Jurisprudence Commons^™

Revisiting The Enforceability Of Online Contracts: The Need For Unambiguous Assent To Inconspicuous Terms, Tom Mozingo

Seattle University Law Review

In determining the enforceability of online contracts, namely those formed from the use of smartphone applications, courts typically look to whether the contract terms were reasonably conspicuous or communicated to the consumer. With the rise of “browse-wrap” contracts, where terms are not directly communicated to the consumer or where the consumer is not required to click the equivalent of an “I agree” button clearly manifesting assent to the terms, courts have inconsistently applied the reasonable communicativeness standard to the detriment of consumers and application developers alike. This Comment will explore the development of browse-wrap contracting jurisprudence and the need to …

"Inciting A Riot": Silent Sentinels, Group Protests, And Prisoners' Petition And Associational Rights, Nicole B. Godfrey

Seattle University Law Review

This Article argues for increased legal protections for prisoners who choose to engage in group protest to shed light on the conditions of their incarceration. A companion piece to a similar article that focused on prisoner free speech rights, this Article uses the acts of protest utilized by the Silent Sentinels to examine why prisoners’ rights to petition and association should be strengthened. By strengthening these rights, the Article argues that we will advance the values enshrined by the First Amendment’s Petition Clause while simultaneously advancing the rights of the incarcerated millions with little to no political power.

The Article …

Black Women And Girls And The Twenty-Sixth Amendment: Constitutional Connections, Activist Intersections, And The First Wave Youth Suffrage Movement, Mae C. Quinn

Seattle University Law Review

On this 100th anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment—and on the cusp of the fiftieth anniversary of the Twenty-sixth Amendment—this article seeks to expand the voting rights canon. It complicates our understanding of voting rights history in the United States, adding layers to the history of federal constitutional enfranchisement and encouraging a more intersectional telling of our suffrage story in the days ahead.

Thus, this work not only seeks to acknowledge the Twenty-sixth Amendment as important constitutional content, as was the goal of the article I wrote with my law student colleagues for a conference held at the University of Akron …

Does The Woman Suffrage Amendment Protect The Voting Rights Of Men?, Steve Kolbert

Seattle University Law Review

This Article—part of the Seattle University Law Review’s symposium on the centennial of the ratification of the Woman Suffrage Amendment—examines that open possibility. Concluding that the Nineteenth Amendment does protect men’s voting rights, this Article explores why and how that protection empowers Congress to address felon disenfranchisement and military voting. This Article also examines the advantages of using Nineteenth Amendment enforcement legislation compared to legislation enacted under other constitutional provisions.

Part I discusses the unique barriers to voting faced by voters with criminal convictions (Section I.A) and voters in the armed forces (Section I.B). This Part also explains how existing …

The Internet Never Forgets: A Federal Solution To The Dissemination Of Nonconsensual Pornography, Alexis Santiago

Seattle University Law Review

As technology evolves, new outlets for interpersonal conflict and crime evolve with it. The law is notorious for its inability to keep pace with this evolution. This Comment focuses on one area that the law urgently needs to regulate—the dissemination of “revenge porn,” otherwise known as nonconsensual pornography. Currently, no federal law exists in the U.S. that criminalizes the dissemination of nonconsensual pornography. Most U.S. states have criminalized the offense, but with vastly different degrees of severity, resulting in legal inconsistencies and jurisdictional conflicts. This Comment proposes a federal solution to the dissemination of nonconsensual pornography that carefully balances the …

Attorney–Client Privilege In Bad Faith Insurance Claims: The Cedell Presumption And A Necessary National Resolution, Klien Hilliard

Seattle University Law Review

Attorney–client privilege is one of the most important aspects of our legal system. It is one of the oldest privileges in American law and is codified both at the national and state level. Applying to both individual persons and corporations, this expanded privilege covers a wide breadth of clients. However, this broad privilege can sometimes become blurred in relationships between the corporation and the individuals it serves. Specifically, insurance companies and those they cover have complex relationships, as the insurer possesses a quasi-fiduciary relationship in relation to the insured. This type of relationship requires that the insurer act in good …

A Class Action Lawsuit For The Right To A Minimum Education In Detroit, Carter G. Phillips

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.

