Law Commons^™

Voter F̶R̶A̶U̶D̶ Mistake, Benjamin Plener Cover

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

False narratives challenging electoral integrity often cite ineligible voting as a prime example of so-called widespread voter fraud. This Article demonstrates that ineligible voting often consists of mistakes that are problematically treated like fraud. Some jurisdictions criminalize ineligible voting on a strict liability basis, imposing punishment even when the ineligible voter is unaware of her ineligibility. When jurisdictions impose this strict criminal liability, mistakes are often misunderstood or misrepresented as fraud. This harsh and confused treatment of voter mistake undermines the criminal justice system by severing criminality from culpability, punishing good faith democratic participation, targeting marginalized populations, and amplifying systemic …

Note, Sophia Caroline Marcolla

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

No abstract provided.

Meals On Duty: The Case For Excluding Meal Reimbursements For Law Enforcement, Daniel De Izaguirre

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

This article advocates for the extension of the Internal Revenue Code (I.R.C.) § 119 exclusion to cover cash reimbursements for meals provided to law enforcement officers. Currently, § 119 excludes meals furnished by an employer from gross income, but not cash reimbursements. The unique demand placed on law enforcement officers, including the requirement to remain on-call during meals, justify the inclusion of these reimbursements within the scope of § 119. Through a comprehensive analysis of legislative intent, case law, and the “substance over form” doctrine, this article argues that cash reimbursements serve the same substantial business purpose as meals-in-kind and …

The Opposite Of Retail Therapy: Hidden Fees And Online Shopping Hell, Claire Hiegel

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

In 2024, California passed a law banning hidden fees, and the Federal Trade Commission finalized a similar new rule in 2025, targeting unfair and deceptive fees. These laws aim to benefit consumers and enhance competition by increasing pricing transparency. However, they fail to adequately address variable fees, putting some businesses between a rock and a hard place as they are forced to choose between advertising a misleading price or not advertising an initial price at all, leaving some consumers with less accurate information than they would have had before the enactment of the law. These laws also vary significantly in …

Juris Dr. Strangelove Or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Machines, Garret Macko

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

Despite a surplus of practicing attorneys, millions of Americans experience inadequate legal representation, demonstrating deep inefficiencies in the market for legal services. This paper explores the potential for artificial intelligence (“AI”) to expand access to justice by providing efficient and affordable solutions. Free and widely available AI-powered tools, like ChatGPT and Claude, demonstrate the capability to assist non-lawyers in tasks like drafting legal documents, conducting legal research, and resolving disputes. These tools represent a practical and economically efficient way to increase access to legal resources for underserved populations. Still, while AI offers significant promise, clear challenges exist. Issues like hallucinations—instances …

The Screen Is Going To Ask You A Couple Questions: Analyzing No Tax On Tips And How It Will Change The Hospitality And Service Industries, Nicholas Prindiville

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

The Coronavirus Pandemic, point-of-sale technology, and financial instability has pushed demand for tips to all-time highs as tipped workers struggle to make ends meet. In response, Democrats and Republicans have proposed the “No Tax On Tips” bill, which would create a limitless deduction for tip income, to provide tipped workers with financial relief. With the bill targeting such a unique type of income, the potential results of this bill are just as polarizing. This paper looks at the origin of America’s tipping culture, how tips impacted labor and tax legislation, how the bill’s tip deduction would expose holes in labor …

The Devil Wears Dupes: Legal Implications Of “Dupe Culture” In The Fashion Industry And How Trademark Law Should Adapt, Alexis Theoharidis

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

The proliferation of dupes in the fashion industry—affordable imitations of high-end designs—has created a complex intersection of intellectual property challenges, ethical concerns, and consumer behavior shifts. While dupes democratize fashion by providing low-cost access to high-end aesthetics, they undermine brand integrity, dilute designer creativity, and exacerbate labor and environmental issues tied to fast fashion. Current trademark law, centered on the Lanham Act, insufficiently addresses these challenges, particularly when dupes avoid direct counterfeiting and exploit legal gray areas. This article critiques the limitations of existing protections, evaluates alternative legal reforms, including updates to anti-dilution provisions and the use of blockchain technology, …

A Snitch In Time Can Help Deport Nine: Proposing A Private Enforcement Scheme To Spur Self-Deportations, Ajay Gupta

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

Any forcible deportation drive that the incoming Trump administration may undertake to remove some of the many millions of aliens illegally present in the country would be limited in scope, underscoring the importance of goading self-deportations for perceptibly reducing these aliens’ numbers by curtailing their employment opportunities. Based in part on Britain’s experience with eradicating child labor in the nineteenth century, the article proposes a scheme of private enforcement for rendering unemployable a large proportion of unauthorized aliens in the United States labor market today. The proposal comprises enacting a punitive tax on all compensation paid for the personal services …

Masthead

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

No abstract provided.

