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Seattle University Law Review

Articles 241 - 261 of 261

Full-Text Articles in Civil Law

Fugitives In Immigration: A Call For Legislative Guidelines On Disentitlement, Kiran H. Griffith Oct 2012

Fugitives In Immigration: A Call For Legislative Guidelines On Disentitlement, Kiran H. Griffith

Seattle University Law Review

In light of Supreme Court jurisprudence regarding the fugitive disentitlement doctrine, the circuit courts of appeal have readily expanded the doctrine’s use to civil matters, as well as immigration. But the Supreme Court’s nuanced treatment of the rationales underlying this doctrine, specifically in Ortega-Rodriguez v. United States and Degen v. United States, has led to inconsistent application across the circuits. Specifically, a split has arisen among the Second, Fifth, Seventh, and Ninth Circuits as to whether these rationales support invocation of the fugitive disentitlement doctrine to find fugitivity and dismiss an alien’s petition for review when an alien fails to …

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The Right To Publicity After Death: Postmortem Personality Rights In The Wake Of Experiencehendrix V. Hendrixlicensing.Com, Aubrie Hicks Oct 2012

The Right To Publicity After Death: Postmortem Personality Rights In The Wake Of Experiencehendrix V. Hendrixlicensing.Com, Aubrie Hicks

Seattle University Law Review

While the states are fairly consistent in protecting the rights of living individuals, the level of protection for deceased celebrities varies among the states. Some states allow the right to extend beyond death, while others refuse to recognize a postmortem right of publicity. Even among states that do recognize a postmortem right of publicity, the right is protected to varying degrees, with some states providing explicit statutory protections and others providing only common law protections. Given the inconsistencies among the states, the continuing right to publicity after death has been the subject of much litigation over the last few years, …

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Protect Me From Myself: Determining Competency To Waive The Right To Counsel During Civil-Commitment Proceedings In Washington State, Jacob J. Stender Apr 2011

Protect Me From Myself: Determining Competency To Waive The Right To Counsel During Civil-Commitment Proceedings In Washington State, Jacob J. Stender

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment argues that an unarticulated, heightened standard of competency to waive counsel, under which Washington currently operates, is the ideal standard to address the unique concerns that exist in civil- commitment proceedings. This Comment clarifies the existing law governing the determination of a party’s right to waive counsel, as well as the determination of the validity of such a waiver. This Comment also articulates a comprehensive inquiry standard for trial courts, both within and outside of Washington, to apply when determining the competency of a party and the validity of a waiver. The goal of this express determination standard …

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Internet Voting With Initiatives And Referendums: Stumbling Towards Direct Democracy, Rebekah K. Browder Jan 2005

Internet Voting With Initiatives And Referendums: Stumbling Towards Direct Democracy, Rebekah K. Browder

Seattle University Law Review

Imagine that it is Tuesday, November 4, 2008, and you realize that you have not yet voted for the candidate that you want to be President of the United States. The polls close at 7 p.m., and it is already 6:45 p.m. Instead of rushing off to the nearest polling place, you simply go to your computer, log in, fill out a ballot, and email your ballot to your designated polling website. The whole process takes fewer than ten minutes, and you have done your civic duty. Leading proponents of Internet voting point to five possible benefits of electronic voting: …

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Voting Rights At A Crossroads: Return To The Past Or An Opportunity For The Future, Barbara Arnwine Jan 2005

Voting Rights At A Crossroads: Return To The Past Or An Opportunity For The Future, Barbara Arnwine

Seattle University Law Review

This keynote address for the 2005 Symposium: Where's My Vote? Lessons Learned from Washington State's Gubernatorial Election was presented by Barbara Arnwine. The focus of the presentation was on "Voting Rights at a Crossroad: Return to the Past or an Opportunity for the Future?" To students who are on the career path to becoming practitioners of law, and to attorneys and law professors, no role is more important than enhancing democracy. Ms. Arnwine's speech addresses the topics of voting rights from a national perspective highlighting the most pressing challenges. In addressing this theme, four areas of voting rights are covered …

