Law Commons^™

Reforming Property Law To Address Devastating Land Loss, Thomas W. Mitchell

Thomas W. Mitchell

Tenancy-in-common ownership represents the most widespread form of common ownership of real property in the United States. Such ownership under the default rules also represents the most unstable ownership of real property in this country. Thousands of tenancy-in-common property owners, including members of many poor and minority families, have lost their commonly-owned property due to court-ordered, forced partition sales as well as much of their real estate wealth associated with such ownership as a result of such sales. Though some scholars and the media have highlighted how thousands of African-Americans have lost an untold amount of property and substantial real …

“Certain Fundamental Truths”: A Dialectic On Negative And Positive Liberty In Hate-Speech Cases, W. Bradley Wendel

W. Bradley Wendel

Matthew Hale is a white supremacist who likes to attract media attention. He set himself up as the leader of a racist "church" called the World Church of the Creator and immediately went about attempting to put an articulate, polite face on the organization. Hale's application to become a licensed attorney in Illinois, his subsequent denial and the litigation that followed are discussed.

Buying Voice: Financial Rewards For Whistleblowing Lawyers, Nancy J. Moore, Kathleen Clark

Nancy J Moore

“Buying Voice: Financial Incentives for Whistleblowing Lawyers”

Kathleen Clark and Nancy J. Moore

Abstract

The federal government relies increasingly on whistleblowers to ferret out fraud, and has awarded whistleblowers over $4 billion under the False Claims Act and the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform and Consumer Protection Act. May lawyers ethically seek whistleblower rewards under these federal statutes? A handful of lawyers have tried to do so as FCA qui tam relators. They have not yet succeeded, but several court decisions suggest that they might be able to do so under confidentiality exceptions to state ethics law, which several courts have …

When Lawyers Move Their Lips: Attorney Truthfulness In Mediation And A Modest Proposal, Donald Peters

Don Peters

This article examines whether the punch line that you can tell when lawyers are lying by confirming that their lips are moving applies to their conduct when negotiating in mediations. General surveys of lawyer honesty suggest that this perception probably does apply to the way lawyers negotiate in mediations. Only 20% of people surveyed in a 1993 American Bar Association poll described the legal profession as honest, and that number fell to 14% in a 1998 Gallup poll. However, research demonstrates a connection between honest negotiating and perceived effectiveness. A study of 5,000 Denver and Phoenix lawyers found that honest, …

What About The Majority? Considering The Legal Research Practices Of Solo And Small Firm Attorneys, Joseph D. Lawson

AALL/LexisNexis Call for Papers

Solo and small firm practitioners account for the majority of attorneys practicing in the United States. However, they are regularly underrepresented in studies of attorneys’ research practices, which tend to focus on attorneys in larger practice settings. This article reports the results of a local survey in which more than 80 percent of respondents fell into this forgotten demographic. Comparison of the local study with a recent national survey demonstrates that greater consideration of smaller firms could lead to a different understanding of fee-based online resource usage among the demographic, which may have widespread implications for public and academic law …

Can A Single Masterpiece Sustain A Lawyer's Lifetime And Other Questions That Cross A Lawyer's Way, Randy Lee

Randy Lee

No abstract provided.

The Preclusion Of Nonlawyer Ownership Of Law Firms: Protecting The Interest Of Clients Or Protecting The Interest Of Lawyers?, Louise Hill

Louise L Hill

For the third time in as many decades, lawyers in the United States have sullied the notion of nonlawyer ownership of law firms. The most recent examination of alternative law practice structures was undertaken by Ethics 20/20, a Commission created by the American Bar Association [ABA] to conduct a plenary assessment of the ABA Rules of Professional Conduct and related ABA policies. A Working Group was formed which considered whether clients could be better served if law practice entities were restructured. To this end, issues were formulated and different law practice configurations were proposed, about which the public and members …

Law & Science: Toward A Unified Field, Deborah Hussey Freeland

Deborah M. Hussey Freeland

To be relevant to the real world and to have a reasonable chance of producing fair outcomes, legal and political decisionmaking must take science into account. Scholars have been aware of this for over fifty years. The need for law to be informed by rigorous science is compelling, as we must make collective decisions that impact our sustainability and our humanity on a global scale. However, the field of Law & Science remains as fragmented now as it was a half-century ago. We have yet to find a reliable way to establish coherent interdisciplinary interaction that enables science to inform …

A Lesson From Trollope For Counselors At Law, Thomas L. Shaffer

Thomas L. Shaffer

No abstract provided.

Foreword To The Conference: The Law: Business Or Profession? The Continuing Relevance Of Julius Henry Cohen For The Practice Of Law In The Twenty-First Century, Samuel J. Levine

Samuel J. Levine

No abstract provided.

Symposium Introduction: Humanism Goes To Law School, Marjorie A. Silver

Marjorie A. Silver

By now, the knowledge that law students experience more than their fair share of distress is old news. The studies about law student (and lawyer) unhappiness have been widely discussed in both academic literature and trade publications. Less well known, however, are the increasing number of programs that law schools, and individuals within those schools, have implemented to counter that distress,and to help students develop a positive professional identity,both as students and as the lawyers they are about to become.

