Food and Drug Law Commons^™

The Opioid Crisis: How The United States And Countries Abroad Are Making Strides, Maura Mcginnity

DePaul Journal of Health Care Law

The opioid epidemic has been an ongoing problem in the United States since the 1980s. The United States has had a very negative attitude towards individuals suffering from addiction. This attitude is clearly shown through the United States’ handling of the opioid crisis. Hundreds of thousands of individuals have died due to opioids. In the forty years since this epidemic became prevalent, the United States has still failed to implement a country-wide solution to combat the crisis. Certain states, like New York and Illinois, have made strides toward helping individuals suffering from opioid use disorder, but nationally, the country is …

Re-Imagining Tomorrow: A Technology, Innovation Law, And Ethics Symposium On Addictive Technology And Children, Margaret Chon

Seattle University Law Review

In this Foreword, Professor Margaret Chon introduces Seattle University's Technology, Innovation Law, and Ethics (TILE) program, the 2024 TILE Symposium, and Dr. Gaia Bernstein’s Unwired: Gaining Control Over Addictive Technologies.

Same Crime, Different Time: Sentencing Disparities In The Deep South & A Path Forward Under The Fourteenth Amendment, Hailey M. Donovan

Seattle University Law Review

The United States has the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world. The American obsession with crime and punishment can be tracked over the last half-century, as the nation’s incarceration rate has risen astronomically. Since 1970, the number of incarcerated people in the United States has increased more than sevenfold to over 2.3 million, outpacing both crime and population growth considerably. While the rise itself is undoubtedly bleak, a more troubling truth lies just below the surface. Not all states contribute equally to American mass incarceration. Rather, states have vastly different incarceration rates. Unlike at the federal level, …

Verses Turned To Verdicts: Ysl Rico Case Sets A High-Watermark For The Legal Pseudo-Censorship Of Rap Music, Nabil Yousfi

Seattle University Law Review

Whichever way you spin the record, rap music and courtrooms don’t mix. On one side, rap records are well known for their unapologetic lyrical composition, often expressing a blatant disregard for legal institutions and authorities. On the other, court records reflect a Van Gogh’s ear for rap music, frequently allowing rap lyrics—but not similar lyrics from other genres—to be used as criminal evidence against the defendants who authored them. Over the last thirty years, this immiscibility has engendered a legal landscape where prosecutors wield rap lyrics as potent instruments for criminal prosecution. In such cases, color-blind courts neglect that rap …

We Shall Overcome: The Evolution Of Quotas In The Land Of The Free And The Home Of Samba, Stella Emery Santana

Seattle University Law Review

When were voices given to the voiceless? When will education be permitted to all? When will we need to protest no more? It’s the twenty-first century, and the fight for equity in higher education remains a challenge to peoples all over the world. While students in the United States must deal with the increase in loans, in Brazil, only around 20% of youth between the ages of twenty-five and thirty-four have a higher education degree.

The primary objective of this Article is to conduct an in-depth comparative analysis of the development, implementation, and legal adjudication of educational quota systems within …

The Sffa V. Harvard Trojan Horse Admissions Lawsuit, Kimberly West-Faulcon

Seattle University Law Review

Affirmative-action-hostile admissions lawsuits are modern Trojan horses. The SFFA v. Harvard/UNC case—Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. University of North Carolina, et. al., decided jointly—is the most effective Trojan horse admissions lawsuit to date. Constructed to have the distractingly appealing exterior façade of a lawsuit seeking greater fairness in college admissions, the SFFA v. Harvard/UNC case is best understood as a deception-driven battle tactic used by forces waging a multi-decade war against the major legislative victories of America’s Civil Rights Movement, specifically Title VI and Title VII …

Students For Fair Admissions: Affirming Affirmative Action And Shapeshifting Towards Cognitive Diversity?, Steven A. Ramirez

Seattle University Law Review

The Roberts Court holds a well-earned reputation for overturning Supreme Court precedent regardless of the long-standing nature of the case. The Roberts Court knows how to overrule precedent. In Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard (SFFA), the Court’s majority opinion never intimates that it overrules Grutter v. Bollinger, the Court’s leading opinion permitting race-based affirmative action in college admissions. Instead, the Roberts Court applied Grutter as authoritative to hold certain affirmative action programs entailing racial preferences violative of the Constitution. These programs did not provide an end point, nor did they require assessment, review, periodic expiration, or revision for greater …

