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Betschart V. Oregon: A Seven-Day Standard For Maine, Henry Gates Jul 2026

Betschart V. Oregon: A Seven-Day Standard For Maine, Henry Gates

Maine Law Review

Maine lacks a clear standard for ensuring the right to counsel for indigent defendants. The State’s public defense system is struggling to meet Maine’s constitutional mandate: To provide indigent defense services in rural areas and across the state. An aging bar with few new attorneys working in rural areas—where there are often higher relative prosecution rates and a corresponding increased need for legal services—is contributing to the problem. This has resulted in a legal system that negatively impacts rural communities and indigent defendants to the point that one court concluded the state is violating the Sixth Amendment. Following the Ninth …


One Year's Seeding: Looking Back On The Last Seven Years Of Maine's Progress Toward Rural Justice, Christopher Northrop, Seth Main Jul 2026

One Year's Seeding: Looking Back On The Last Seven Years Of Maine's Progress Toward Rural Justice, Christopher Northrop, Seth Main

Maine Law Review

Nationally, the crisis in access to legal services in rural areas continues to grow despite significant attention and efforts to reverse this troubling trend. This Article explores Maine’s efforts to address our legal deserts. The Article’s starting point is a retrospective look at our 2019 national symposium on rural justice and accompanying Maine Law Review issue. We will try to measure successes and failures, while also addressing the significant impact caused by the intervening pandemic. The Article will then shift to an analysis of the current landscape, focusing on the role of the University of Maine School of Law. We …


The Other Right To Counsel: The Civil Guarantee In State Constitutions, Dmitry Bam Jul 2026

The Other Right To Counsel: The Civil Guarantee In State Constitutions, Dmitry Bam

Maine Law Review

When most people speak of the right to counsel, they speak in the singular. After the Supreme Court’s seminal decision in Gideon v. Wainwright, the right to counsel in criminal prosecutions has become one of our most cherished fundamental rights. It is a right ingrained in our culture. Even children can recite the mantra that the accused have the right to a lawyer, and if they can’t afford a lawyer, one will be provided to them free of charge. It is no surprise, then, that our constitutional focus is trained on the criminal defendant’s right to counsel. After all, there …


Foreword, Adam Fortier-Brown Jul 2026

Foreword, Adam Fortier-Brown

Maine Law Review

Access to legal services in America has emerged as one of the most pressing structural challenges facing the legal community. As attorneys increasingly concentrate in metropolitan areas, large areas are left with few practicing attorneys and challenging prospects of attracting many more. The consequences of this challenge reach across nearly every aspect of life in these communities—from housing and family stability, to starting or winding down businesses, and critically, to the constitutional guarantees that attach when someone is charged with a crime. Yet, these challenges have also generated a period of genuine creativity and collaboration between communities and different institutions. …


The Status Of Private Covenants In Gross In Maine, Geoffrey Forney Mar 2026

The Status Of Private Covenants In Gross In Maine, Geoffrey Forney

Maine Law Review

In State v. Moosehead Mountain Resort, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court recently held that the State may enforce a restrictive covenant in gross. The decision appears to create new law by departing from the established rule in Maine, as laid down in an earlier decision in Brown v. Heirs of Fuller, that restrictive covenants in gross are not enforceable in equity. Although the holding in Moosehead Mountain is arguably narrow because the case only addressed the government's ability to enforce covenants in gross, the Law Court's omission of any reference to or discussion of its decision in Brown leaves open …


The Evolution Of The Supreme Court's Second Amendment Jurisprudence, Kermit V. Lipez Mar 2026

The Evolution Of The Supreme Court's Second Amendment Jurisprudence, Kermit V. Lipez

Maine Law Review

We live in the shadow of an epidemic of gun violence. We dread the next report of an inevitable mass shooting. We no longer feel secure in public places. We fear for the safety of our children and our grandchildren at their schools. We shake our heads in disbelief at the empty ritual of "thoughts and prayers" for victims and their families. As one commentator put it, we suffer from the "[u]nbearable [m]onotony of [g]rief." Why must we live like this? Why are there no solutions? In conversations posing these questions, there are often references to the Supreme Court's Second …


Maine's Judicial Machinery At The Crossroads, Armand A. Dufresne Jr. May 2025

Maine's Judicial Machinery At The Crossroads, Armand A. Dufresne Jr.

