Law Commons^™

How Long Can This Go On? The Controversy Over The Application Of The Statute Of Limitations To S Corporations And Their Shareholders, J. Marcus Sommers

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Endangered Species Act's Fall From Grace In The Supreme Court, J.B. Ruhl

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Thirty-five years ago, the Endangered Species Act ("ESA") had as auspicious a debut in the U.S. Supreme Court as any statute could hope for. In Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hill, a majority of the Court proclaimed that the ESA was intended "to halt and reverse the trend toward species extinction, whatever the cost" and backed up those and other bold words by preventing a nearly completed federal dam from impounding its reservoir because doing so would eliminate the only known (at the time) habitat of a small fish, the now infamous snail darter. To this day, Hill remains actively discussed …

Federalism And Preemption In October Term 1999, Jonathan D. Varat

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

State Action And The Supreme Court's Emerging Consensus On The Line Between Establishment And Private Religious Expression, Michael W. Mcconnell

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Sex, Money, And Groups: Free Speech And Association Decisions In The October 1999 Term, Kathleen M. Sullivan

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Disentangling Symmetries: Speech, Association, Parenthood, Laurence H. Tribe

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Rediscovering A Principled Commerce Power , Douglas W. Kmiec

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Substance And Method In The Year 2000, Akhil Reed Amar

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Law Enforcement And Criminal Law Decisions, Erwin Chemerinsky

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Supreme Court's Most Extraordinary Term - Introduction, Douglas W. Kmiec

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Tinkering Around The Edges: The Supreme Court's Death Penalty Jurisprudence, John Bessler

All Faculty Scholarship

This Essay examines America's death penalty forty years after Furman and provides a critique of the Supreme Court's existing Eighth Amendment case law. Part I briefly summarizes how the Court, to date, has approached death sentences, while Part II highlights the incongruous manner in which the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause has been read. For instance, Justice Antonin Scalia-one of the Court's most vocal proponents of "originalism" conceded that corporal punishments such as handbranding and public flogging are no longer constitutionally permissible; yet, he (and the Court itself) continues to allow death sentences to be imposed. The American Bar Association …

Smile For The Camera - The Long Lost Photos Of The Supreme Court At Work—And What They Reveal., Sonja R. West

Popular Media

In a day when even our cellphones can capture images unobtrusively, why were we forced to stare at pixels on our computer screens or at a static televised image of the Supreme Court’s exterior? In 2012, why is there a wall of separation between the American people and their high court?

For decades, the debate over cameras in the court has gone something like this: the press pleads for permission and the court says no; academics make policy arguments that the court ignores; and Congress threatens to force cameras into the court, but the justices don’t blink. The argument remains …

Newman, J., Dissenting: Another Vision Of The Federal Circuit, Blake R. Hartz

IP Theory

No abstract provided.

The Representative Equality Principle: Disaggregating The Equal Protection Intent Standard, Bertrall L. Ross Ii

Fordham Law Review

   Challenges under the Equal Protection Clause require proof of intentional discrimination. Though rarely questioned by legal scholars or the courts, that conventional account cannot explain the success of equal protection challenges to electoral structures that dilute the vote of racial minorities. In the Supreme Court’s most recent decisions on vote dilution, the Court has invalidated local electoral structures under the Equal Protection Clause to the extent that they deprive African Americans of the opportunity for effective representation in the political process. The Court has reached its decisions despite the absence of any proof of intentional discrimination in the adoption of …

Foreword: Academic Influence On The Court, Neal K. Katyal

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The months leading up to the Supreme Court’s blockbuster decision on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) were characterized by a prodigious amount of media coverage that purported to analyze how the legal challenge to Obamacare went mainstream. The nation’s major newspapers each had a prominent story describing how conservative academics, led by Professor Randy Barnett, had a long-term strategy to make the case appear credible. In the first weeks after the ACA’s passage, the storyline went, the lawsuit’s prospects of success were thought to be virtually nil. Professor (and former Solicitor General) Charles Fried stated that he would “eat a …

The Praise Of Silly: Critical Legal Studies And The Roberts Court, James F. Lucarello

Touro Law Review

This Comment demonstrates that the Supreme Court is lying to you in its opinions. Why is it lying? The short answer to this question is quite simple: It is being silly.

There is nothing inherently wrong with being silly. In fact, some praise silliness, as a heightened and healthy understanding of the indeterminate world that incorporates our reality. Silliness, how ever, is only praise-worthy when it is understood and utilized purposefully. The silliness of most of the Justices on the Supreme Court, on the other hand, is a product of self-delusion and fundamentalism, which makes their silliness not silly at …

Counterparts In Modern Policing: The Influence Of Corporate Investigators On The Public Police And A Call For The Broadening Of The State Action Doctrine, Sean James Beaton

Touro Law Review

This Comment first provides an overview of the constitutional concerns that arise when the private police interact with criminal defendants, and the even graver issues that are present when this interaction also involves governmental law enforcement. Part III presents an in depth look at private police, with some detail focused specifically on corporate investigators who work in conjunction with public law enforcement. After assessing this ubiquitous group, Part IV harmonizes the private police and the state action doctrine. Because the state action doctrine has been classified as not being a "model of consistency" and a "conceptual disaster area," the analysis …

