Jurisprudence Commons^™

Human Rights Pragmatism And Human Dignity, David Luban

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Human rights sound a lot like moral rights: rights that we have because we are human. Many philosophers think it follows that the list of international human rights must therefore be founded on some philosophical account of moral rights or of human dignity. More recently, other philosophers have rejected this foundationalist picture of international human rights (“foundationalist” meaning that moral rights are the foundation of international human rights). These critics argue that international human rights need no philosophical foundation; instead, we should look to the actual practices of human rights: the practices of international institutions, tribunals, NGOs, monitors, and activists. …

Constitutionally Tailoring Punishment, Richard A. Bierschbach, Stephanos Bibas

Articles

Since the turn of the century, the Supreme Court has regulated noncapital sentencing under the Sixth Amendment in the Apprendi line of cases (requiring jury findings of fact to justify sentence enhancements) as well as under the Eighth Amendment in the Miller and Graham line of cases (forbidding mandatory life imprisonment for juvenile defendants). Although both lines of authority sound in individual rights, in fact they are fundamentally about the structures of criminal justice. These two seemingly disparate doctrines respond to structural imbalances in noncapital sentencing by promoting morally appropriate punishment judgments that are based on individualized input and that …

Cosmopolitanism In Constitutional Law, Vlad Perju

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Pallant V Morgan Equity Reconsidered, Man Yip

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This paper argues that the Pallant v Morgan equity should not be recognised as an independent doctrine because it does not rest on any tenable jurisprudential basis. It shows that a characterisation based on ‘common intention’ should be rejected because it is inconsistent with established legal principles and commercial practice. The alternative explanation based on breach of fiduciary duty, as suggested by Etherton LJ in Crossco No. 4 Unlimited v Jolan Unlimited [2011] 2 All ER 754 fares no better, as there is no reason why the Pallant v Morgan equity cases should be considered separately from other instances of …

To Say What The Law Is: Rules, Results, And The Dangers Of Inferential Stare Decisis, Adam N. Steinman

Faculty Scholarship

Judicial decisions do more than resolve disputes. They are also crucial sources of prospective law, because stare decisis obligates future courts to follow those decisions. Yet there remains tremendous uncertainty about how we identify a judicial decision’s lawmaking content. Does stare decisis require future courts to follow the rules stated in a precedent-setting opinion? Or must future courts merely reconcile their decisions with the ultimate result of the precedent-setting case? Although it is widely assumed that a rule-based approach puts greater constraints on future courts, two recent Supreme Court decisions—Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes and Ashcroft v. Iqbal—turn this conventional …

Trademark As Promise, Laura A. Heymann

Popular Media

No abstract provided.

Legal Summaries , Emily Edwards

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

No abstract provided.

Sotomayor's Empathy Moves The Court A Step Closer To Equitable Adjudication, Veronica Couzo

Notre Dame Law Review

On August 6, 2009, then-Judge, now-Justice, Sonia Sotomayor was confirmed as the nation’s first Latina Supreme Court Justice. While many Latinos embraced the idea of having “Sonia from the Bronx” on the bench, others were fearful that her jurisprudence, combined with her background, would result in “reverse racism.” These fears, while arguably unfounded at the time, have been completely dispelled. Just as Justice Thurgood Marshall transformed the adjudications of the Supreme Court through experiential discourse, so too, to a lesser extent, has Justice Sotomayor. In both oral arguments and written opinions, Justice Sonia Sotomayor has demonstrated educative leadership—enlightening her colleagues …

Originalism And The Colorblind Constitution, Michael B. Rappaport

Notre Dame Law Review

In this Article, I challenge the claim that the original meaning clearly allows the states to engage in affirmative action. I argue that the original meaning does not plainly establish that affirmative action by the states is constitutional. Instead, there is, at the least, a reasonable argument to be made that state government affirmative action is unconstitutional. In fact, based on the available evidence, I believe that the case for concluding that the Fourteenth Amendment’s original meaning prohibits affirmative action as to laws within its scope is stronger than the case for concluding that it allows affirmative action. I do …

Self-Government And The Judicial Function, David Rudenstine

Articles

No abstract provided.

