Food and Drug Law Commons^™

Finding Parity Through Preclusion: Novel Mental Health Parity Solutions At The State Level, Ryan D. Kingshill

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

Recently, the federal government has taken numerous steps to promote the equal treatment (also known as parity) of mental and physical health issues. The two most impactful actions are the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Act of 2008 and the Affordable Care Act. These acts focus on the traditional avenue for parity change—insurance regulation. While these acts have improved parity, major gaps in coverage and treatment between mental health/substance use disorder treatment and medical/surgical treatment persist. ERISA Preemption, evasive insurer behavior, lack of enforcement, and lack of consumer education continue to plague patients and healthcare professionals. On its own, federal …

Achieving Better Care In Pennsylvania By Allowing Pharmacists To Practice Pharmacy, Travis Murray

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

Traditionally, state legislatures implemented Prescription Drug Monitoring Programs (“PDMPs”) to assist prescribers, pharmacists, and law enforcement in identifying patients likely to misuse, abuse, or divert controlled substances. PDMP databases contain a catalog of a patient’s recent controlled substances that pharmacies have filled, including the date, location, the quantity of medication filled, and the prescribing health care provider. Prescribers in Pennsylvania have a duty to query the PDMP before prescribing controlled substances in most clinical settings. Pharmacists have a similar duty in Pennsylvania to dispense safe and effective medication therapy to patients and to screen patients for potential signs of misuse, …

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

The Spirit Is Willing: A Proposal For American Single Malt Whiskey, Raymond Cleaveland

Seattle University Law Review

Over the past twenty-five years, small, independent American distilleries have carved out a new niche in the United States liquor market: craft single malt whiskey. Inspired by the success of single malt Scotch and other single malts, American craft distillers are now fighting for their own shelf behind the bar and in the liquor store aisle. In 2018, a cadre of these distillers petitioned the U.S. Treasury Department’s Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau to formally recognize a new category of whiskey in the Code of Federal Regulations: American Single Malt Whiskey. For purposes of consumer protection, the Treasury …

American Edibles: How Cannabis Regulatory Policy Rehashes Prohibitionist Fears And What To Do About It, Connor Burns, Jay Wexler

Seattle University Law Review

Why can’t we buy a cannabis muffin with our morning coffee? For much of the past century, the answer was simple: cannabis was illegal. Now, however, with more and more states legalizing cannabis for adult use, the answer is far less clear. Even in those states that have legalized cannabis, the simple action of buying and eating edibles at the same location has somehow remained a pipe dream despite consumer demand. Digging a little deeper, we can see how contemporary alarmism—by rehashing the same prohibitionist rhetoric demonizing cannabis for over eighty years—has once again arisen with a new target: cannabis-infused …

A History Of United States Cannabis Law, David V. Patton

Journal of Law and Health

Perhaps the best way to understand early-Twenty-First Century state and federal cannabis law in the United States is to examine the relevant history. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.’s statement is apropos: "[A] page of history is worth a volume of logic." This article begins by discussing the early history of cannabis and its uses. Next, the article examines the first state and federal marijuana laws. After a brief comparison of alcohol prohibition to cannabis prohibition, this article addresses cannabis laws from the 1920s to the early 1950s. Then, the article takes up the reorganization of the federal drug regulatory bureaucracy …

Enough Is As Good As A Feast, Noah C. Chauvin

Seattle University Law Review

Ipse Dixit, the podcast on legal scholarship, provides a valuable service to the legal community and particularly to the legal academy. The podcast’s hosts skillfully interview guests about their legal and law-related scholarship, helping those guests communicate their ideas clearly and concisely. In this review essay, I argue that Ipse Dixit has made a major contribution to legal scholarship by demonstrating in its interview episodes that law review articles are neither the only nor the best way of communicating scholarly ideas. This contribution should be considered “scholarship,” because one of the primary goals of scholarship is to communicate new ideas.

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

21 In The 21st—An Evaluation Of The Tobacco Regulation Trend, Casey Kellum

St. Mary's Law Journal

Tobacco regulation persists as a controversial issue both legally and politically in the United States. Throughout American history, states rely on local legislation to provide adequate protection to consumers of tobacco products, as “Big Tobacco” targets consumers for its addictive product. One of the most recent amendments in this arena is the state by state decision to raise the minimum legal sales age for tobacco to twenty-one.

Despite rigorous regulation of tobacco products in the United States, however, tobacco remains the leading cause of preventable deaths in the country. These “Tobacco 21” ordinances come at a critical time when the …

Milk And The Motherland? Colonial Legacies Of Taste And The Law In The Anglophone Caribbean, Merisa S. Thompson

Journal of Food Law & Policy

This paper tells a story of the relationship between colonialism and capitalism through the lens of “milk” and “the law” in the Caribbean. Despite high levels of lactose intolerance amongst its population, milk is a regular part of many Caribbean diets and features prominently in its foodscapes. This represents a distinctive colonial inheritance that is the result of centuries of ongoing colonial violence and displacement. Taking a feminist and intersectional approach, the paper draws on analysis of key pieces of colonial legislation at significant historical junctures and secondary literature to do three things. Firstly, it examines how law aided the …

Reflections On The Effects Of Federalism On Opioid Policy, Matthew B. Lawrence

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

No abstract provided.