Snap Removal: Concept; Cause; Cacophony; And Cure, Jeffrey W. Stempel, Thomas O. Main, David Mcclure

Scholarly Works

So-called “snap removal” – removal of a case from state to federal court prior to service on a forum state defendant – has divided federal trial courts for 20 years. Recently, panels of the Second, Third and Fifth Circuits have sided with those supporting the tactic even though it conflicts with the general prohibition on removal when the case includes a forum state defendant, a situation historically viewed as eliminating the need to protect the outsider defendant from possible state court hostility.

Consistent with the public policy underlying diversity jurisdiction – availability of a federal forum to protect against defending …

“Remarkable Influence”: The Unexpected Importance Of Justice Scalia’S Deceptively Unanimous And Contested Majority Opinions, Linda L. Berger, Eric C. Nystrom

Scholarly Works

What constitutes judicial influence and how should it be measured? Curious about the broader role that rhetoric plays in judicial influence over time, we undertook a rhetorical-computational analysis of the 282 majority opinions that Justice Scalia wrote during his 30 years on the Supreme Court. Our analysis is the first to examine the full majority opinion output of a Supreme Court justice using a unique “medium data” approach that combines rhetorical coding with quantitative analysis relying on Shepard’s Citations and LexisNexis headnotes. The resulting study casts doubt on the ability of judicial authors, including Justice Scalia, to control the extent …

Thin Separability: An Answer To Star Athletica, Angelo Marchesini

Seattle University Law Review

Courts have consistently struggled to adopt a test that appropriately interprets the Copyright Act’s language protecting works of art incorporated into useful articles. The analysis that allows protections of these works of art is called “separability,” and it has been an ambiguous area of copyright law since its inception. In essence, this analysis gives copyright protection to a work of art incorporated into a useful article as long as the work of art is “separate” from the utilitarian aspects of the useful article. The Supreme Court was positioned to end the uncertainty surrounding the separability analysis in its recent decision, …

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

Have Problem-Solving Courts Changed The Practice Of Law?, Cynthia Alkon

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

No abstract provided.

The Past, Present, And Future Of Christian Adr, Ronald J. Colombo

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

Many religious traditions recommend (if not require) that their adherents bring some if not all of their disputes with co-adherents before a religious tribunal for resolution. The Christian religious tradition is no exception. That said, the dramatic history of the Church in the West, from that of a persecuted Jewish sect, to the official state religion of Imperial Rome, to an international authority competing with that of local monarchs, to its modern status of merely tolerated, has yielded a variety of evolving perspectives on the question of intra-faith dispute resolution within Christianity. This article examines that question and the historical …

Reevaluating Politicized Identity & Notions Of An American Political Community In The Legal & Political Process, Marvin L. Astrada Jd, Phd

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.

The Pursuit Of Comprehensive Education Funding Reform Via Litigation, Lisa Scruggs

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.

Panel Discussion: The Right To Education: With Liberty, Justice, And Education For All?

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.

Legal Risks Of Adversarial Machine Learning Research, Ram Shankar Siva Kumar, Jonathon Penney, Bruce Schneier, Kendra Albert

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

Adversarial machine learning is the systematic study of how motivated adversaries can compromise the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of machine learning (ML) systems through targeted or blanket attacks. The problem of attacking ML systems is so prevalent that CERT, the federally funded research and development center tasked with studying attacks, issued a broad vulnerability note on how most ML classifiers are vulnerable to adversarial manipulation. Google, IBM, Facebook, and Microsoft have committed to investing in securing machine learning systems. The US and EU are likewise putting security and safety of AI systems as a top priority.