How To Interpret The Securities Laws?, Zachary J. Gubler

Seattle University Law Review

In discussions of the federal securities laws, the SEC usually gets most of the attention. This makes some sense. After all, it is the agency charged with administrating the securities laws and regulating the industry as a whole. It makes the majority of the laws; it engages in enforcement actions; it reacts to crises; and it, or sometimes even its individual commissioners, intervene publicly in policy debates. Often overlooked in such discussion, however, is the role of the Supreme Court in shaping securities law, and a new book by Adam Pritchard and Robert Thompson demonstrates why this is an oversight. …

Going Forward: The Role Of Affirmative Action, Race, And Diversity In University Admissions And The Broader Construction Of Society, Steven W. Bender

Seattle University Law Review

The third annual EPOCH symposium, a partnership between the Seattle University Law Review and the Black Law Student Association took place in late summer 2023 at the Seattle University School of Law. It was intended to uplift and amplify Black voices and ideas, and those of allies in the legal community. Prompted by the swell of public outcry surrounding ongoing police violence against the Black community, the EPOCH partnership marked a commitment to antiracism imperatives and effectuating change for the Black community. The published symposium in this volume encompasses some, but not all, the ideas and vision detailed in the …

Memories Of An Affirmative Action Activist, Margaret E. Montoya

Seattle University Law Review

Some twenty-five years ago, the Society of American Law Teachers (SALT) led a march supporting Affirmative Action in legal education to counter the spate of litigation and other legal prohibitions that exploded during the 1990s, seeking to limit or abolish race-based measures. The march began at the San Francisco Hilton Hotel, where the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) was having its annual meeting, and proceeded to Union Square. We, the organizers of the march, did not expect the march to become an iconic event; one that would be remembered as a harbinger of a new era of activism by …

After Affirmative Action, Meera E. Deo

Seattle University Law Review

This is a time of crisis in legal education. In truth, we are in the midst of several crises. We are emerging from the COVID pandemic, a period of unprecedented upheaval where law students and law faculty alike struggled through physical challenges, mental health burdens, and decreased academic and professional success. The past few years also have seen a precipitous drop in applications to and enrollment in legal education. Simultaneously, students have been burdened with the skyrocketing costs of attending law school, taking on unmanageable levels of debt. And with the Supreme Court decision in SFFA v. Harvard, we are …

Religious Freedom And Diversity Missions: Insights From Jesuit Law Deans, Anthony E. Varona, Michèle Alexandre, Michael J. Kaufman, Madeleine M. Landrieu

Seattle University Law Review

This Article is a transcript of a panel moderated by Anthony E. Varona, Dean of Seattle University School of Law. During the panel, Jesuit and religious law school deans discussed what law schools with religious missions have to add to the conversation around SFFA and the continuing role of affirmative action in higher education.

A Synthesis Of The Science And Law Relating To Eyewitness Misidentifications And Recommendations For How Police And Courts Can Reduce Wrongful Convictions Based On Them, Henry F. Fradella

Seattle University Law Review

The empirical literature on perception and memory consistently demonstrates the pitfalls of eyewitness identifications. Exoneration data lend external validity to these studies. With the goal of informing law enforcement officers, prosecutors, criminal defense attorneys, judges, and judicial law clerks about what they can do to reduce wrongful convictions based on misidentifications, this Article presents a synthesis of the scientific knowledge relevant to how perception and memory affect the (un)reliability of eyewitness identifications. The Article situates that body of knowledge within the context of leading case law. The Article then summarizes the most current recommendations for how law enforcement personnel should—and …

The 1994 Federal Crime Bill: An Evaluation Of The Past, Present, And Future Of Its Impact On The Criminal Justice System, Jade R. Philpot

Honors College Theses

The 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act was signed into law in response to the crack cocaine and crime epidemic of the 1980s. In this thesis I address the major elements of this bill, the racial, financial, and ethical conflicts that arose thereafter, and the reforms that should be implemented today to correct said conflicts.

A Review Of Grey Literature Cited By Food Loss Law And Policy Scholarship, Angela Hackstadt

University Libraries Faculty Scholarship

In the United States, state and federal programs, rules, and legislation attempt to address the social, economic, and environmental impacts of food waste. Research on the efficacy of these interventions rely on a variety of grey literature resources. Grey literature is valuable to policy research but may be overlooked because it is not published commercially and is often deemed unauthoritative. This review focuses on the use of grey literature in food waste law and policy scholarship to identify the most used sources and to determine what, if any, archiving strategies authors use. Recommendations for librarians and researchers are discussed.

