Judges Commons^™

The Legal And Constitutional Foundations For The District Of Columbia Judicial Branch, Steven M. Schneebaum

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Keynote Address Of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton, Eleanor Holmes Norton

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Who Should Appoint Judges Of The D.C. Courts?, Charles A. Miller

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

Since 1970, the District of Columbia court system has been comprised of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals and the Superior Court of the District of Columbia.' From the time of the establishment of the District, judges of its courts have been appointed by the President of the United States, acting on the advice of the Attorney General. When the general issue of District home rule came before Congress in the 1960s, one of the subjects considered was the judicial appointment process. In 1970, the District of Columbia Court Reform and Criminal Procedure Act 2 continued the Presidential appointment …

The District Of Columbia's Judicial Selection Process: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly, Patricia M. Worthy

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Comments On Who Appoints D.C. Judges, Daniel A. Rezneck

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Thirty-Year Retrospective. Comments Of The Honorable Gregory E. Mize (Ret.), Gregory E. Mize

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Prologue To District Of Columbia Democracy And The Third Branch Of Government, John W. Nields, Timothy J. May

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

Why does the President of the United States appoint the judges of the District of Columbia's local court system? Why is the District of Columbia's local court system funded and overseen by the United States Congress? Why does the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia and not the Attorney General for the District of Columbia function as a local prosecutor, prosecuting most D.C. Code crimes in the District of Columbia's courts? The four essays which follow this introduction explore the rich history behind these unusual structural features of the District of Columbia government; they present the arguments for …

The Sixth Amendment And Criminal Sentencing, Stephanos Bibas, Susan Klein

Cardozo Law Review

This symposium essay explores the impact of Rita, Gall, and Kimbrough on state and federal sentencing and plea bargaining systems. The Court continues to try to explain how the Sixth Amendment jury trial right limits legislative and judicial control of criminal sentencing. Equally important, the opposing sides in this debate have begun to form a stable consensus. These decisions inject more uncertainty in the process and free trial judges to counterbalance prosecutors. Thus, we predict, these decisions will move the balance of plea bargaining power back toward criminal defendants.

The Judicial Behavior Of Justice Souter In Criminal Cases And The Denial Of A Conservative Counterrevolution, Scott P. Johnson

The University of New Hampshire Law Review

[Excerpt] “The following article documents the judicial career of Justice David Souter from his time served as an attorney general and state judge in New Hampshire until his recent tenure on the U.S. Supreme Court. Based upon his written opinions and individual votes, Justice Souter clearly has evolved into a more liberal jurist than ideological conservatives would have preferred in the area of criminal justice. Over the course of his judicial career, Justice Souter has gained respect as an intellectual scholar by attempting to completely understand both sides of a dispute and applying precedent and legal rules in a flexible—albeit …

The Myth Of The Generalist Judge, Edward K. Cheng

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Conventional judicial wisdom assumes and indeed celebrates the ideal of the generalist judge, but do judges really believe in it? This Article empirically tests this question by examining opinion assignments in the federal courts of appeals from 1995-2005. It reveals that opinion specialization is a regular part of circuit court practice, and that a significant number of judges specialize in specific subject areas. The Article then assesses the desirability of opinion specialization. Far from being a mere loophole, opinion specialization turns out to be an important development in judicial practice that promises to increase judicial expertise without incurring many of …

A Narrow Path To Diversity: The Constitutionality Of Rezoning Plans And Strategic Site Selection Of Schools After Parents Involved, Steven T. Collis

Michigan Law Review

Justice Kennedy's concurrence in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District Number 1 raised an important and timely constitutional issue: whether the Constitution permits K-12 public school districts not under existing desegregation orders to use site selection of new schools or rezoning plans to achieve racial diversity. Numerous scholars and journalists have interpreted Justice Kennedy's concurrence as explicitly answering the question in the affirmative. This Note argues that the opposite is true. Justice Kennedy's past jurisprudence, as well as his language in Parents Involved, favors the use of strict scrutiny. Indeed, in Parents Involved, Justice Kennedy …

Reasonable Suspicion Or Real Likelihood: A Question Of Semantics? Re Shankar Alan S/O Anant Kulkarni, Lionel Leo, Siyuan Chen

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The law on apparent bias has been mired in some controversy following the High Court decision of Re Shankar Alan s/o Anant Kulkarni, where Sundaresh Menon J.C. seemingly departed from the tentative views of Andrew Phang J.C. (as he then was) in Tang Kin Hwa v. Traditional Chinese Medicine Practitioners Board on the issue of whether there were any material differences between the “reasonable suspicion of bias” test and the “real likelihood of bias” test, the two formulations of the test for apparent bias that have been variously adopted by different jurisdictions in the common law world. In Tang Kin …

Guarding The Guardians: Judges' Rights And Virginia's Judicial Inquiry And Review Commission, Jeffrey D. Mcmahan Jr.

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Issue 1: Table Of Contents

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reconsidering Virginia Judicial Selection, Carl W. Tobias

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

"The Threes": Re-Imagining Supreme Court Decisionmaking, Chris Guthrie, Tracey E. George

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

In this Essay--the first in a series of essays designed to reimagine the Supreme Court--we argue that Congress should authorize the Court to adopt, in whole or part, panel decision making... With respect to the prospect of different Court outcomes, we demonstrate empirically in this Essay that the vast majority of cases decided during the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries--including "Grutter", "Roe", and "Bush v. Gore" --would have come out the same way if the Court had decided them in panels rather than as a full Court.

