Common Law Commons^™

The Role Of The State, Multinational Oil Companies, International Law & The International Community: Intersection Of Human Rights & Environmental Degradation Climate Change In The 21st Century Caused By Traditional Extractive Practices, The Amazon Rainforest, Indigenous People And Universal Jurisdiction To Resolve The Accountability Issue, Marcela Cabrera Luna

Master's Theses

Local, national and international conventions that protect indigenous sovereignty and their territories, where many of the resources are extracted from by multinational corporations (MNCs) particularly oil, the number one commodity of the world and cause of climate change, continue to be jeopardized because of the lack of a clear international legal framework that can protect them and potentially hold multinationals accountable for their actions. These practices are causing not only environmental issues to the indigenous and surrounding communities, but climate change is in fact, the real human rights issue of the 21^st century and it affects everyone. By using …

Common Law Fundamentals Of The Right To Abortion, Anita Bernstein

Buffalo Law Review

No abstract provided.

Common Law Fundamentals Of The Right To Abortion, Anita Bernstein

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Impasse Of Tibetan Justice: Spain's Exercise Of Universal Jurisdiction In Prosecuting Chinese Genocide, Craig Peters

Seattle University Law Review

Universal jurisdiction is the progressive and contentious legal principle that courts have competence to adjudicate cases involving alleged violations of international law regardless of the nation in which those crimes occurred, the nationality of the victim, or the nationality of the perpetrator. While the limits of more conventional theories of jurisdiction are defined by sovereignty, territory, and nationality, the exercise of universal jurisdiction is based solely on the nature of the crime alleged. That is, when a crime is so serious that it violates peremptory norms of international law, courts are entitled, or even obliged, to hear those cases regardless …

Blood And Privacy: Towards A "Testing-As-Search" Paradigm Under The Fourth Amendment, Andrei Nedelcu

Seattle University Law Review

A vehicle on a public thoroughfare is observed driving erratically and careening across the roadway. After the vehicle strikes another passenger car and comes to a stop, the responding officer notices in the driver the telltale symptoms of intoxication—bloodshot eyes, slurred speech, and a distinct odor of intoxicants. On these facts, a lawfully-procured warrant authorizing the extraction of the driver’s blood is obtained. However, the document fails to circumscribe the manner and variety of testing that may be performed on the sample. Does this lack of particularity render the warrant constitutionally infirm as a mandate for chemical analysis of the …

The Diffusion Of Doctrinal Innovations In Tort Law, Kyle Graham

Marquette Law Review

This Article examines the spread of “successful” common-law doctrinal innovations in the law of torts. Its analysis reveals recurring influences upon and tendencies within the diffusion of novel tort doctrines across the states. The studied diffusion patterns also document a trend toward common-law doctrinal “stabilization” over the past quarter-century. As detailed herein, this stabilization owes in part to altered adoption dynamics associated with the ongoing shrinkage and fragmentation of the common-law tort dockets entertained by state supreme courts. Prevailing conditions will make it difficult, this Article concludes, for even well-received common-law doctrinal innovations of the future to match the rapid …

Enduring Doctrine: The Collateral Source Rule In Wisconsin Injury Law, Joseph P. Poehlmann

Marquette Law Review

When the common law collateral source rule first arose in the area of tort law over one hundred years ago, only a minority of individuals maintained health insurance coverage to protect against loss in the event that a negligent actor injured them. Today, however, the vast majority of Americans are covered. Because of this change in the landscape of insurance coverage, many jurisdictions have abrogated or greatly eroded the collateral source rule under the belief that the rule no longer holds a justified role in personal injury litigation. Wisconsin, however, continues to follow the common law form of the rule …

Identifying Pathways To And Experiences Of Street Involvementthrough Case Law, Suzanne Bouclin

Dalhousie Law Journal

This research explores what can be learned about the experiences of streetinvolved people by reading cases that deal with people characterized on the record as "homeless." The author builds on existing empirical research by reading a large body of cases to discuss pathways to and experiences of street involvement. She proceeds to more closely explore cases regarding people (1) who are identified in the cases as homeless, and (2) find themselves before the courts for having engaged in income generating activities. The author argues that cases constitute knowledge about street involvement in ways that may take us beyond what we …

The Standing Of The Public Interest, Amitai Etzioni

Barry Law Review

No abstract provided.