Maine Law Review

There is really no such thing as "a court"; in modem society, at least, there is only something which may be called a court system. Even that designation, however, may be a misnomer; a court system is really no more than a group of people, judges, clerks, lawyers, bailiffs, and so forth, tied together by certain functional arrangements. Even the finest institutional organization for a court system will produce delay and injustice if it is not staffed by competent people. Conversely, the most competent and dedicated people cannot produce satisfactory results from an institutional arrangement which does not permit them …


Preliminary Questions Of Fact: Respective Roles Of Judge And Jury In Maine Courts, Maine Law Review May 2025

Preliminary Questions Of Fact: Respective Roles Of Judge And Jury In Maine Courts, Maine Law Review

Maine Law Review

Virtually indisputable in the law is the notion that the trial judge determines questions of admissibility of evidence. However, when admissibility depends upon the evaluation of a preliminary question of fact, both courts and commentators disagree as to whether the judge should continue to occupy the role of sole decision-maker. The intertwining of fact, the preliminary condition, and law, the admissibility decision, raises some havoc with accepted views of the judge as arbiter of the law and the jury as fact finder. If the judge determines both questions, he is resolving not only legal, but also factual issues traditionally within …


Prentiss Mellen, Maine's First Chief Justice: A Legal Biography, Ellyn C. Ballou Apr 2025

Prentiss Mellen, Maine's First Chief Justice: A Legal Biography, Ellyn C. Ballou

Maine Law Review

It is in the bosoms of his contemporaries of the profession, and of his clients and personal friends, that the memory of the lawyer is embalmed . . . . [Chief Justice Mellen's] life furnishes a striking illustration of the justness of the preceding remarks, since it was that of one almost exclusively conversant with the active practice of the law. Thus wrote Simon Greenleaf shortly after Prentiss Mellen's death. Greenleaf, perhaps due to the modesty of one in a similar position, was only partially correct. True, few today, even in the legal profession, recognize the name of Maine's first …


Chief Justice Dufresne: An Appreciation, Charles A. Pomeroy Apr 2025

Chief Justice Dufresne: An Appreciation, Charles A. Pomeroy

Maine Law Review

To those of us who worked with him almost daily, the years of Armand Dufresne's stewardship will be best remembered as the years during which the Justices of the Supreme Court grew closer together, both in their professional and social relations, and in the respect and admiration each held for the other and all held for the Chief Justice. I am confident I express the sentiment of my colleagues when I say the Dufresne years were among the happiest years of the Court family, largely because of the leadership Chief Justice Dufresne provided US.


In Memoriam Harry P. Glassman, L. Kinvin Wroth, Daniel E. Wathen, Gerald F. Petruccelli, Melvyn H. Zarr Mar 2025

In Memoriam Harry P. Glassman, L. Kinvin Wroth, Daniel E. Wathen, Gerald F. Petruccelli, Melvyn H. Zarr

Maine Law Review

Harry Paul Glassman was a remarkable lawyer, scholar, teacher, judge, colleague, and friend, whose untimely death has been deeply felt by all who knew him. The editors of the Maine Law Review have brought together in this issue a wide-ranging and moving col- lection of essays that illuminates each of these aspects of Harry's multifaceted life.