Mhpaea & Marble Cake: Parity & The Forgotten Frame Of Federalism, Taleed El-Sabawi

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

No abstract provided.

State Regulatory Responses To The Prescription Opioid Crisis: Too Much To Bear?, Lars Noah

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

In order to prevent further overuse of prescription opioids, states have adopted a variety of strategies. This article summarizes the growing use of prescription drug monitoring programs, crackdowns on “pill mills,” prohibitions on the use of particularly hazardous opioids, limitations on the duration and dosage of prescribed opioids, excise taxes, physician education and patient disclosure requirements, public awareness campaigns, and drug take-back programs. Although occasionally challenged on constitutional grounds, including claims of federal preemption under the Supremacy Clause, discrimination against out-of-state businesses under the dormant Commerce Clause doctrine, and interference with rights of commercial free speech, this article evaluates the …

The Opioid Litigation: The Fda Is Mia, Catherine M. Sharkey

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

It is readily agreed that federal preemption of state tort law alters the balance between federal and state power. Federal preemption is a high-profile defense in almost all modern products liability cases. It is thus surprising to see how little attention has been given to federal preemption by courts and commentators in the opioid litigation. Opioid litigation provides a lens through which I explore the role of state and federal courts and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in striking the right balance of power. My purpose here is not to resolve the divide among the few courts that have …

Safe Consumption Sites And The Perverse Dynamics Of Federalism In The Aftermath Of The War On Drugs, Deborah Ahrens

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

In this Article, I explore the complicated regulatory and federalism issues posed by creating safe consumption sites for drug users—an effort which would regulate drugs through use of a public health paradigm. This Article details the difficulties that localities pursuing such sites and other non-criminal-law responses have faced as a result of both federal and state interference. It contrasts those difficulties with the carte blanche local and state officials typically receive from federal regulators when creatively adopting new punitive policies to combat drugs. In so doing, this Article identifies systemic asymmetries of federalism that threaten drug policy reform. While traditional …

The Budding Hemp Industry: The Effect Of Texas House Bill 1325 On Employment Drug Policies, Meina Heydari

Student Scholarship

Contemporary attitudes toward cannabis use in the United States have shifted from War on Drugsera prohibition toward decriminalization over the past two decades. As states that do not seek to decriminalize marijuana nonetheless enact legislation legalizing CBD, policy tensions arise. In 2019, Texas joined the ranks of states that legalized hemp and hemp-derived products with the passage of House Bill 1325. In light of this legislation, this Article discusses the implications of legalized cannabidiol (CBD) on employment drug policies in Texas. The benefits of CBD legalization must be weighed against the practical implications to effectively balance policies that aim to …

Recalibrating Suspicion In An Era Of Hazy Legality, Deborah Ahrens

Seattle University Law Review

After a century of employing varying levels of prohibition enforced by criminal law, the United States has entered an era where individual states are rethinking marijuana policy, and the majority of states have in some way decided to make cannabis legally available. This symposium Article will offer a description of what has happened in the past few years, as well as ideas for how jurisdictions can use the changing legal status of cannabis to reshape criminal procedure more broadly. This Article will recommend that law enforcement no longer be permitted use the smell of marijuana as a reason to search …

The “Free Market” For Marijuana: A Sober, Clear-Eyed Analysis Of Marijuana Policy, H. Justin Pace

Lewis & Clark Law Review

Federal law prohibits the possession and sale of marijuana. At the same time, states are not only decriminalizing marijuana but also attempting to provide a regulatory apparatus for its sale. This has created a unique business environ- ment. In some ways, there is a true “free market” for marijuana in states that have legalized it—free, that is, of the legal and financial infrastructure avail- able to fully licit businesses in America.

Contracts may not be enforceable because they lack a legal purpose. Relief in bankruptcy court may not be available, either as a debtor or as a creditor. Use of …

Cannabis Legalization In State Legislatures: Public Health Opportunity And Risk, Daniel G. Orenstein, Stanton A. Glantz

Marquette Law Review

Cannabis is widely used in the United States and internationally despite its illicit status, but that illicit status is changing. In the United States, thirty-three states and the District of Columbia have legalized medical cannabis, and eleven states and D.C. have legalized adult use cannabis. A majority of state medical cannabis laws and all but two state adult use laws are the result of citizen ballot initiatives, but state legislatures are beginning to seriously consider adult use legislation. From a public health perspective, cannabis legalization presents a mix of potential risks and benefits, but a legislative approach offers an opportunity …

The Current Application Of The Myriad And Mayo/Alice Rulings On Patent Eligibility: Inconsistent Results And Contradistinguishing Biotechnology Products, Skye Cho

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

The note examines the inconsistent application of the patent eligibility framework under Section 101 of the Patent Act, particularly in biotechnology. It argues that despite efforts by the USPTO to clarify the framework through memos and examples, courts have applied it inconsistently, leading to discrimination against biotechnology products. The analysis focuses on key Supreme Court decisions, such as Myriad Genetics and Mayo, and their impact on the patent eligibility of biotechnological innovations. The note highlights the need for clearer guidance to ensure consistent outcomes and fair treatment of biotechnological inventions.

