Common Law Commons^™

The Unconstitutionality Of The Protecting Access To Care Act Of 2017’S Cap On Noneconomic Damages In Medical Malpractice Cases, Kaeleigh P. Christie

Journal of Legislation

No abstract provided.

Clinton V. Jones: The King Has No Clothes (Nor Absolute Immunity To Boot), Christopher James Sears

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Law By Non-Lawyers: The Limit To Limited License Legal Technicians Increasing Access To Justice, Rebecca M. Donaldson

Seattle University Law Review

For the first time in the American legal profession, non-lawyers can openly, independently, ethically, and legally engage in activities recognized by bar associations as the practice of law. In 2012, the Washington Supreme Court passed Admission and Practice Rule 28 (APR 28), establishing the profession’s first paraprofessional licensing scheme that allows non-lawyers to give legal advice. The process authorizes qualified non-lawyers to provide legal advice without the supervision of a lawyer. Washington’s Supreme Court intends for Limited License Legal Technicians, or “LLLTs” as they are known, to increase access to justice by responding to the unmet civil legal needs of …

The Criminalization Of Vehicle Residency And The Case For Judicial Intervention Via The Washington State Homestead Act, T. Ray Ivey

Seattle University Law Review

In 2014, a nationwide survey by the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty found that the number of cities with ordinances that effectively criminalized vehicle habitation increased by 119% between 2011 and 2014. These ordinances take the form of metered street parking zones, permit-only parking zones, time restrictions, restrictions on vehicle operability, restrictions regarding licensing and registration, and even prohibitions directed specifically at vehicle habitation. Violations of these policies typically result in noncriminal citations imposing fees, requiring attendance at hearings, or inflicting other financial burdens, which nevertheless can have devastating impacts on someone with already limited resources. Additionally, the …

Voila! Taking The Judge Out Of Divorce, Margaret Ryznar, Angélique Devaux

Seattle University Law Review

This Article examines the possibility of non-judicial divorce in the United States based on the French model. Part I begins by examining the recognition of divorce by agreement of the parties in France. Part II analyzes the judicial role in American divorces, and whether it bars either domestic non-judicial divorce or recognition of foreign non-judicial divorce. Part III undertakes a comparative analysis, concluding that the United States may be amenable to non-judicial divorces that occur not only abroad but, eventually, within its own borders.

The Paradox Of Christian-Based Political Advocacy: A Reply To Professor Calhoun, Wayne R. Barnes

Washington and Lee Law Review Online

Professor Calhoun, in his Article around which this symposium is based, has asserted that it is permissible for citizens to publicly argue for laws or public policy solutions based on explicitly religious reasons. Calhoun candidly admits that he has “long grappled” with this question (as have I, though he for longer), and, in probably the biggest understatement in this entire symposium, notes that Professor Kent Greenawalt identified this as “a particularly significant, debatable, and highly complex problem.” Is it ever. I have a position that I will advance in this article, but I wish to acknowledge at the outset that …

America's Creed: The Inevitable, Sometimes Dangerous, Mixing Of Religion And Politics, David M. Smolin

Washington and Lee Law Review Online

Political and philosophical theorists have often advocated for the exclusion of some or all religious perspectives from full participation in politics. Such approaches create criteria—such as public accessibility, public reason, or secular rationale—to legitimate such exclusion. During the 1990s I argued, as an evangelical Christian, against such exclusionary theories, defending the rights to full and equal political participation by evangelical Christians, traditionalist Roman Catholics, and any others who would be restricted by such criteria.

The Right To Appeal In Comparative Perspective, Dražan Djukić

The Journal of Appellate Practice and Process

Appellate procedures regarding the most serious crimes under domestic law are, in general, conducted differently in common law and civil law systems. This article reviews the differences concerning the primary facets of such proceedings, namely prosecutorial rights of appeal, access to appellate review, the scope of appellate review, the admission of additional evidence, appellate decisionmaking powers, and the functions of appellate review. It then explains that these differences result from dissimilar decisionmaking processes, degrees of adherence to the search for the truth, and sources of law.

Private Law, Fundamental Rights, And The Rule Of Law, Hugh Collins

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Common-Law Exceptions Clause: Congressional Control Of Supreme Court Appellate Jurisdiction In Light Of British Precedent, Daniel D. Birk

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Comparison Of Laws And Regulations Concerning Human Factors In Maritime Accident, Yifang Xu

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Case Against Qualified Immunity, Joanna C. Schwartz

Notre Dame Law Review

If the Court did find an appropriate case to reconsider qualified immunity, and took seriously available evidence about qualified immunity’s historical precedents and current operation, the Court could not justify the continued existence of the doctrine in its current form. Ample evidence undermines the purported common-law foundations for qualified immunity. Research examining contemporary civil rights litigation against state and local law enforcement shows that qualified immunity also fails to achieve its intended policy aims. Qualified immunity does not shield individual officers from financial liability. It almost never shields government officials from costs and burdens associated with discovery and trial in …