Judge Edward T. Gignoux — A Personal Appreciation, Frank M. Coffin Dec 2024

Judge Edward T. Gignoux — A Personal Appreciation, Frank M. Coffin

Maine Law Review

Most occasions for encomia about judges occur when the subject has departed the scene of his accomplishments. Happily, the subject of this issue of the Maine Law Review is still with us and likely to be so for a long time. He also happens to measure up precisely to the overused word "paragon." I use it in the original Latin sense of "whetstone," something to sharpen against or to compare oneself with. My thesis is that Judge Gignoux gives observers of any age, but particularly the young, an inspiring role model. This volume is felicitously dedicated. The ever-present problem is …


Solemn Vow: Solum's Originalism, Treaties, And Tribal Sovereignty In Castro-Huerta, Liam T. Sheridan Jul 2023

Solemn Vow: Solum's Originalism, Treaties, And Tribal Sovereignty In Castro-Huerta, Liam T. Sheridan

Maine Law Review

In Oklahoma v. Castro-Huerta, the Supreme Court held that states have inherent authority to prosecute crimes committed by non-Indians in “Indian country.” Only two years earlier, the Court in McGirt v. Oklahoma held that most of eastern Oklahoma was Indian country, and thus immune from any state criminal jurisdiction. Castro-Huerta limited this immunity and narrowed the Court’s view of tribal sovereignty as a whole. The majority represented the Court’s originalist faction—minus Justice Gorsuch, who had penned both the majority opinion in McGirt and the dissent in Castro-Huerta. The majority and dissent disagreed over whether federal statutes preempted Oklahoma’s criminal jurisdiction. …


Hart Failure: The Supreme Judicial Court's Interpretation Of Nonjudicial Demeanor, Harold T. Kelly Jr. Apr 2020

Hart Failure: The Supreme Judicial Court's Interpretation Of Nonjudicial Demeanor, Harold T. Kelly Jr.

Maine Law Review

Among the inherent powers of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court is the power to regulate the officers of its courts. As the court explained in Board of Overseers of the Bar v. Lee, “each of the three co-equal branches of government has, without any express grant, the inherent right to accomplish all objects necessarily within the orbit of that department when not expressly allocated to, or limited by the existence of a similar power in, one of the other departments.” It is not surprising that the Supreme Judicial Court has for many years regulated, through formal disciplinary proceedings, the conduct …


Judge, J. Peter Byrne Apr 2020

Judge, J. Peter Byrne

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Judge Frank M. Coffin. Judge Coffin was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit by President Lyndon Baines Johnson on October 2, 1965, and took the oath of office six weeks later. Since his retirement on February 1, 1989, he has continued to serve the federal judiciary with distinction in the capacity of a United States Senior Circuit Judge. Each of the four tributes that follow, though brief, resonate with the respect and affection inspired by the …


An Advocate's Perception, Margaret D. Mcgaughey Apr 2020

An Advocate's Perception, Margaret D. Mcgaughey

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Judge Frank M. Coffin. Judge Coffin was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit by President Lyndon Baines Johnson on October 2, 1965, and took the oath of office six weeks later. Since his retirement on February 1, 1989, he has continued to serve the federal judiciary with distinction in the capacity of a United States Senior Circuit Judge. Each of the four tributes that follow, though brief, resonate with the respect and affection inspired by the …


A Tribute To Judge Coffin, Stephen Breyer Apr 2020

A Tribute To Judge Coffin, Stephen Breyer

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Judge Frank M. Coffin. Judge Coffin was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit by President Lyndon Baines Johnson on October 2, 1965, and took the oath of office six weeks later. Since his retirement on February 1, 1989, he has continued to serve the federal judiciary with distinction in the capacity of a United States Senior Circuit Judge. Each of the four tributes that follow, though brief, resonate with the respect and affection inspired by the …


Judge Frank M. Coffin, Edmund S. Muskie Apr 2020

Judge Frank M. Coffin, Edmund S. Muskie

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Judge Frank M. Coffin. Judge Coffin was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit by President Lyndon Baines Johnson on October 2, 1965, and took the oath of office six weeks later. Since his retirement on February 1, 1989, he has continued to serve the federal judiciary with distinction in the capacity of a United States Senior Circuit Judge. Each of the four tributes that follow, though brief, resonate with the respect and affection inspired by the …


