Common Law Commons^™

Constitutional Implications Of School Punishment For Cyber Bullying, Raul R. Calvoz, Bradley W. Davis, Mark A. Gooden

Cardozo Law Review de•novo

In this article, we address the scope of student free speech rights as it relates to cyber bullying. We provide a review of legal theories under which school administrators can address cyber bullying while still respecting student free speech rights and the First Amendment. Additionally, we address the jurisdiction of administrators to deal with off-campus bullying conduct.

Statutes In Common Law Courts, Jeffrey A. Pojanowski

Journal Articles

The Supreme Court teaches that federal courts, unlike their counterparts in the states, are not general common law courts. Nevertheless, a perennial point of contention among federal law scholars is whether and how a court’s common law powers affect its treatment of statutes. Textualists point to federal courts’ lack of common law powers to reject purposivist statutory interpretation. Critics of textualism challenge this characterization of federal courts’ powers, leveraging a more robust notion of the judicial power to support purposivist or dynamic interpretation. This disagreement has become more important in recent years with the emergence of a refreshing movement in …

Innovation In China: Fragmentation, Structured Uncertainty, And Technology Standards, Michael Murphree, Dan Breznitz

Cardozo Law Review de•novo

This Article discusses the history of China’s attempts to develop indigenous technology standards. A case study is presented on China’s attempts to develop digital optical storage media standards, the failure of which we attribute to fragmentation of production and structured uncertainty in China’s economy. Despite the market failures of China’s domestic standards development efforts, we conclude by highlighting some of the appurtenant benefits they produce for Chinese manufacturers.

The Best Interest Of The Child And The Law , Christian Reichel Van Deusen

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Separation Of Powers Doctrine On The Modern Supreme Court And Four Doctrinal Approaches To Judicial Decision-Making, R. Randall Kelso

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Property Before Property: Romanizing The English Law Of Land, Thomas J. Mcsweeney

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

English Justices And Roman Jurists: The Civilian Learning Behind England's First Case Law, Thomas J. Mcsweeney

Faculty Publications

Article looks at a historical problem—the first use of case law by English royal justices in the thirteenth century—and makes it a starting point for thinking about the ways legal reasoning works in the modern common law. In the first Part of the Article, I show that, at its origin, the English justices’ use of decided cases as a source of law was inspired by the work civil and canon law scholars were doing with written authorities in the medieval universities. In an attempt to make the case that English law was on par with civil law and canon law, …

Reason, The Common Law, And The Living Constitution (Review Of The Living Constitution By David Strauss), Matthew J. Steilen

Book Reviews

This article reviews David Strauss’s recent book, The Living Constitution. The thesis of Strauss’s book is that constitutional law is a kind of common law, based largely on judicial precedent and common-sense judgments about what works and what is fair. Strauss argues constitutional doctrines prohibiting discrimination and protecting free speech have a common law basis, and that the originalist would have to reject them. However, it is unclear that the common law can justify these rights. This review examines Strauss’s account of the common law and shows why it cannot justify our First Amendment protections of subversive advocacy, as Strauss …

The Democratic Common Law, Matthew J. Steilen

Journal Articles

This article explores the democratic features of common-law judicial law-making. It begins by examining the so-called “classical” account of the common law, associated with English jurists Edward Coke and Matthew Hale. These jurists describe the common law as a kind of “reasonable custom” that emerges out of a public process in which lawyers exchange reasons with the court about how to resolve a dispute. The article then turns to modern common-law adjudication, and, drawing on the work of Fred Schauer, Edward Levi, Martin Golding, and others, shows how public deliberation prominently features in the modern adjudicative process as well. The …

Echoes Of The Impact Of Webb V. Mcgowin On The Doctrine Of Consideration Under Contract Law: Some Reflections On The Decision On The Approach Of Its 75th Anniversary, Stephen J. Leacock

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

From Judging Culture To Taxing 'Indians': Tracing The Legal Discourse Of The 'Indian Mode Of Life', Constance Macintosh

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

In this article I consider how judicial decision making characterizes Indigenous peoples’ culture outside the context of determinations under section 35(1) of the Constitution Act, 1982. I am concerned with how contemporary jurisprudence sometimes subjects Indigenous people to stereotyped tests of Aboriginality when they seek to exercise legislated rights. These common law tests of Aboriginality tend to turn on troubling oppositional logics, such as whether or not the Indigenous person engages in waged labour or commercial activities. These tests arose in historic legislation and policy that were premised on social evolutionary theory and were directed at determining whether an Indigenous …

Introduction: Common Law Environmental Protection, Jonathan H. Adler, Andrew P. Morriss

Faculty Publications

Today there is widespread dissatisfaction with many aspects of federal environmental law. The apparent success of early environmental regulations notwithstanding, many analysts and academics have begun to reexamine the potential of common law causes of action to supplement, if not supplant, portions of the existing regulatory regime. Some environmental advocates have come to the conclusion that state-based tort law may be more protective than federal regulations. At the same time, private litigators and state attorneys general are reviving common law causes of action in an effort to augment existing regulatory controls.

Is the common law a viable means of addressing …

Preventing, Implementing And Enforcing International Humanitarian Law, Juan E. Mendez

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

No abstract provided.