Dean’S Message, Lawrence Raful

Lawrence Raful

No abstract provided.

1998 Survey Of Ethics In Land-Use Planning, Patricia E. Salkin

Patricia E. Salkin

No abstract provided.

Developing Professional Identity Through Reflective Practice, Suzanne Darrow Kleinhaus

Suzanne Darrow Kleinhaus

No abstract provided.

505 And All That—The Defendant’S Dilemma, Peter Jaszi

Peter Jaszi

Section 505 of the Copyright Act of 1909 was carried forth, without substantive change, into the Copyright Act of 1976. An assessment of section 505 is presented.

Lawyers As Whistleblowers Under The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act, Barry R. Temkin, Ben Moskovitz

Barry R. Temkin

Section 922 of Dodd-Frank added new section 21F to the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, creating a whistleblower bounty program under which individuals who voluntarily provide original information leading to successful Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement actions may receive bounty payments based on penalties assessed against respondents. The general rule is that whistleblowers who voluntarily furnish original information to the SEC or CFTC that results in a successful prosecution netting monetary penalties in excess of $1 million are entitled, with some exceptions, to bounties of ten percent to thirty percent of the amount recovered in the government enforcement actions. Lawyers, …

Ignore The Man Behind The Curtain: On The Government Speech Doctrine And What It Licenses, Mark Strasser

Mark Strasser

While federal and state governments have long been communicating to various audiences in multiple ways in a variety of contexts, the United States Supreme Court has only recently invoked the government speech doctrine to protect certain state acts and policies from First Amendment challenge. The contours of the doctrine are rather fuzzy—there are no clear criteria by which to determine when the government is speaking or what, if anything, the government must be saying in order for the doctrine’s protections to be invoked. This lack of clarity has caused great confusion in the lower courts—judges seem not to know how …

Foreword: The New Era- Quo Vadis?, John Sahl

John Sahl

The Inaugural MBI Symposium’s twenty-six participants highlight many important developments and challenges caused by MJP and new technologies. Their assessments and suggestions provide a helpful roadmap for lawyers and regulators to negotiate the increasingly complex, fast-paced, and ethically risky landscape for delivering legal services. Several panelists suggested regulatory reforms that range from the creation of a regulatory framework for lawyers engaged in crossborder practice to the creation of standards for the supervision of offshore outsourced legal services268 and the mining of metadata. Some of the panelists’ suggestions and reforms are especially important given the “high [financial] stakes” involved in the …

The Tort Of Betrayal Of Trust, Caroline Forell, Anna Sortun

Caroline A Forell

Fiduciary betrayal is a serious harm. When the fiduciary is a doctor or a lawyer, and the entrustor is a patient or client, this harm frequently goes unremedied. Betrayals arise out of disloyalty and conflicts of interest where the lawyer or doctor puts his or her interest above that of his or her client or patient. It causes dignitary harm that is different from the harm flowing from negligent malpractice. Nevertheless, courts, concerned with overdeterrence, have for the most part refused to allow a separate claim for betrayal. In this Article, we suggest that betrayal deserves a remedy and propose …

Lawyers And The War, Robert Power

Robert C Power

No abstract provided.

Happy Law Students, Happy Lawyers, Nancy Levit, Douglas Linder

Nancy Levit

This article draws on research into the science of happiness and asks a series of interrelated questions: Whether law schools can make law students happier? Whether making happier law students will translate into making them happier lawyers, and the accompanying question of whether making law students happier would create better lawyers? After covering the limitations of genetic determinants of happiness and happiness set-points, the article addresses those qualities that happiness research indicates are paramount in creating satisfaction: control, connections, creative challenge (or flow), and comparisons (preferably downward). Those qualities are then applied to legal education, while addressing the larger philosophical …

Does Being A Repeat Player Make A Difference? The Impact Of Attorney Experience And 'Case Picking' On The Outcome Of Medical Malpractice Lawsuits, Ralph Peeples, Catherine Harris, Thomas Metzloff

Ralph Peeples

No abstract provided.

Contract And Conflict Management, Thomas J. Stipanowich

Thomas J. Stipanowich

Despite the widespread use of mediation and other dispute resolution processes in the United States today, many members of the bench and bar - including those responsible for the drafting, interpretation and implementation of consensual dispute resolution provisions still lack a fundamental grasp of the process choices available to contracting parties. More often than not, their information is fragmentary, their perceptions framed by anecdote and hearsay in lieu of personal experience. Transactional lawyers, those in the best position to offer advice and counsel in the structuring of contractual conflict management options, tend to be less well informed than colleagues in …

The Quiet Revolution Comes To Kentucky: A Case Study In Community Mediation, Thomas J. Stipanowich

Thomas J. Stipanowich

This article is part of a symposium entitled “Emerging Alternative Dispute Resolution Systems” and discusses Professor Stipanowich's experience helping to establish a court-connected community mediation program. The article includes extensive discussion of the practical, legal and ethical issues associated with such programs and includes some early case statistics.