Assignments For The Benefit Of Creditors As An Alternative To Bankruptcy Proceedings, Jessica G. Mckinlay

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

Many companies intending to close benefit from going through a formal dissolution procedure. The simplest method is to dissolve under state law, which can be done internally by the officers and directors or other responsible people in charge of the business. Dissolution under state law is a preferred method for companies without complicated debt structures or significant remaining assets. Instead of going through a dissolution handled internally by the company decision makers, companies may also consider retaining a third-party fiduciary who can notify creditors that the company has ceased doing business, sell any remaining assets, and distribute the proceeds to …

Us V. Rahimi, Originalism's Loaded Weapon, And The Lost Boys Of The Supreme Court, Mary Anne Franks

Articles

No abstract provided.

Brain-Dead Surrogacy And Testamentary Disposition: Legal Rights Over One’S Body For Reproductive Purposes, Cassandra L. Nelson

Vanderbilt Law Review

Through the advancement of modern medical technology, including life-support machines and in vitro fertilization, it may soon become possible to carry out brain-dead surrogacy—that is, gestational surrogacy in brain-dead carriers. When a person experiences brain death, life-support machines can nevertheless artificially maintain the body’s homeostatic functions, including the ability to gestate a fetus, for several years thereafter. There have already been several reported instances of brain-dead pregnant people on ventilation successfully carrying and delivering children. In light of the United States’ historical interest in promoting familymaking, this emerging avenue for surrogacy could increase the availability of surrogates and expand opportunities …

Hipaa, Sandra B. Wadeh, Victoria Sintes, Anna Olson, Ethan Lowry

SPARK Symposium Presentations

HIPAA is a federal law designed to protect patient privacy by regulating how Protected Health Information is handled, stored, and shared. Violations of HIPAA can result in severe civil and criminal penalties, including fines, lawsuits, and even imprisonment for willful misconduct.

Public Investment As Constitutional Power And Accountability Challenge, Saule T. Omarova, Brian Richardson

University of Chicago Law Review

No abstract provided.

In Defense Of The Texas Statutory Easement, Matthew Crockett

Texas A&M Journal of Property Law

More than half the states, including Texas, have adopted a little-known statutory procedure by which a landlocked property owner may ask the government to exercise eminent domain to gain an easement over a neighbor’s property. Texas’s version, the rarely cited Texas Transportation Code section § 251.053, raises as many questions as it answers. This Article dissects section § 251.053, discusses the arguments for and against statutory easements, and argues in favor of statutory easements, particularly in Texas.

Rivers V. Guerrero, Meagan R. Hurley

Articles

Danny Rivers sought federal habeas relief, arguing that his trial counsel was ineffective. Rivers’s petition was denied, but while his initial habeas appeal was pending, he initiated a second filing to include new information that his prior counsel failed to utilize in an exculpatory report supporting his innocence. Applying 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b)(2), the district court determined it was “without jurisdiction to entertain” the new evidence because Rivers’s filing was a “second or successive” petition. The Fifth Circuit of Appeals agreed.

Charter Schools: The Education Solution Strangling The Public Education System, Brynna Smith

The Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review

This paper investigates why charter schools exist in Missouri and how judicial precedent has permitted their constitutionality. It will highlight their potential for corrupt policy, rebut the scant evidence proving they perform better than public schools, and demonstrate that charter schools are not the effective solution to poor public-school performance as they were initially intended. Rather they are disguised constitutional violations. This paper proposes that the United States abandon the charter school movement, concentrate all educational funding in public schools, and use the grants intended for charter schools to implement educational reform proven to be effective.

Asking The Rights Questions: An Emgerency Action Exception To The Major Questions Doctrine, Mark Hager

Minnesota Law Review Vols. 106:2 onward (2021-present)

Congress delegates broad discretionary power to administrative agencies to respond to emergency situations, taking advantage of their extraordinary expertise and response speed. Yet these delegations are defined by a judicial rule known as the “Major Questions Doctrine.” The Major Questions Doctrine seeks to protect the separation of powers by preventing excessive use of executive power without clear delegation by Congress. Where a “major question” of vast economic or political significance is raised, it requires “clear” authorization in the delegating statute. During COVID-19, the Supreme Court used the doctrine to strike down several response programs, including: the Center for Disease Control’s …

What's Important To Write About? A Century Of Washington Law Review Topics, Hugh Spitzer

Washington Law Review

This Article examines the topics of all lead articles in Washington Law Review during its past ninety-eight years of publication. The analysis illustrates the changing interests of legal academics, student editors, and the working lawyers and judges who have read and used the articles over a century. For its first fifty years, the journal focused on general topics of interest to practitioners, Washington law matters, business and tax law, and government regulation. Other topics, such as legal and judicial system reform, constitutional law, and comparative and international law, were present in modest numbers. In its second half century, Washington Law …

Barlow V. Washington: Judicial Hesitancy And Sexual Violence At Universities, Elizabeth G. Porter