Common Law Police Powers And The Rule Of Law, Steve Coughlan

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

Common law police powers have long been a source of some dispute in the Canadian criminal justice system. On the one hand, their existence is difficult to reconcile with predictability in the law, since in any individual case where a new power is created (generally referred to as use of the "ancillary powers doctrine"), it would not have been possible to know in advance that the police were actually acting legally. On the other hand the benefit for society purchased with that ambiguity is a more tailored response to the particular problem, which might also lead to better results in …

A Theory Of Federal Common Law, Jay Tidmarsh, Brian J. Murray

Journal Articles

Federal common law is a puzzle. Despite Erie's declaration that "[t]here is no federal general common law,"' well-established and stable pockets of federal common law persist in several areas: cases affecting the rights and obligations of the United States,2 disputes between states, 3 cases affecting international relations,4 and admiralty.5 If anything, federal common law is expanding. Eighteen years ago, a case in which state law was in "significant conflict" with "uniquely federal interests" provided an occasion for the Supreme Court to create another form of federal common law.6 Five years ago, the Court added yet another piece to the puzzle, …

Judging Reputation: Realism And Common Law In Justice White's Defamation Jurisprudence, John C.P. Goldberg

University of Colorado Law Review

No abstract provided.

Objective Interpretation And Objective Meaning In Holmes And Dickerson: Interpretive Practice And Interpretive Theory, Patrick J. Kelley

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Cases Concerning Equity And The Courts Of Equity 1550-1660, William Hamilton Bryson

Law Faculty Publications

This volume of previously unpublished equity reports in the period 1550-1660 includes cases of substantive equity prosecuted by English bill procedure, cases that explain the jurisdiction, procedures, and practices of the courts of equity in England, and a few cases from the courts of common law that touch on and consider the jurisdiction of the equity courts. Also included are cases in the equity courts that involve equitable remedies needed to protect common law rights. Frequently the equity judge had to determine a common law right before an equitable remedy could be granted.

Readings In The Common Law, Paul L. Sayre

Indiana Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Whether The Federal Rules Of Evidence Should Be Conceived As A Perpetual Index Code: Blindness Is Worse Than Myopia, Edward J. Imwinkelried

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Elusive Identity Of The Federal Rules Of Evidence, Glen Weissenberger

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Evidence Myopia: The Failure To See The Federal Rules Of Evidence As A Codification Of The Common Law, Glen Weissenberger

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Franchisor Liability For The Torts Of Its Franchisees: The Case For Substituting Liability As A Guarantor For The Current Vicarious Liability, John L. Hanks

Articles

The author reviews the justifications for applying the law of vicarious liability in the franchising context and concludes that its application is often inefficient and arbitrary. He argues that the employee-independent contractor dichotomy used by courts to determine franchisor liability is not well-suited to franchising, where the relationship encompasses both concepts. He proposes that vicarious liability not be applied in the franchising context. Instead, the courts by case law or state legislatures by statute should impose a guarantor status on franchisors that would expose them to liability for the torts of the franchisees only if the franchisee was unavailable to …

Comparative Law In Action: Promissory Estoppel, The Civil Law, And The Mixed Jurisdiction, David Snyder

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

No abstract provided.

Back To The Parent: Holding Company Liability For Subsidiary Banks - A Discussion Of The Net Worth Maintenance Agreement, The Source Of Stength Doctrine, And The Prompt Corrective Action Provision, Cassandra Jones Havard

Cardozo Law Review

The unprecedented number of bank failures in the past several years has spawned a crisis in the industry and fueled an extensive debate about how federal regulators can effectively make banks more responsible for guaranteeing the soundness of their operations. For the federal regulators most involved-the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation ("FDIC"), Office of Thrift Supervision ("OTS"), and the Federal Reserve Board ("FRB") -Congress is directing the effort to enhance the banks' guarantees of self-policing. Congress's basic response to the crisis has been to heighten the minimum capital levels the banks must maintain to avoid direct corrective intervention by the federal …

Benjamin Nathan Cardozo The Teacher, Joseph W. Bellacosa

Cardozo Law Review

The forty-seventh Cardozo Memorial Lecture, delivered in memory of Benjamin N. Cardozo at the House of the Association on November 9, 1994.

Critiquing The Legal Order In The Name Of “Critical Morality”, Julius Cohen

Cardozo Law Review

The moral criticism of the legal order has been a longtime sport (serious), if not an industry, for law teachers, theorists, judges, and other legal functionaries. In the process, they often reach for criteria beyond those utilized in conventional morality. Sometimes the reach "beyond" is ad hoc; sometimes it is accompanied by an awareness that it is toward a pattern of a higher-level, critical morality. The reach beyond is often triggered by a need to resolve conflicts within conventional morality. Or it is a function of the distrust of some of the sources of conventional morality, such as prejudice, unrefined …

Overview Of The Role Of Precedent In The Legal System Of The United States, Ana Elena Fierro

LLM Theses and Essays

Traditionally, legal systems have been classified as either Common Law or Civil Law; scholars distinguish these systems based on their origins, as well their attitudes towards stare decisis. Common law considers precedent as a source of binding rules, while civil law does not. However, some scholars consider the methods for legal reasoning to be almost the same in every legal system. These scholars maintain that regardless of the source of law in a particular country, once a judge determines that the facts of one case are similar to those regulated by a certain rule, the judge will apply that particular …

Job Security: Protecting At-Will Employees With Good Cause Legislation, Mayumi Yokoyama

LLM Theses and Essays

Recent decades have witnessed significant developments in employment termination law in the United States. In particular, the long-standing “at-will” doctrine, under which employers can fire employees for good, bad, or no reason at all, has experienced great erosion and wide variations in law from state to state. There has been a movement of statutory and common law restrictions limiting an employer’s freedom to terminate at will, which reflects the increasing consciousness of job security by society and workers. This paper analyzes the problem of job security by tracing the origin of the at-will doctrine to 19th century principles favoring economic …

The Development Of Common Law Defamation Privileges: From Communitarian Society To Market Society, M. M. Slaughter

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.