Supreme Court Criminal Law Jurisprudence - October 2008 Term, Richard Klein

Touro Law Review

The last Term of the Supreme Court addressed the constitutionally protected rights of criminal defendants not only at trial but at the post-conviction stage as well. The Court dealt with the defendant's rights to a speedy trial and effective assistance of counsel in Vermont v. Brillon; the claim was that these constitutional protections were substantially frustrated by underfunded public defender offices, thereby leaving the defendant improperly incarcerated for three years. The Court also considered a case wherein the State had utilized a jailhouse snitch to elicit inculpatory statements from a defendant in violation of his Sixth Amendment right to counsel. …

Federal Governmental Power: Preemption From The October 2008 Term, Eileen Kaufman

Touro Law Review

In a stunning trifecta, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of consumers and held that federal law did not preempt state consumer claims. The three cases concerned patients injured by drugs, smokers misled by false advertising, and borrowers victimized by predatory lending practices. These cases represent the latest battle in the ongoing war between consumer advocates and business entities over whether federal laws should be interpreted to erect barriers against state consumer protection laws.

Wyeth v. Levine raised the issue of whether approval of a drug by the F.D.A. preempts a state tort claim based on failure to warn. Altria …

Federal Governmental Power: The Voting Rights Act, Michael C. Dorf

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The October 2008 Term: First Amendment And Then Some, Burt Neuborne

Touro Law Review

Liberals must acknowledge a dirty little secret about American constitutional law; a secret that the Warren Court made apparent, though it had existed from the day John Marshall asserted the power of judicial review in a Constitution that says nothing about it. The secret is that there is no serious theory explaining or justifying what courts actually do when they strike down a statute as unconstitutional.

The Warren years were enormously important in moving the country forward. I do not know what we would have done without the wisdom and courage of the Court. But when you start looking for …

Section 1983 Litigation: Post-Pearson And Post-Iqbal, Karen M. Blum

Touro Law Review

The Supreme Court's decision in Pearson v. Callahan marked a significant change in the structure of the analysis to be performedin the adjudication of the qualified immunity defense in§ 1983 litigation. Prior to Pearson, the Court required a mandatory two-step approach for the qualified immunity analysis. Whenever qualified immunity was raised in response to an alleged constitutional violation, the lower courts were instructed that the disposition of the qualified immunity issue required the court to first address the merits question. Under Saucier v. Katz, the courts were required first to decide whether the complaint stated a violation of a constitutional …

A Passion For Justice, Charles A. Reich

Touro Law Review

What makes a good judge or justice? The public has a need to know. But simplistic labels, such as "activist," "liberal" and "conservative," are both meaningless and misleading. Perhaps aformer law clerk can offer a different perspective.

I served with David J. Vann as law clerk to Justice Hugo L.Black during the momentous 1953 Term of the Supreme Court. This was the year when Brown v. Board of Education was decided. It was also the year when Chief Justice Vinson died and was replaced by the Governor of California, Earl Warren. And it was also a year in which the …

Always Ask For A Brand-Name Drug: Trying To Untangle The Holding In Pliva V. Mensing, Elizabeth M. Lafayette

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Reluctant Apology For Plessy: A Response To Akhil Amar, Barry P. Mcdonald

Pepperdine Law Review

A response to the article "Plessy v. Ferguson and the Anti-Canon," by Akhil Amar, published in the November 2011 issue of the "Pepperdine Law Review," is presented. Topics include an examination of Justice Henry Billings Brown's decision in the case, the constitutionality of segregating U.S. citizens by race, and the impact of public opinion on U.S. Supreme Court decisions.

Plessy V. Ferguson And The Anti-Canon, Akhil Reed Amar

Pepperdine Law Review

The article focuses on the U.S. Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson, which dealt with the constitutionality of racial segregation in the U.S. Topics include the application of precedent in controversial U.S. Supreme Court cases, when the U.S. Constitution can overrule a court decision, and dissenting judicial opinions.

Let's Talk: Judicial Decisions At Supreme Court Confirmation Hearings, Anna Batta, Paul M. Collins, Jr., Tom Miles, Lori A. Ringhand

Scholarly Works

An investigation of Supreme Court Confirmation hearings reveals many queries posed to nominees reference specific court cases, especially recent decisions, and with questioning often divided along partisan lines. These findings indicate that the hearings are more substantive than is commonly assumed.

Toward A Limited Consensus On The Loss Of Civilian Immunity In Non-International Armed Conflict: Making Progress Through Practice, Stephen Pomper

International Law Studies

No abstract provided.

The Abnormalcy Of Normal Delay, Kimberly Horsley

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

The First Amendment, Gaming Advertisements, And Congressional Inconsistency: The Future Of The Commercial Speech Doctrine After Greater New Orleans Broadcasting Ass'n V. United States, Nicholas P. Consula

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.