Washington Law Review

Sexual violence among university students—most frequently, violence against women—is a well-known and pernicious problem. But the liability of universities for failing to prevent such violence is exceedingly rare. Courts remain hesitant to impose a duty on universities to prevent sexual violence, even in situations where they are in by far the best position to do so. This Article examines that judicial hesitancy in the context of a claim by Madeleine Barlow, who sued Washington State University (WSU) after she was raped at an off-campus party in her first week of college by a student with a record of past sexual …

Washington's Implementation Of Legalized Cannabis: A Model For Other States And The Federal Government, Bruce Turcott, Daniel Shortt

Washington Law Review

This Article examines the process and outcomes of cannabis legalization in Washington State, offering insights for other states and potential federal legalization schemes. It begins with an overview of the campaign that led to the passage of Initiative 502 (I-502), detailing the initiative’s structure, which draws from liquor licensing laws. The Article then explores the establishment of a recreational cannabis market from scratch, focusing on agency structure, federal responses such as the Cole Memorandum, and the state’s regulatory framework aimed at preventing adverse outcomes.

Additionally, this Article highlights Washington’s efforts to promote social equity, emphasizing that I-502 was framed as …

Liability Considerations For Marine Carbon Dioxide Removal Projects In U.S. Waters, Korey Silverman-Roati, Martin Lockman, Romany M. Webb

Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

Scientists have identified a number of land- and ocean-based carbon dioxide removal (“CDR”) approaches. Ocean-based approaches, also known as marine CDR, hold great potential for uptake and sequestration of carbon dioxide. However, controlled field trials in the ocean are needed to better understand the efficacy and impacts of several marine CDR approaches. Legal considerations will have a major bearing on whether, when, where, and how such field research goes forward. Previous studies have analyzed the potential international and domestic legal framework applicable to marine CDR research and subsequent deployment (if that is ultimately deemed appropriate). However, relatively little research has …

Contents, North Carolina Law Review

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Prison Penalty: Use Of Force Litigation After Kingsley V. Hendrickson, Danielle C. Jefferis

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Digital Speech And Future Persecution, Liane M. Jarvis Cooper

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Good Language For Dispute Resolution Bots And Humanoids, John Lande

Faculty Publications

In developing the AI tool, the RPS Negotiation and Mediation Coach, I had to give it strict instructions to use certain terms and avoid others so that it doesn’t use lots of problematic dispute resolution jargon on the internet. This short article lists those terms.

The article points out that, just like bots, humanoids need to be trained. It is especially important to teach good dispute resolution language to law professor, law student, and practitioner units. Many of these humanoids are stuck on defective codings such as “facilitative” and “evaluative” mediation, which are like contagious malware. Humanoids generally can “learn” …

The Artificially Intelligent Rps Negotiation And Mediation Coach, John Lande

Faculty Publications

This document describes the artificially intelligent RPS Negotiation and Mediation Coach (“RPS Coach”) tool, which is an outgrowth of the Real Practice Systems (RPS) Project. It is designed to help many different users perform numerous tasks including (1) attorneys anticipating challenges, strategizing, and representing clients, (2) mediators enhancing preparation, communication, and decision-making, (3) disputing parties making better decisions, (4) ADR program administrators developing clear rules, policies, and materials, (5) educators and trainers teaching practical theory and skills, and (6) students and trainees learning practical theory and skills.

RPS theory and practice is designed to help attorneys and mediators help their …

A Practical Guide For Using The Rps Negotiation And Mediation Coach, John Lande

Faculty Publications

This two-page guide introduces the RPS Negotiation and Mediation Coach, an AI-powered tool grounded in Real Practice Systems (RPS) theory. It explains who can use RPS Coach, how it supports good decision-making, and the range of tasks it can perform. It is designed for attorneys, mediators, parties, ADR program administrators, educators, and students to improve the quality of dispute resolution practice, program design, and legal education. Practitioners and parties can use it to prepare for, participate in, and reflect on negotiation and mediation. Faculty can use it to develop syllabi, assignments, and simulations. Users can explore ideas, generate drafts, and …

The Fintiv Pendulum Swings Again: More Discretionary Denials Coming Soon, Dennis D. Crouch

Faculty Publications

This article examines the USPTO’s recent rescission of the June 2022 Vidal memorandum, signaling a significant policy shift in the Patent Trial and Appeal Board's (PTAB) approach to discretionary denials of inter partes reviews (IPRs). The rescission reinstates the precedential status of Apple Inc. v. Fintiv, Inc. and its six-factor test for evaluating whether to deny IPR institution based on parallel district court litigation. The article traces the evolution of discretionary denials under the America Invents Act (AIA), from their initial limited application to the expansive approach under Director Iancu, the subsequent narrowing under Director Vidal, and now the anticipated …

State Constitutional Rights, Naturally, Daniel B. Rodriguez

UMKC Law Review

No abstract provided.