Now, research on adversarial …

Our Criminal Justice System Is A Bear Trap, Frederick K. Brewington

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

No abstract provided.

Confession Obsession: How To Protect Minors In Interrogations, Cindy Chau

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

No abstract provided.

The Future Of Pretrial Detention In A Criminal System Looking For Justice, Gabrielle Costa

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

No abstract provided.

Remorse, Not Race: Essence Of Parole Release?, Lovashni Khalikaprasad

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

No abstract provided.

As Pertains To The Criminal Justice System, Is Hindsight 20/20?, Syndie G. E. Molina, Cristina Negrillo

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

No abstract provided.

The Inconvenience Of Justice: How Unmitigated Official Misconduct Almost Destroyed The Lives Of Five Young Boys From Harlem, Stefania Bordone, David Wright

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

No abstract provided.

The Life And Legal Legacy Of Justice Steven L. Zinter, Neil Fulton

Faculty Publications

Justice Steven L. Zinter was a vital part of South Dakota's legal landscape for decades. As a private practitioner, circuit court judge, supreme court justice, and in other official capacities, he forged a powerful legacy in South Dakota. Over the course of his time he worked on cases large and small in many areas of law. He was recognized as a brilliant legal mind, precise writer, and careful thinker. It is a challenge to capture the breadth and depth of such a career. This article takes a look at his personal formation, his legal work in several settings, and how …

The Central Park Five As “Discrete And Insular” Minorities Under The Equal Protection Clause: The Evolution Of The Right To Counsel For Wrongfully Convicted Minors, Todd K. Beharry

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

No abstract provided.

From Common Law To Constitution, Sanctioned Dispossession And Subjugation Through Otherization And Discriminatory Classification, Mobolaji Oladeji

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

No abstract provided.

How Circuits Can Fix Their Splits, Wyatt G. Sassman

Marquette Law Review

The desire to avoid conflicts between the regional circuits of the federal courts of appeals, commonly known as “circuit splits,” has had an immense influence on the structure and operation of the federal appellate courts for roughly a century. Over time, the Supreme Court has been assigned responsibility for resolving these conflicts. Yet as overall federal caseloads have increased, this reliance on the Supreme Court has imposed serious and well-recognized burdens on the operation of the federal courts. For decades scholars have debated bold proposals to address these problems, such as creating a new national court dedicated to resolving conflicts …

Fosta: A Necessary Step In Advancement Of The Women’S Rights Movement, Alexandra Sanchez

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Washington’S Young Offenders: O’Dell Demands A Change To Sentencing Guidelines, Erika Vranizan

Seattle University Law Review

This Note argues that the O’Dell decision was a watershed moment for criminal justice reform. It argues that the reasoning in O’Dell should be seized upon by the legislature to take action to remediate instances in which defendants are legal adults but do not possess the cognitive characteristics of an adult sufficient to justify adult punishment. Given both the scientific impossibility of identifying a precise age at which characteristics of youthfulness end and adulthood begins and the Court’s repeated recognition that these very factors impact culpability, the current approach to sentencing young offenders aged eighteen to twenty-five as adults simply …

John Marshall’S Constitution: Methodological Pluralism And Second-Order Ipse Dixit In Constitutional Adjudication, D.A. Jeremy Telman

Lewis & Clark Law Review

This Article provides a comprehensive treatment of the constitutional jurispru- dence of the Marshall Court (1801–1835), addressing its relationship to con- temporary originalism. Until recently, there seemed to be no need for such a study. With the move from intentionalism to textualism in the 1980s, originalists came to understand their movement as an innovation and a reac- tion against the perceived excesses of the Warren and Burger Courts. Original- ists did not claim that originalist methodology informed nineteenth-century constitutional adjudication.

Recently, however, originalists have made claims that constitutional adjudi- cation in the United States has always been originalist. This Article …