State V. Violette: Harsher Resentencing Encounters A Bolder Resumption Of Vindictiveness, Thomas C. Bradley Apr 2020

State V. Violette: Harsher Resentencing Encounters A Bolder Resumption Of Vindictiveness, Thomas C. Bradley

Maine Law Review

Twenty-one years ago, in Weeks v. State, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, sitting as the Law Court, adopted a rule to prevent judicial vindictiveness when resentencing defendants who had successfully appealed their conviction and been reconvicted. The Weeks court adopted as a state due process protection the United States Supreme Court's rule laid down the preceding year in North Carolina v. Pearce. The Pearce rule provides that harsher resentencing of such defendants creates a presumption of constitutionally prohibited vindictiveness unless the harsher sentence is explicitly based on some identifiable misconduct by the defendant since the prior sentencing. Thus, the Law …


Vincent L. Mckusick And The Maine Rules Of Civil Procedure: A Thirty-Five Year Perspective, L. Kinvin Wroth Apr 2020

Vincent L. Mckusick And The Maine Rules Of Civil Procedure: A Thirty-Five Year Perspective, L. Kinvin Wroth

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Vincent L. McKusick, Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. Chief Justice McKusick took the oath of office on September 16, 1977, having been appointed the previous month by Governor James B. Longley, and will retire on February 28, 1992. As the following tributes make clear, the contributions he has made to the betterment of state and national legal institutions during his tenure evidence the same qualities of integrity and excellence that have been the hallmarks of his long and distinguished …


Structure Of The Maine Court System, 1956-1991, Edward S. Godfrey Apr 2020

Structure Of The Maine Court System, 1956-1991, Edward S. Godfrey

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Vincent L. McKusick, Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. Chief Justice McKusick took the oath of office on September 16, 1977, having been appointed the previous month by Governor James B. Longley, and will retire on February 28, 1992. As the following tributes make clear, the contributions he has made to the betterment of state and national legal institutions during his tenure evidence the same qualities of integrity and excellence that have been the hallmarks of his long and distinguished …


Law As Integrity: Chief Justice Mckusick's Common Law Jurisprudence, Eric R. Herlan Apr 2020

Law As Integrity: Chief Justice Mckusick's Common Law Jurisprudence, Eric R. Herlan

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Vincent L. McKusick, Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. Chief Justice McKusick took the oath of office on September 16, 1977, having been appointed the previous month by Governor James B. Longley, and will retire on February 28, 1992. As the following tributes make clear, the contributions he has made to the betterment of state and national legal institutions during his tenure evidence the same qualities of integrity and excellence that have been the hallmarks of his long and distinguished …


Vincent L. Mckusick: Chief Justice Of The Maine Supreme Judicial Court, Fred C. Scribner Jr. Apr 2020

Vincent L. Mckusick: Chief Justice Of The Maine Supreme Judicial Court, Fred C. Scribner Jr.

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Vincent L. McKusick, Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. Chief Justice McKusick took the oath of office on September 16, 1977, having been appointed the previous month by Governor James B. Longley, and will retire on February 28, 1992. As the following tributes make clear, the contributions he has made to the betterment of state and national legal institutions during his tenure evidence the same qualities of integrity and excellence that have been the hallmarks of his long and distinguished …


The National And International Outreach Of Justice Vincent L. Mckusick, Roswell B. Perkins Apr 2020

The National And International Outreach Of Justice Vincent L. Mckusick, Roswell B. Perkins

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Vincent L. McKusick, Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. Chief Justice McKusick took the oath of office on September 16, 1977, having been appointed the previous month by Governor James B. Longley, and will retire on February 28, 1992. As the following tributes make clear, the contributions he has made to the betterment of state and national legal institutions during his tenure evidence the same qualities of integrity and excellence that have been the hallmarks of his long and distinguished …


