the plaintiff …

The Mosaic Theory In Individual Rights Litigation: On The Genealogy And Expansion Of A Concept, Robert M. Pallitto

Richmond Journal of Law and the Public Interest

This article explores the use of the concept of "mosaics" in individual rights litigation, a topic that has received virtually no scholarly attention. Originally a construct used in analysis of intelligence data, the mosaic theory has been transposed to the litigation context and applied in a range of recent case law. Here, the article examines the theory's use in two settings that have important implications for individual liberties: to support the state secrets privilege as a form of information control, and to defeat habeas petitions filed by "war on terror" detainees. In these areas, the mosaic concept is used in …