Equity In The Age Of Statutes, Hang Wu Tang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

It has been said that we have moved from a legal system dominated by the common law to one where statutes represent the primary source of the law. Where does that leave equitable jurisprudence in the age of statutes? This article examines the tricky interplay between statute law and equity. It is suggested that there are broadly three categories of cases when the court is considering the application of equitable doctrines in the context of a statute. First, the statute may explicitly or implicitly abolish the application of a relevant equitable doctrine. In this case, the relevant equitable doctrine should …

Juggling Centralized Constitutional Review And Eu Primacy In The Domestic Enforcement Of The Charter: A. V. B., Maartje De Visser

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Let the letters in the title of the judgment not fool anyone as to the anonymity of the parties involved: the facts that can be gleaned from this and the relevant Austrian judgments (the Kazakhstani plaintiff was alleged to have kidnapped other Kazakhs and lived at various junctures in Austria and Malta) should provide enough information for anyone with rudimentary skills in operating search engines to unearth the sensational beginning and unexpected ending of the protagonist. Such details, unfortunately, belong in a blockbuster movie rather than an academic case note.

Fashioning A General Common Law For Employment In An Age Of Statutes, Michael C. Harper

Faculty Scholarship

In the current post-Erie age of statutes the Supreme Court continues to have potential influence over the development of a “general” common law used to decide recurring issues governed by state law. This influence, which has drawn little commentary, derives from the Court’s authority to consider analogous issues when filling gaps in federal statutes, sometimes through express reliance on general common law. The influence is through the power to persuade, like that of the federal judiciary in its general common lawmaking age of Swift, rather than through the power to command, like that of the federal judiciary in the formulation …

Amendments To The Companies Act – Audit Exemption For Small Companies, Pey Woan Lee

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The first phase of legislative amendments introduced by the Companies (Amendment) Act 2014 took effect on 1 July 2015. Of these amendments, the most significant is arguably the introduction of the “small company”, which replaces the exempt private company for purposes of audit exemption. This article considers the features of this new regime and illustrates its application to existing as well as new companies.

Military Rules Of Evidence: Adoption Or Abrogation Of The Common Law?, Richard H. Mills

Akron Law Review

Posit: What role should the common law of evidence play in a military judge's decisions under the present rules of evidence? My conclusion is that the answer to this question is of bedrock importance to military justice.

Yet despite these differences, an understanding of the Federal Rules of Evidence and the common law precedents from which they evolved is imperative if the majority of the military rules is to be properly employed.

Tortious Necessity; The Privileged Defense, John P. Finan, John Ritson

Akron Law Review

The similarities between the laws of torts in the United States of America and England enable one to make an interesting comparison between the two sets of rules applicable to the general defense of necessity. Although both tort systems are derivatives to a greater or lesser extent of the English common law, they have inevitably developed their own individual jurisprudence over the years. Concepts have been refined and extended to produce significant and curious differences which provide an interesting exercise in legal forensic. The similarities of the two tort systems make a comparative study possible, and the differences provide the …

Refusing To Remove An Obstacle To The Remedy: The Supreme Court's Decision In Town Of Castle Rock V. Gonzales Continues To Deny Domestic Violence Victims Meaningful Recourse, Nicole M. Quester

Akron Law Review

The Supreme Court’s opinion in Castle Rock illustrates that more conscious efforts must be made by every branch of the legal system to eradicate domestic abuse. The entire legal system must work together to raise the curtain on domestic violence. Legislatures must continue to promote social change in the area of domestic violence, and courts must enforce legislation without questioning the legislature’s policy determinations. Police departments must enforce strict policies aimed at protecting the abused, while being held accountable when failing to provide any measure of protection. The legal system must heed a woman’s pleas for help and prevent court …

“Nede Hath No Law”: The State Of Exception In Gower And Langland, Conrad J. Van Dijk

Accessus

This article discusses the use of the legal maxim necessity knows no law in the works of William Langland and John Gower. Whereas Langland’s usage has stirred up great controversy, Gower’s unique application of the canon law adage has received hardly any attention. On the surface, it is difficult to think of two authors less alike, and the way in which they relate the concept of necessity to different subjects (the poverty debate, fin amour) seems to support that feeling. Yet this article argues that reading Langland and Gower side by side is mutually illuminating. Specifically, this article reveals …