Vincent L. Mckusick, William H. Rehnquist Apr 2020

Vincent L. Mckusick, William H. Rehnquist

Maine Law Review

The Editorial Board and Staff of Volume 43 of the Maine Law Review enthusiastically dedicate this issue to Vincent L. McKusick, Chief Justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. Chief Justice McKusick took the oath of office on September 16, 1977, having been appointed the previous month by Governor James B. Longley, and will retire on February 28, 1992. As the following tributes make clear, the contributions he has made to the betterment of state and national legal institutions during his tenure evidence the same qualities of integrity and excellence that have been the hallmarks of his long and distinguished …


Hart Failure: The Supreme Judicial Court's Interpretation Of Nonjudicial Demeanor, Harold T. Kelly Jr. Apr 2020

Hart Failure: The Supreme Judicial Court's Interpretation Of Nonjudicial Demeanor, Harold T. Kelly Jr.

Maine Law Review

Among the inherent powers of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court is the power to regulate the officers of its courts. As the court explained in Board of Overseers of the Bar v. Lee, “each of the three co-equal branches of government has, without any express grant, the inherent right to accomplish all objects necessarily within the orbit of that department when not expressly allocated to, or limited by the existence of a similar power in, one of the other departments.” It is not surprising that the Supreme Judicial Court has for many years regulated, through formal disciplinary proceedings, the conduct …


Nomination And Confirmation Of Supreme Court Justices: Some Personal Observations, Joseph L. Rauth Jr. May 2018

Nomination And Confirmation Of Supreme Court Justices: Some Personal Observations, Joseph L. Rauth Jr.

Maine Law Review

The following remarks were delivered on October 13, 1992, on the occasion of the first Frank M. Coffin Lecture on Law and Public Service, henceforth to be an annual event at the University of Maine School of Law. The speech was written by the late Joseph L. Rauh, Jr., who died a few weeks before the speech was to be given. The speech was presented by his widow, Olie Rauh, and their son, Michael Rauh.


Reclaiming A Great Judge's Legacy, Frank M. Coffin Apr 2018

Reclaiming A Great Judge's Legacy, Frank M. Coffin

Maine Law Review

In the legal profession a deep sigh of relief is heard over the land. After roughly two decades of incubation, the long-awaited biography of the great judge has arrived, Learned Hand: The Man and the Judge, by Stanford Law Professor Gerald Gunther. The book, in my opinion, is well worth the wait. Nearly 700 pages, plus a hundred more for footnotes, it nevertheless represents a heroic condensation of some 100,000 different items on file at Harvard Law School, including no fewer than 50,000 items of correspondence, 1,000 district court opinions, and nearly 3,000 circuit court opinions. The inventory alone requires …


The Use Of American Precedents In Canadian Courts, Gerard V. La Forest Apr 2018

The Use Of American Precedents In Canadian Courts, Gerard V. La Forest

Maine Law Review

In 1849, the Supreme Court of New Brunswick faced the issue of whether there was a public right to float logs on navigable streams. Not surprisingly, no general right was found in the English common law as large scale floating of lumber down rivers did not exist in England. “Yet in a young country like Canada, the right to float logs and timber was an economic necessity in many areas and some device had to be found to make the activity legal.” To find that legal device, the New Brunswick court turned to the United States, specifically to Maine, and …


On Appeal: Courts, Lawyering, And Judging, Richard L. O'Meara Apr 2018

On Appeal: Courts, Lawyering, And Judging, Richard L. O'Meara

Maine Law Review

If one were to ask the members of the Maine legal community to define the term “judicial temperament,” many would answer the question simply by referring to Frank Coffin. Judge Coffin's newest book, On Appeal: Courts, Lawyering, and Judging, illustrates why the Judge has earned such overwhelming respect. This highly personal work permits readers a glimpse “behind the scenes” at the judicial life of a man who has forged a highly successful career of public service marked by sensitive, fair, and well-reasoned decision-making and by good-humored, collegial relationships with all of his colleagues in the legal community and beyond.