Marijuana Law Reform In 2020 And Beyond: Where We Are And Where We’Re Going, Sam Kamin

Seattle University Law Review

With another presidential election now looming on the horizon, both political parties and both sides of the marijuana law reform debate are once again preparing for the possibility of a seismic change in how marijuana is regulated in the United States. In this Article, I lay out the state of marijuana law and policy in the United States today with an eye toward that uncertain future. I describe the differential treatment of marijuana under state and federal law and the tensions this causes for those seeking to take advantage of marijuana law reform in the states. I analyze recent changes …

Tiptoeing Through The Landmines: The Evolution Of States’ Legal Ethics Authority Regarding Representing Cannabis Clients, Karen E. Boxx

Seattle University Law Review

Despite the continued federal classification of cannabis as an illegal drug, states have legalized the possession, use, production, and sale of cannabis. In order to do so, the states have created complex regulatory schemes to control and monitor the cannabis industry and satisfy the federal government concerns, such as use by minors and organized crime involvement. First, this Article presents the ethical dilemma of cannabis lawyering. Second, this Article describes the history, evolution, and current status of the various states’ pronouncements on a lawyer’s ethical duties with respect to the business and use of cannabis that may be legal under …

Say “No” To Discrimination, “Yes” To Accommodation: Why States Should Prohibit Discrimination Of Workers Who Use Cannabis For Medical Purposes, Anne Marie Lofaso, Lakyn D. Cecil

Seattle University Law Review

This Article addresses the question of how the law should treat medical cannabis in the employment context. Using Colorado as a primary example, we argue that states such as Colorado should amend their constitutions and legislate to provide employment protections for employees who are registered medical cannabis cardholders or registered caregivers.

Part I briefly traces the legal regulation of cannabis from an unregulated medicine known as cannabis to a highly regulated illicit substance known as marijuana under the Controlled Substances Act. Our travail through this history reveals, unsurprisingly, an increasing demonization of cannabis throughout the twentieth century. That socio-legal demonization …

In Memory Of Professor James E. Bond, Janet Ainsworth

Seattle University Law Review

Janet Ainsworth, Professor of Law at Seattle University School of Law: In Memory of Professor James E. Bond.

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

Global Implementation Of Soda Taxes: Is There A Better Solution For Combatting Obesity?, Lauren Cedeno

Brooklyn Journal of International Law

As incidences of overweight and obese populations continue to increase around the world, countries are looking for ways to decrease the prevalence of this epidemic. Soda and SSB taxes have increased in prevalence as countries seek to address the health problems associated with consumption of soda and other sugary beverages. This Note explores the implementation of these taxes in Mexico, Europe, and the United States. In analyzing these taxes, this Note seeks to gain a greater understanding of whether these taxes have impacted overweight and obesity rates in the countries and municipalities that have enacted them. This Note argues that …

Beauty Shouldn’T Cause Pain: A Makeover Proposal For The Fda’S Cosmetics Regulation, Lauren Jacobs

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

The American cosmetics industry is not required by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to conduct pre-market safety assessments of cosmetics. The FDA only reviews personal care products when people voluntarily report problems. Further, companies continue to test animals for cosmetics, despite the FDA’s recommendation that manufacturers seek more humane and accurate testing. Although the FDA does not require animal testing for product safety or premarket approval, the United States is one of the largest users of laboratory animals for product testing. There are two pending pieces of legislation, which if passed would be the first acts of cosmetic regulation …

The Future Of Dairy Cooperatives In The Modern Marketplace: Redeveloping The Capper-Volstead Act, Sarah K. Phillips

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

Agriculture plays a fundamental role in the U.S. economy as a multibillion-dollar industry that feeds people all over the world. However, over the past decade, the dairy industry in particular has changed from a reliable sector of the greater agricultural industry into an unsettled, politically-charged, and fractured group. Dairy farmers’ consistently receiving low milk prices has facilitated this divide. Tired of being ignored and underpaid, dairy farmers are demanding change in the current dairy market structure.

Federal Milk Marketing Orders and a variety of statutes regulate the dairy industry, but the 1922 Capper-Volstead Act remains the most notable piece of …

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Marijuana Issues For Voters: Studying Issues Us States Have Had With Legalizing Marijuana, Kody Kesler

WRIT: Journal of First-Year Writing

In the United States, the legalization of medical and recreational marijuana in individual states, rather than the whole nation, is a great example of states being “laboratories of democracy.” Legalizing marijuana in the states first is essential to deciding how to go about the issue on the national level, once Americans are ready for it. In most states where it is legal, employees can still be fired for having marijuana in their system, even if they have a medical recommendation. The drug tests that employers use don’t test for the recent use of drugs like marijuana, but for a part …