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The Washington 2004 Gubernatorial Election Crisis: The Necessity Of Restoring Public Confidence In The Electoral Process, Joaquin G. Avila Jan 2005

The Washington 2004 Gubernatorial Election Crisis: The Necessity Of Restoring Public Confidence In The Electoral Process, Joaquin G. Avila

Seattle University Law Review

This Article details the plethora of problems associated with Washington State's 2004 gubernatorial election and explores the proposed electoral reforms in light of prior threats to the electoral process. The Article postulates that electoral reforms in the administration of elections also present an important opportunity to provide minority communities with greater access to the political process. Part II of this Article begins with a history ofvoting discrimination in the United States. This history provides a context to the 2004 gubernatorial election in Washington. In addition, this history provides an important background context for assessing whether reforms in the administration of …

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Competing Values Or False Choices: Coming To Consensus On The Election Reform Debate In Washington State And The Country, Tova Andrea Wang Jan 2005

Competing Values Or False Choices: Coming To Consensus On The Election Reform Debate In Washington State And The Country, Tova Andrea Wang

Seattle University Law Review

This Article examines the problems revealed in Washington State's election system as a result of its staggeringly close gubernatorial election, and compares such problems to those encountered by other states in the 2004 election. It examines the challenge of fixing these problems through the prism of the ongoing debate over what values and goals are most important when making election administration decisions. The various values and goals of expanding voter access, increasing voter participation and election efficiency, preventing voter fraud, ensuring the count of every vote, and creating finality in the voting system are included in this examination. Throughout this …

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Death By A Thousand Signatures: The Rise Of Restrictive Ballot Access Laws And The Decline Of Electoral Competition In The United States, Oliver Hall Jan 2005

Death By A Thousand Signatures: The Rise Of Restrictive Ballot Access Laws And The Decline Of Electoral Competition In The United States, Oliver Hall

Seattle University Law Review

This Article explores one instance of the countermajoritarian problem in American democracy: how to protect the rights of minor parties and independent candidates participating in an electoral system dominated by two major parties. In particular, this Article focuses on the effect of modern ballot access laws on candidates' rights, arguing that courts ought to treat these laws as a presumptively impermissible form of "collusion in restraint of democracy." Although the article borrows the language of antitrust law, this argument is rooted in core constitutional principles and rights guaranteed under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. Nevertheless, the analogy to antitrust law …

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Partisanship Redefined: Why Blanket Primaries Are Constitutional, Deidra A. Foster Jan 2005

Partisanship Redefined: Why Blanket Primaries Are Constitutional, Deidra A. Foster

Seattle University Law Review

In 2003, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rendered a decision that would pave the way for drastic changes in Washington State's election process. In Democratic Party of Washington v. Reed, the court held that Washington's nearly seventy-year-old blanket primary was unconstitutional, and the Supreme Court declined to review the case. The Ninth Circuit professed to be bound by California Democratic Party v. Jones, the Supreme Court case that ruled California's blanket primary unconstitutional just three years earlier, ignoring the argument that Washington's blanket primary differed materially from California's. What followed was a melee of voter disapproval and …

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Flawed Justice: Limitation Of Parental Remedies For The Loss Of Consortium Of Adult Children, William S. Bailey Jan 2004

Flawed Justice: Limitation Of Parental Remedies For The Loss Of Consortium Of Adult Children, William S. Bailey

Seattle University Law Review

This article presents the inherent contradiction between a parent- child relationship that has steadily evolved from the early 20th Century to the present and the multitude of court decisions on damages that remain studiously ignorant of this shift. Part I of the article will set forth the common law origins of restrictions on recovery for wrongful death within the context of a shifting view of children from economic units to objects of adoration. Part II will examine the devastating impact that the loss of an adult child has on parents both from their perspectives and from now existing research. In …

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Time Is Not On Your Side: Establishing A Consistent Statute Of Limitations For The Alien Tort Claims Act, David E. Chawes Jan 2003