Superstatute Theory And Administrative Common Law, Kathryn E. Kovacs

Indiana Law Journal

This Article employs William Eskridge and John Ferejohn’s theory of superstatutes as a tool to argue that administrative common law that contradicts or ignores the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) is illegitimate. Eskridge and Ferejohn conceive of statutes that emerge from a lengthy, public debate and take on great normative weight over time as “superstatutes.” Superstatute theory highlights the deficiency in deliberation about the meaning of the APA. The APA bears all the hallmarks of a superstatute. Unlike the typical federal superstatute, however, the APA is not administered by a single agency. Thus, to respect and encourage the civic-republican style of …

Enforcement Of Forum Selection Agreements In Contracts Between Unequal Parties, Cindy Noles

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

The Recognition And Enforcement Of Foreign Country Judgments And Arbitral Awards: A North-South Perspective, Michael Quilling

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

The Traditional View Of Public Policy And Ordre Public In Private International Law, Kent Murphy

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Commerce, Commonality, And Contract Law: Legal Reform In A Mixed Jurisdiction, Christopher K. Odinet

Louisiana Law Review

The article offers information on the history, purpose and significant need for reform to commerce, commonality, and contract law in the mixed jurisdiction of Louisiana. Topics discussed include the significance of the bijural character of the common law government in developing a mixed legal systems, the comparison between the compatibility of doctrines of civil law and common law, and the role of former governor William C. C. Claiborne in maintaining the integrity of traditional civil law.

Regulating The Dead: Rights For The Corpse And The Removal Of San Francisco's Cemeteries, Lance Muckey

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

A specialized facet of American common law developed throughout the nineteenth century; that being mortuary law or the law of the corpse. This jurisprudence transferred limited property rights to dead bodies, which was a radical departure from the treatment of the dead under the English common law tradition that the United States had adopted after the American Revolution.

The dead fit into a unique category in law. Legally they do not exist and therefore have no voice. It thus falls to the state to speak for them in the form of statutes and judicial decisions, which represents a continuation of …

Foreign Sovereign Immunity - Rex V. Cia. Pervana De Vapores, S.A., Richard O. Ward

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Government Duty To Protect: Post-Deshaney Developments, Erwin Chemerinsky

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Procedural And Structural Obstacles In Challenging Aspects Of The Criminal Justice System, John Boston

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Civil And Common Law: A Historical Analysis Of Colonial And Postcolonial Canada, Patrick S. Stroud

Butler Journal of Undergraduate Research

Legal historians divide European law into two principal families: common law (British law) and civil law (continental European law). Common law judges favor cases; courts “discover” law on a case-by-case basis and those cases make precedents for future ruling. Civil law courts favor codes; courts compare cases to existing laws and those laws control judges’ rulings. The two rarely interact, save one prominent example: Canada. British common law supposedly superseded French legal traditions in colonial Canada. But is history so binary? Did British common law truly “conquer” French civil law? Through analysis of Canadian legal history, this article demonstrates how …

The Uneasy And Often Unhelpful Interaction Of Tort Law And Constitutional Law In First Amendment Litigation, George C. Christie

Marquette Law Review

There are increasing tensions between the First Amendment and the common law torts of intentional infliction of emotional distress, defamation, and privacy. This Article discusses the conflicting interactions among the three models that are competing for primacy as the tort law governing expressive activities evolves to accommodate the requirements of the First Amendment. At one extreme there is the model that expression containing information which has been lawfully obtained that contains neither intentional falsehoods nor incitements to immediate violence can only be sanctioned in narrowly defined exceptional circumstances, even if that expression involves matters that are universally regarded as being …

Police Racism, Sam Prey

Nebraska College Preparatory Academy: Senior Capstone Projects

The Police Force is a respected service that keeps our streets safe but their power of enforcing the law could be and has been abused and has caused a lot of controversy between people of different ethnic backgrounds. This is important because rights have been violated and in this modern age these cases shouldn’t occur at all. There is a lot of informaLon about cases where people have been mistreated or abused excessively for a crime that could have been handled differently and lives would not have been lost.

A Government Of Laws Not Of Precedents 1776-1876: The Google Challenge To Common Law Myth, James Maxeiner

All Faculty Scholarship

The United States, it is said, is a common law country. The genius of American common law, according to American jurists, is its flexibility in adapting to change and in developing new causes of action. Courts make law even as they apply it. This permits them better to do justice and effectuate public policy in individual cases, say American jurists.

Not all Americans are convinced of the virtues of this American common law method. Many in the public protest, we want judges that apply and do not make law. American jurists discount these protests as criticisms of naive laymen. They …