Practice Makes Perfect? An Empirical Study Of Claim Construction Reversal Rates In Patent Cases, David L. Schwartz

Michigan Law Review

This Article examines whether U.S. district court judges improve their skills at patent claim construction with experience, including the experience of having their own cases reviewed by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. In theory, higher courts teach doctrine to lower courts via judicial decisions, and lower courts learn from these decisions. This Article tests the teaching-and-learning premise on the issue of claim construction in the realities of patent litigation. While others have shown that the Federal Circuit reverses a large percentage of lower court claim constructions, no one has analyzed whether judges with more claim construction appeal …

Solidifying Judicial Discretion Through Statutory Interpretation: The Implications Of United States V. Nelson On Criminal Sentencing, Tashama Williams

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

Justice Kennedy's Short-Lived Libertarian Revolution: A Brief History Of Supreme Court Libertarian Ideology, Stephen O'Hanlon

Cardozo Public Law, Policy & Ethics Journal

This paper contends that Justice Anthony Kennedy did not initiate a libertarian jurisprudential revolution following Lawrence v. Texas. The article begins with an overview of constitutional fundamental rights jurisprudence and examines similarities with libertarian theory.

The paper then assesses the legal decisions of Justice Kennedy but concludes that Justice Kennedy is not a libertarian. This provides the basis for critiquing Professor Randy Barnett's assertion that Justice Kennedy was the instigator of a libertarian revolution in U.S. Supreme Court jurisprudence. The fact that Justice Kennedy is not a libertarian is apparent from his reasoning in the recent partial birth abortion …

Judicial Independence: A Call For Reform, Terence J. Lau

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Social Reality And Philosophical Ideals In Transitional Justice, Jamie Rowen

Cardozo Public Law, Policy & Ethics Journal

The article argues that transitional justice mechanisms in post-conflict societies, such as Bosnia, often fail to establish legitimate authority because they neglect the crucial role of community building. It emphasizes that community is a prerequisite for legal authority and highlights the dialectical relationship between law and community, where each can shape the other. The case of Bosnia illustrates how the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the War Crimes Chamber (WCC) in Sarajevo have struggled to gain legitimacy due to their focus on procedural values over community engagement. The article advocates for a reoriented approach to transitional …

Only Skin Deep?: The Cost Of Partisan Politics On Minority Diversity Of The Federal Bench, Sylvia R. Lazos Vargas

Indiana Law Journal

Symposium: Latinos and Latinas at the Epicenter of Contemporary Legal Discourses. Indiana University School of Law-Bloomington, March 2007.

Limiting The Federal Pardon Power, Kristen H. Fowler

Indiana Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Errors, Omissions, And The Tennessee Plan, Brian T. Fitzpatrick

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

In the Spring 2008 issue of the Tennessee Law Review, I wrote an essay questioning whether Tennessee's merit system for selecting appellate judges - the Tennessee Plan - satisfies the requirements of the Tennessee Constitution. The Tennessee Constitution requires all judges to be elected by the qualified voters of the state, yet, under the Plan, all appellate judges are initially selected by gubernatorial appointment and then retained in uncontested referenda. I argued that both the appointment and retention features of the Plan are unconstitutional, and I recommended that the legislature refuse to reauthorize the Plan when it expires in June …

The Use Of Litigation Screenings In Mass Torts: A Formula For Fraud?, Lester Brickman

Articles

The article critically examines the pervasive abuse of litigation screenings in mass tort cases, revealing a system driven by financial exploitation where medical evaluations are manipulated to generate lawsuits. These screenings, often designed to produce false positives, undermine the integrity of the legal system by creating a flood of specious claims. The analysis highlights how lawyers, doctors, and screening companies exploit legal loopholes and financial incentives, leading to billions of dollars in settlements and eroding public trust in the civil justice system.

Extra-Legal Characteristics And Sentencing Disparity Among Federal Drug Offenders, Justin D. Galasso

Sociology & Criminal Justice Theses & Dissertations

The development of the federal sentencing guidelines was made as an attempt to provide a uniform standard of sentencing procedure for defendants convicted within the federal legal system. Unfortunately, such unvarying policy has over the years birthed a system of sentencing that lacks equality among like defendants. The Supreme Court, in 2005, ruled that the sentencing guidelines were no longer to be compulsory during sentencing procedures, but rather act as an ancillary tool. The present study examines multiple legal and extra-legal variables and their influence on two aspects of imprisonment probability for federal drug offenders for the years of 1999-2006: …

The Supreme Common Law Court Of The United States, Jack M. Beermann

Faculty Scholarship

The U.S. Supreme Court's primary role in the history of the United States, especially in constitutional cases (and cases hovering in the universe of the Constitution), has been to limit Congress's ability to redefine and redistribute rights in a direction most people would characterize as liberal. In other words, the Supreme Court, for most of the history of the United States since the adoption of the Constitution, has been a conservative force against change and redistribution. The Court has used five distinct devices to advance its control over the law. First, it has construed rights-creating constitutional provisions narrowly when those …

Book Review Of The Nine: Inside The Secret World Of The Supreme Court, Eric J. Segall

Journal of Legal Education

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Judges In A Government Of, By, And For The People: Notes For The Fifty-Eighth Cardozo Lecture, Jack B. Weinstein

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

Judicial Selection: It's More About The Choices Than Who Does The Choosing, Honorable Lavenski R. Smith

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.