Time Is Not On Your Side: Establishing A Consistent Statute Of Limitations For The Alien Tort Claims Act, David E. Chawes

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment argues that inconsistent application of limitations periods to ATCA claims does not provide sufficient and certain notice to potential parties to allow them to bring a timely claim, thereby potentially denying them an opportunity to receive a fair hearing in federal courts. Absent a U.S. Supreme Court ruling to provide consistent guidance on the applicable ATCA limitations period, Congress should amend the statute to provide a specific ten-year limitations period for most torts. Because both international and U.S. laws provide that murder committed as part of the crime of genocide has no statute of limitations," ATCA claims arising …

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Recent Changes To Washington's Jury Trials: A Great System Made Even Better, Jeffrey C. Grant Jan 2003

Recent Changes To Washington's Jury Trials: A Great System Made Even Better, Jeffrey C. Grant

Seattle University Law Review

It was in this spirit that the Board of Judicial Administration created the Washington State Jury Commission in June 1999. The Commission's mandate was to "conduct a broad inquiry into the jury system and examine issues including ... juror responsiveness, citizen satisfaction from jury service, adequacy of juror reimbursement, and improving juror participation in trials." This Article sets forth a brief summary of the Commission's work and examines, in more detail, certain, specific recommendations of the Commission, including those that have been implemented and those that have not. In addition, this Article provides an update on the status of the …

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Stretching The Equal Access Act Beyond Equal Access, Aaron H. Caplan Jan 2003

Stretching The Equal Access Act Beyond Equal Access, Aaron H. Caplan

Seattle University Law Review

This article explores the ramifications of stretching the Equal Access Act ("EAA" or "the Act") beyond equal access to school premises for meetings during noninstructional time. Part I provides background on the Equal Access Act, from its legislative origins through its interpretations by federal courts. This part includes a careful look at the statute's often confusing language. Part II describes and criticizes Prince v. Jacoby. I argue that the decision is plagued with legal errors large and small, but that the main error is its failure to consider a central question: equal access to what? Both the EAA and …

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Ex Parte Civil Commitment, Family Care-Givers, And Schizophrenia: A Therapeutic Jurisprudence Analysis, Éva Szeli Jan 2000

Ex Parte Civil Commitment, Family Care-Givers, And Schizophrenia: A Therapeutic Jurisprudence Analysis, Éva Szeli

Seattle University Law Review

First, this Article will discuss schizophrenia and its impact on these individuals and their families. Family variables in the course of the disorder will be highlighted. Then, this Article will review the legal power afforded such families by ex parte provisions in civil commitment statutes using the involuntary examination portion of the Florida mental health code as a model. Finally, this Article will assess this system of civil commitment available to care-giving families in therapeutic jurisprudential terms, with recommendations for maximizing the therapeutic consequences and minimizing the antitherapeutic consequences of ex parte procedures.

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The View From The Bottomless Pit: Truth, Myth, And Irony In A Civil Action, Jerome P. Facher Jan 1999

The View From The Bottomless Pit: Truth, Myth, And Irony In A Civil Action, Jerome P. Facher

Seattle University Law Review

This Article offers the observations, analysis, and commentary of Beatrice's chief trial counsel about some of the important issues and rulings in Anderson, the accuracy of the events reported in A Civil Action, and the misimpressions created by the book's undoubted tilt in the plaintiffs' direction. Wherever possible, this Article's effort to balance the scales relies on court records, trial and hearing transcripts, and on other actual trial materials in Anderson to present the relevant facts and events in the context in which they arose. Contrary to the erroneous impression of justice gone astray created by the book …

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The Woburn Case: Is There A Better Way?, Michael B. Keating Jan 1999

The Woburn Case: Is There A Better Way?, Michael B. Keating

Seattle University Law Review

This essay suggests that the intense public interest in the best selling novel, A Civil Action, and the subsequent film should be directed less to Academy Awards nominations and more toward ways to improve the methods that our legal system employs to resolve complex and important disputes.

