Law Commons^™

Language's Empire: A Counter-Telling Of Administrative Law In Canada, Nicholas Hooper

LLM Theses

This thesis renders the unstated assumptions that animate statutory interpretation in the administrative state. It argues that the current approach is a disingenuous rhetorical overlay that masks the politics of definitional meaning. After rejecting the possibility of structuring principles in our (post)modern oversaturation of signs, the thesis concludes with an aspirational account of interpretive pragmatism in the face of uncertainty.

The Architecture Of Law: Building Law In The Classical Tradition, Brian M. Mccall

Brian M McCall

A Philosophical Defense Of Judicial Minimalism, Cory A. Evans

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation analyzes, criticizes and ultimately defends judicial minimalism, a contemporary theory of judging that has come to the forefront of American jurisprudence in the early part of the 21st Century. In this dissertation I offer the first formal definition of judicial minimalism, apply that definition to case law and the literature, refute many objections to judicial minimalism including objections based on tough case counterexamples, offer a new version of the argument of epistemic humility and offer a new argument in support of judicial minimalism from the perspective of law and economics.

Fiction In The Code: Reading Legislation As Literature, Thomas J. Mcsweeney

Faculty Publications

One of the major branches of the field of law and literature is often described as "law as literature." Scholars of law as literature examine the law using the tools of literary analysis. The scholarship in this subfield is dominated by the discussion of narrative texts: confessions, victim-impact statements, and, above all, the judicial opinion. This article will argue that we can use some of the same tools to help us understand non-narrative texts, such as law codes and statutes. Genres create expectations. We do not expect a law code to be literary. Indeed, we tend to dissociate the law …

The Free Exercise Clause, Minority Faiths, And The Possibility Of Religious Independence After Rawlsian Liberalism, David Charles Scott

Theses and Dissertations--Philosophy

The conversation to which my dissertation belongs is that which preoccupied John Rawls in Political Liberalism, namely: (1) how it is possible that a religiously and morally pluralistic culture like ours lives cooperatively from one generation to the next, and (2) The extent to which religious or moral convictions are appropriate bases for political action. My three-essay dissertation is about aspects of this investigation that affect minority or non-mainstream religious and cultural groups, since legal institutions, and theoretical models of them (such as Rawls’s and Ronald Dworkin’s) are in many ways ill-suited to accommodate their ways of life. In the …

The Language Of Neutrality In Supreme Court Confirmation Hearings, Carolyn Shapiro

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

At Justice Neil Gorsuch’s confirmation hearing, then-Judge Gorsuch repeatedly insisted that judging involves no more than examining the legal materials—like statutes and precedents— and applying them to the facts of the case. There is, he emphasized, no room for a Justice’s “personal views,” and he refused even to state his agreement (or disagreement) with such iconic cases as Loving v. Virginia and Griswold v. Connecticut. Instead, then Judge Gorsuch reiterated only that they were precedents of the Court and thus entitled to respect. Frustrating as his answers may have been to some senators, however, they differed from answers given …

Doctrinal Reasoning As A Disruptive Practice, Jessie Allen

Articles

Legal doctrine is generally thought to contribute to legal decision making only to the extent it determines substantive results. Yet in many cases, the available authorities are indeterminate. I propose a different model for how doctrinal reasoning might contribute to judicial decisions. Drawing on performance theory and psychological studies of readers, I argue that judges’ engagement with formal legal doctrine might have self-disrupting effects like those performers experience when they adopt uncharacteristic behaviors. Such disruptive effects would not explain how judges ultimately select, or should select, legal results. But they might help legal decision makers to set aside subjective biases.

Dorothy Moser Medlin Papers - Accession 1049, Dorothy Moser Medlin

Manuscript Collection

(The Dorothy Moser Medlin Papers are currently in processing.)

This collection contains most of the records of Dorothy Medlin’s work and correspondence and also includes reference materials, notes, microfilm, photographic negatives related both to her professional and personal life. Additions include a FLES Handbook, co-authored by Dorothy Medlin and a decorative mirror belonging to Dorothy Medlin.

Major series in this collection include: some original 18th century writings and ephemera and primary source material of André Morellet, extensive collection of secondary material on André Morellet's writings and translations, Winthrop related files, literary manuscripts and notes by Dorothy Medlin (1966-2011), copies …

Artificial Intelligence And Role-Reversible Judgment, Stephen E. Henderson, Kiel Brennan-Marquez

Stephen E Henderson