The History, Meaning, And Use Of The Words Justice And Judge, Jason Boatright

St. Mary's Law Journal

The words justice and judge have similar meanings because they have a common ancestry. They are derived from the same Latin term, jus, which is defined in dictionaries as “right” and “law.” However, those definitions of jus are so broad that they obscure the details of what the term meant when it formed the words that eventually became justice and judge. The etymology of jus reveals the kind of right and law it signified was related to the concepts of restriction and obligation. Vestiges of this sense of jus survived in the meaning of justice and judge. …

Trademark's Judicial De-Evolution: Why Courts Get Trademark Cases Wrong Repeatedly, Glynn Lunney

Faculty Scholarship

Trademark law has de-evolved. It has transitioned from an efficient mechanism for ensuring competition into an inefficient regime for capturing economic rents. In this Article, I focus on the role that party self-interest has played in biasing the evolution of trademark law. This self-interest tends to lead parties to (1) challenge efficient legal rules and seek to replace them with inefficient, anticompetitive rules, and (2) accede to inefficient, anticompetitive rules once they are in place. Almost by definition, when a rule of trademark law promotes competition, it reduces the market surplus or rents that current producers capture. As a result, …

The Future Of The Federal Common Law Of Foreign Relations, Ingrid W. Brunk

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

The federal common law of foreign relations has been in decline for decades. The field was built in part on the claim that customary international law is federal common law and in part on the claim that federal judges should displace state law when they conclude that it poses difficul- ties for U.S. foreign relations. Today, however, customary international law is generally applied based upon the implied intentions of Congress, rather than its free-standing status as federal common law, and judicial evaluation of foreign policy problems has largely been replaced by reli- ance upon presidential or congressional action, or by …

The Best And Worst Of Contracts Decisions: An Anthology, Nathan B. Oman, Daniel Barnhizer, Scott J. Burnham, Charles R. Calleros, Larry T. Garvin, Nadelle Grossman, F. E. Guerra-Pujol, Jeffrey L. Harrison, Hila Keren, Michael P. Malloy, Daniel P. O'Gorman, Deborah Post, Val Ricks, Rachel Arnow-Richman, Richard R. Carlson, Mark P. Gergen, Kenney Hegland, Nancy S. Kim, Jean Fleming Powers, Cheryl B. Preston

Faculty Publications

Five hundred years ago, the common law of contract was without substance. It was form-procedure. Plaintiffs picked a form of action, and common law judges made sure someone besides themselves answered all the hard questions; the parties, a jury, or a ritual determined the winner and the remedy. Judges ran a switch on a conflicts-resolution railway. Thomas More, when Chancellor of England (1529-33), urged judges to lay tracks and control the trains. The problem, he said, was that the judges, "by the verdict of the jury[,] cast off all quarrels from themselves." The judges soon assumed greater authority, taking responsibility …

Things Invisible To See: State Action & Private Property, Joseph William Singer, Isaac Saidel-Goley

Texas A&M Law Review

This Article revisits the state action doctrine, a judicial invention that shields “private” or “non-governmental” discrimination from constitutional scrutiny. Traditionally, this doctrine has applied to discrimination even in places of public accommodation, like restaurants, hotels, and grocery stores. Born of overt racial discrimination, the doctrine has inflicted substantial injustice throughout its inglorious history, and courts have continuously struggled in vain to coherently apply the doctrine. Yet, the United States Supreme Court has not fully insulated “private” or “horizontal” relations among persons from constitutional scrutiny. The cases in which it has applied constitutional norms to non-governmental actors should be celebrated rather …

Six Of One, Half A Dozen Of The Other? Jurisdiction In Common Law Canada, Stephen G.A. Pitel

Osgoode Hall Law Journal

This short article considers the central differences in the law on taking jurisdiction in civil and commercial disputes between those common law provinces that have implemented a statute on jurisdiction (British Columbia, Nova Scotia, and Saskatchewan) and those common law provinces that rely on the common law (Alberta, Ontario, and others). It focuses on the distinction between presence and ordinary residence, the role and analysis of presumptive connecting factors for taking jurisdiction, and issues related to immovable property.

Death In America Under Color Of Law: Our Long, Inglorious Experience With Capital Punishment, Rob Warden, Daniel Lennard

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.

A Lesson From Goodfellas: Why Current Illinois Consideration Based Pension Reform Proposals Still Fail, Lari A. Dierks

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.