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Interpretation Of The Statutory Modification Of Joint And Several Liability: Resisting The Deconstruction Of Tort Reform, Gregory C. Sisk Jan 1992

Interpretation Of The Statutory Modification Of Joint And Several Liability: Resisting The Deconstruction Of Tort Reform, Gregory C. Sisk

Seattle University Law Review

This Article defends RCW 4.22.070 and opposes the deconstruction of legislative tort reform. The Article’s premise is that the legislature did indeed intend to accomplish a significant reform of the liability system and to take a long, purposeful stride toward the implementation of comparative fault as applied to all parties in tort litigation. The Article concludes that the legislature adopted language that adequately, if sometimes imperfectly, achieves that purpose. The Article discusses the following: the meaning of “fault” as applicable through RCW 4.22.070; the nature of the entities to whom fault must be allocated; the responsibility for raising the culpability …

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The Constitutional Validity Of The Modification Of Joint And Several Liability In The Washington Tort Reform Act Of 1986, Gregory C. Sisk Jan 1990

The Constitutional Validity Of The Modification Of Joint And Several Liability In The Washington Tort Reform Act Of 1986, Gregory C. Sisk

Seattle University Law Review

With the Washington Supreme Court having recently invalidated the statutory cap placed on awards of noneconomic damages to tort plaintiffs as a violation of the state constitutional right to a jury trial, we may expect an increasing onslaught upon other controversial provisions of the Washington Tort Reform Act of 1986. In particular, the modification of the common law doctrine of joint and several liability, which was also accomplished by the Tort Reform Act and is codified at section 4.22.070 of the Washington Revised Code, has already become a target of plaintiffs' attorneys in tort litigation and has also come under …

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In Re Grant: Where Does Washington Stand On Artificial Nutrition And Hydration?, Stephen P. Vanderhoef Jan 1989

In Re Grant: Where Does Washington Stand On Artificial Nutrition And Hydration?, Stephen P. Vanderhoef

Seattle University Law Review

The Washington Supreme Court in In re Grantsought to determine whether life sustaining treatment could be legally withheld from a terminally ill, non-comatose, incompetent individual. In its December 1987 slip opinion, a majority of the court expanded on its previous decisions empowering third parties, including guardians, families, and physicians, to withhold and withdraw life sustaining treatment from incompetent individuals. This was accomplished by characterizing artificial nutrition and hydration as removable, life sustaining medical treatment. The court also gave third parties the power to remove artificial nutrition and hydration before the incompetent individual in question slips into a coma or …

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Does The Agency Die When The Principal Becomes Mentally Incapacitated?, W. Alfred Mukatis Jan 1983

Does The Agency Die When The Principal Becomes Mentally Incapacitated?, W. Alfred Mukatis

Seattle University Law Review

This Article explores the status of an agency when a competent principal enters into an agency relationship and thereafter becomes mentally incapacitated. On the one hand, does the status of the agency depend on factors relating to the principal such as type, length, or permanence of the incapacity? For instance, is the status of the agency the same when a principal lapses into a coma as it is when a conscious principal is incapacitated because of a mental disease such as schizophrenia? If in a coma, how does the length of the coma affect the status of the agency? Is …

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The Dimensions Of A Journalist's Shield—First Amendment Protection For The Constitutionality Of News Sources Against Requests For Court-Ordered Disclosure In Civil Cases, Frank Van Dusen Jan 1983

The Dimensions Of A Journalist's Shield—First Amendment Protection For The Constitutionality Of News Sources Against Requests For Court-Ordered Disclosure In Civil Cases, Frank Van Dusen

Seattle University Law Review

This comment suggests a test in civil cases that enables a court to determine if there is a first amendment interest in protecting a source’s confidentiality. If a journalist can demonstrate this interest, then the burden shifts to the litigant seeking disclosure. This comments suggests three criteria through which the litigant must persuade the court that the state’s interest outweighs the first amendment interest. The test suggested by this comment should increase protection for the first amendment interest by decreasing the number of disclosure orders issued and by giving journalists and their confidential sources a basis for predicting in advance …

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