Pandemic, Protests, And Prison Reform? Why 2020 Is A Catalyst To Rethink Drug Policy, Keelia Lee

St. Thomas Law Review

This Article will argue for the abandonment of the current criminal justice system as it relates to drug offenses and for its replacement with a medical model to address the healthcare problem of addiction. The medical model approach calls for complete decriminalization of all controlled substances coupled with better rehabilitation and reintegration policies. This Article argues the criminalization of drugs has targeted minorities under the guise of keeping communities safe. It will look at the differences between the United States and Portugal, a country that has implemented the medical model, while also analyzing recent legislation in the United States addressing …

Executive Summary On Ensuring Economic Viability And Sustainability Of Coffee Production, Jeffrey D. Sachs, Kaitlin Y. Cordes, James Rising, Perrine Toledano, Nicolas Maennling

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

Coffee, the world’s favorite beverage, provides livelihoods for at least 60 million people across dozens of countries. Yet this beloved drink is experiencing a sustainability crisis. A sustained decline in world coffee prices has squeezed coffee producers, and thrown a tremendous number of producers below the global extreme poverty line of US$1.90 per day. This briefing note presents our research into sustainability within the coffee sector, including the results of our analytical and empirical modeling, and provides several recommendations.

Ensuring Economic Viability And Sustainability Of Coffee Production, Jeffrey D. Sachs, Kaitlin Y. Cordes, James Rising, Perrine Toledano, Nicolas Maennling

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

Coffee, the world’s favorite beverage, provides livelihoods for at least 60 million people across dozens of countries. Yet this beloved drink is experiencing a sustainability crisis. A sustained decline in world coffee prices has squeezed coffee producers, and thrown a tremendous number of producers below the global extreme poverty line. This report presents our research into sustainability within the coffee sector, including the results of our analytical and empirical modeling, and provides several recommendations.

“Big” Food, Tobacco, And Alcohol: Reducing Industry Influence On Noncommunicable Disease Prevention Laws And Policies, Belinda Reeve, Lawrence O. Gostin

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The food, tobacco and alcohol industries have penetrated markets in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), with a significant impact on these countries’ burden of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). Tangcharoensathien and colleagues describe the aggressive marketing of unhealthy food, alcohol and tobacco in LMICs, as well as key tactics used by these industries to resist laws and policies designed to reduce behavioural risk factors for NCDs. This commentary expands on the recommendations made by Tangcharoensathien and colleagues for preventing or managing conflicts of interest and reducing undue industry influence on NCD prevention policies and laws, focusing on the needs of LMICs. A …

Food Waste Legislation Scholarship: A Mapping Study, Angela Hackstadt

University Libraries Faculty Scholarship

The purpose of this study is to examine research activity on food waste legislation published in law journals to identify top sources and experts cited by recent scholarship. Searches for "food loss" and "food waste" were conducted in three legal research databases for law journal articles published between January 2013 and January 2018. The core list of selected articles consists of 13 law journal articles. The citations from each of the core articles were collected to form a database, which was analyzed to determine what kinds of resources legal scholars rely on when conducting research in food waste legislation. Government …

The Role Of Pressure Groups And Problem Definition In Crafting Legislative Solutions To The Opioid Crisis, Taleed El-Sabawi

Faculty Publications

Organized interest groups and federal administrative agencies have historically been influential in defining problem drug use during nationwide crisis. As such, the manner in which these pressure groups defined the problem may have influenced or, at least, provided support for legislators’ decisions to shy away from a criminal justice approach and towards acceptance of a more “health-oriented” — one that did not comprehensively address demand factors or demonstrate a commitment to reforming U.S. drug policy to meet international standards of best practice. In an effort to provide a snapshot of what such involvement may look like, this article explores the …

Tying The Knot: An Interdisciplinary Approach To Understanding The Human Right To Adequate Nutrition, Jessica Fanzo, Kaitlin Y. Cordes, Elizabeth F. Fox, Anna Bulman

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

Malnutrition is alarmingly prevalent, affecting one in three people worldwide. In this Article, we argue that a key reason the global community has been unsuccessful in combating malnutrition is a lack of clarity outside the field of nutrition regarding the true meaning of “nutrition.” In particular, this has limited the effectiveness of international human rights law as a mechanism for addressing malnutrition.