Take This Job And Shove It: The Pragmatic Philosophy Of Johnny Paycheck And A Prayer For Strict Liability In Appalachia, Eugene "Trey" Moore Iii

The Scholar: St. Mary's Law Review on Race and Social Justice

Abstract forthcoming

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

Georgia State University Law Review

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 …

When Courts Run Amuck: A Book Review Of Unequal: How America's Courts Undermine Discrimination Law By Sandra F. Sperino And Suja A. Thomas (Oxford 2017), Theresa M. Beiner

Texas A&M Law Review

In Unequal: How America’s Courts Undermine Discrimination Law (“Unequal”), law professors Sandra F. Sperino and Suja A. Thomas provide a point-by-point analysis of how the federal courts’ interpretations of federal anti-discrimination laws have undermined their efficacy to provide relief to workers whose employers have allegedly engaged in discrimination. The cases’ results are consistently pro-employer, even while the Supreme Court of the United States—a court not known for being particularly pro-plaintiff—has occasionally ruled in favor of plaintiff employees. The authors suggest some reasons for this apparent anti-plaintiff bias among the federal courts, although they do not settle on a particular reason …

China's Anti-Corruption Crackdown And The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, Daniel C.K. Chow

Texas A&M Law Review

China’s highly publicized crackdown on corruption may affect the type and number of cases in China that arise under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”), but it should not be assumed that the crackdown will necessarily lead to fewer FCPA prosecutions. Although there is some overlap of the goals of China’s corruption crackdown and the goals of the FCPA, China’s crackdown also serves important goals of the ruling Communist Party. The main goal of the current crackdown is to reinforce the Party’s power by targeting enemies and rivals of the current leadership. The crackdown is not aimed at prohibiting bribes …

Entering The Trump Ice Age: Contextualizing The New Immigration Enforcement Regime, Bill Ong Hing

Texas A&M Law Review

During the early stages of the Trump ICE age, America seemed to be witnessing and experiencing an unparalleled era of immigration enforcement. But is it unparalleled? Did we not label Barack Obama the “deporter-inchief?” Was it not George W. Bush who used the authority of the Patriot Act to round up nonimmigrants from Muslim and Arab countries, and did his ICE not commonly engage in armed raids at factories and other worksites? Are there not strong parallels that can be drawn between Trump enforcement plans and actions and those of other eras? What about the fear and hysteria that seems …

Higher Education Savings And Planning: Tax And Nontax Considerations, F. Philip Manns Jr., Timothy M. Todd

Texas A&M Law Review

Funding higher education is among the critical financial decisions made by individuals and families. There are myriad options. Yet, the conventional wisdom—namely using Section 529 Plans—may not be the optimal vehicle to effectuate this goal. Therefore, this Article discusses various strategies to plan, save, and pay for higher education. It compares various savings methods including gifts, UTMA accounts, Section 529 Plans, trusts, and other vehicles. The analysis explores both tax and non-tax considerations, including the effect of different strategies on financial aid, transaction costs, investor control, income taxes, gift and estate taxes, flexibility, and creditor protection. This Article concludes that …

How Subterranean Regulation Hinders Innovation In Assisted Reproductive Technology, Myrisha S. Lewis

Cardozo Law Review

Most scholars believe assisted reproductive technology is subject only to minimal regulation, especially by the federal government. This belief I contend, is wrong. In this Article, I examine agency documents, statements by officials, and letters that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has sent to physicians and researchers over the past fifteen years to reveal an overlooked regulatory program. The FDA has been targeting new forms of assisted reproductive technology that involve small genetic modifications (advanced assisted reproductive technologies or AARTs) through regulatory actions that receive little public, media, or scholarly attention. I term this method of regulation "subterranean …

National Association Of Manufacturers V. Department Of Defense, Summer L. Carmack

Public Land & Resources Law Review

In an attempt to provide consistency to the interpretation and application of the statutory phrase “waters of the United States,” as used in the Clean Water Act, the EPA and Army Corps of Engineers together passed the WOTUS Rule. Unfortunately, the Rule has created more confusion than clarity, resulting in a number of lawsuits challenging substantive portions of the Rule’s language. National Association of Manufacturers v. Department of Defense did not address those substantive challenges, but instead determined whether those claims challenging the Rule must be filed in federal district courts or federal courts of appeals. In its decision, the …

Who Determines What Is Egregious? Judge Or Jury: Enhanced Damages After Halo V. Pulse, Brandon M. Reed

Georgia State University Law Review

Enhanced damages in patent law are a type of punitive damage that can be awarded in the case of “egregious misconduct” during the course of patent infringement. Authorization for enhanced damages comes from 35 U.S.C. § 284, which allows the district court to increase total damages up to three times the amount of actual damages found by the jury. It is well understood that, since enhanced damages are punitive in nature, enhancement should only be considered for cases of “wanton” or “deliberate” infringement. However, determining what constitutes this “egregious” misconduct has vastly transformed over time to include a negligence standard, …

Disseisin, Doubt, And Debate: Adverse Possession Scholarship In The United States (1881-1986), John Lovett

Texas A&M Law Review

Property law scholars in the United States have discussed the doctrine of adverse possession for more than a century. Indeed, ever since American property law scholars began to write property law treatises, formalize property law courses in modern law schools, publish property specific articles in law reviews, and publish property law case books, adverse possession has served as a staple of property law discourse. This Article examines how property law scholars think about and discuss adverse possession. It explores how adverse possession talk has changed—and not changed—over time. In other words, this Article examines both the substance and rhetoric of …