In this interdisciplinary Article, which draws from both the legal and nutrition fields, we unpack the meaning of nutrition and demonstrate that a standalone right to adequate nutrition does indeed exist in international human rights law as a …

Peacebuilding Through Food Recovery, Angela Hackstadt

University Libraries Faculty Scholarship

The United States wastes approximately 133 billion pounds of food annually while 15 million American households are food insecure. Current and proposed U.S. legislation attempts to encourage food recovery efforts to address both of these problems by incentivizing donation of surplus foods by businesses to charitable organizations, yet legislation has failed to deliver. Food insecure individuals who use food banks or other safety net programs are often required to provide personal information and are subject to scrutiny in the process of acquiring food. Information can be leveraged in different ways to stigmatize or marginalize those in need. This presentation discusses …

Agricultural Investments Under International Investment Law, Jesse Coleman, Sarah Brewin, Thierry Berger

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

International investment law, based primarily on international investment treaties, plays an important role in the governance of investment in agriculture, forestry, and fishing. The obligations established by these treaties, and enforced by means of investor–state arbitration, can present challenges for policy-makers and others seeking to ensure that investments are sustainable, including by affecting the ways in which the costs and benefits of investments are distributed among different actors.

CCSI partnered with the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) to produce a briefing note on agricultural investments under international investment law. The …

Gender, Race & The Inadequate Regulation Of Cosmetics, Marie C. Boyd

Faculty Publications

Scholars and other commentators have identified failures in the regulation of cosmetics-which depends heavily on voluntary industry self- regulation-and called for more stringent regulation of these products. Yet these calls have largely neglected an important dimension of the problem: the current laissez-faire approach to the regulation of cosmetics disproportionally places women, and particularly women who are members of other excluded groups, at risk. This Article examines federal cosmetics law and regulation through a feminist lens. It argues that cosmetics law and regulation have lagged behind that of the other major product categories regulated by the Food and Drug Administration under …

Comments On The World Bank’S Draft Guidance Note For Borrowers Ess5: Land Acquisition, Restrictions On Land Use And Involuntary Resettlement, Columbia Center On Sustainable Investment

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

In December 2017, CCSI sent comments to the World Bank regarding its Draft Guidance Note for Borrowers ESS5: Land Acquisition, Restrictions on Land Use and Involuntary Resettlement.

CCSI’s overarching comments on the Guidance Note were that:

• Its description of affected persons and their rights contradicts and undermines international consensus on land governance supported by the Bank
• It fails to provide any guidance on when involuntary resettlement should be considered unavoidable or how Borrowers can prioritize project designs that actually minimize displacement or other harms
• It fails to put rights-holders (or “affected stakeholders”) at the center of solutions
• Its discussion of …

Corporate Agricultural Investment And The Right To Food: Addressing Disparate Protections And Promoting Rights-Consistent Outcomes, Kaitlin Y. Cordes, Anna Bulman

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

Over the past decade, the world has witnessed heightened corporate interest in large-scale land-based agricultural investment. While such investments can potentially have positive effects for local communities, they also can have wide-ranging negative impacts on human rights, including through forced displacement and the loss of livelihoods. This Article examines the impact of large-scale corporate agricultural investment on the right to food, as well as on human rights more generally. It considers the protections offered by the investment and human rights legal regimes to both corporations and individuals, including recent international developments relating to transnational corporate accountability and efforts to integrate …

Exploring The Link Between Food Security And Climate Change, Kaitlin Y. Cordes

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

Our growing global population is demanding a more resource-intensive and so-called “Western” diet. And that change in demand has drastic impact on how we must change our supply.

Opening The Barnyard Door: Transparency And The Resurgence Of Ag-Gag & Veggie Libel Laws, Nicole E. Negowetti

Seattle University Law Review

Over the past several decades, as the agricultural system became increasingly industrialized and the steps from farm to plate multiplied, consumers became farther removed from the sources of their food. Until recently, most consumers in America were content to eat their processed, cheap, and filling foods without giving a second thought to how these foods were produced. The tides are changing. Increasingly, consumers are calling for more transparency in the food system. Repulsed by images of animal cruelty and shocked by unsavory food production practices, consumers want the food industry’s veil lifted and are demanding changes in food production. The …

Re-Tooling Marine Food Supply Resilience In A Climate Change Era: Some Needed Reforms, Robin Kundis Craig

Seattle University Law Review

Ocean fisheries and marine aquaculture are an important but often overlooked component of world food security. For example, of the seven billion (and counting) people on the planet, over one billion depend on fish as their primary source of protein, and fish is a primary source of protein (30 percent or more of protein consumed) in many countries around the world, including Japan, Greenland, Taiwan, Indonesia, several countries in Africa, and several South Pacific island nations. Marine fisheries and marine aquaculture have been subject to a number of stressors that can undermine world food security, including overfishing, habitat destruction, and …