Footnote Online Supplement: State Truancy Law Compilation, Dean H. Rivkin

College of Law Faculty Scholarship

This compilation of state truancy laws is being provided as a footnote supplement to the forthcoming article No Child Left Behind? Representing Youth and Families in Truancy Matters (2013) by Prof. Dean Hill Rivkin and Brenda McGee, of The Education Law Practicum at the University of Tennessee College of Law. It is an updated version of the laws listed in the Juvenile Law Center’s excellent amicus curiae brief in Bellevue School District v. E.S., Brief of Juvenile Law Center, et al., As Amicus Curiae on Behalf of Respondent, Bellevue Sch. Dist. v. E.S., 257 P.3d 570 (Wash. 2011) …

The Liberty Of The Church: Source, Scope And Scandal, Patrick Mckinley Brennan

Working Paper Series

This article was presented at a conference, and is part of a symposium, on "The Freedom of the Church in the Modern Era." The article argues that the liberty of the Church, libertas Ecclesiae, is not a mere metaphor, pace the views of some other contributions to the conference and symposium and of the mentality mostly prevailing over the last five hundred years. The argument is that the Church and her directly God-given rights are ontologically irreducible in a way that the rights of, say, the state of California or even of the United States are not. Based on a …

Tricky Business: A Decision-Making Framework For Legally Sound, Ethically Suspect Business Tactics, Corey A. Ciocchetti

Cardozo Public Law, Policy & Ethics Journal

Trick: "a crafty or underhanded device, maneuver, stratagem, or the like, intended to deceive or cheat." Tricks are designed to outwit others in a cunning and skillful manner. Despite well-written, philosophically sound codes of ethics and core values, businesses are not above employing tricky tactics to suit their pecuniary interests. These strategies often involve the legal system as the outwitted ask courts to vindicate their rights. However, the most successful tricks are skillfully crafted to survive legal scrutiny. This Article evaluates three tricky business tactics found lawful by the United States Supreme Court during its most recent term. The Article …

A Modified Theory Of The Law Of Federal Courts: The Case Of Arising-Under Jurisdiction, Simona Grossi

Washington Law Review

This Article examines and evaluates the legal process method as a perspective from which to assess the law of federal courts. It then offers a modified approach to legal process that encompasses the full range of considerations that ought to inform modern judicial decision-making in this context. With that modified approach in mind, the article describes and critiques the Supreme Court’s statutory arising-under jurisprudence, both as originally developed and as currently practiced. The article shows that while the Court’s early “arising-under” jurisprudence was founded on durable principles and on the reasoned application of those principles, more recent decisions by the …

Caressing The Big Fish? A Critique Of Icc Trial Chamber V(A)'S Decision To Grant Ruto's Request For Excusal From Continuous Presence At Trial, Thomas Obel Hansen

Cardozo Journal of International and Comparative Law

The article critiques the ICC Trial Chamber V(a)'s decision to excuse William Ruto from continuous presence at his trial, arguing that this decision misinterprets Articles 63 and 27 of the Rome Statute. The Chamber's reliance on "exceptional circumstances" and Ruto's official status as Vice President of Kenya undermines the principle of equality before the law and sets a problematic precedent for future cases involving high-ranking officials.

Criminal Forfeiture And The Sixth Amendment: The Role Of The Jury At Common Law, Richard E. Finneran, Steven K. Luther

Cardozo Law Review

Throughout its recent jurisprudence after Apprendi v. New Jersey, the Supreme Court has emphasized that its analysis of the Sixth Amendment jury trial right centers upon the historical role of the jury at common law. Just last year, in Southern Union Co. v. United States, the Court extended the Sixth Amendment jury trial right to criminal fines after concluding that the jury's verdict determined the maximum fine that could be imposed at common law. The Court remained silent, however, with regard to another financial penalty commonly applied in the federal system: criminal forfeitures. Given that the Supreme Court …

Toward A Jurisprudence Of Free Expression In Russia: The European Court Of Human Rights, Sub-National Courts, And Intersystemic Adjudication, Robert B. Ahdieh, H. Forrest Flemming

Faculty Scholarship

Protection of free expression in Russia is headed the wrong direction, but one institution may still be able to slow its backward slide: the Russian judiciary. In particular, sub-national courts-those operating at the ground level-have the potential to shape a renewed jurisprudence of free expression in Russia. To encourage as much, the European Court ofHuman Rights (ECHR) should engage the Russian courts in a pattern of "intersystemic adjudication, "pressing them to embrace ideas about the role of courts, the law, human rights, and free expression more in line with international norms. Hopefully, this can reverse Russia's current path toward the …

The One Or The Many, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

The following Review Essay, inspired by Tracy Isaacs’ new book, Moral Responsibility in Collective Contexts, connects the philosophical literature on group agency with recent trends in international criminal law. Part I of the Essay sketches out the relevant philosophical positions, including collectivist and individualist accounts of group agency. Particular attention is paid to Kornhauser and Sager’s development of the doctrinal paradox, Philip Pettit’s deployment of the paradox towards a general argument for group rationality, and Michael Bratman’s account of shared or joint intentions. Part II then analyzes, with cautious support, Isaacs’ two-level solution, which entails both individual and collective …

Resisting The Grand Coalition In Favor Of The Status Quo By Giving Full Scope To The Libertas Ecclesiae, Patrick Mckinley Brennan

Working Paper Series

This paper argues that questions about "religious freedom" must be subordinated to the fundamental principle of the liberty of the Church, libertas Ecclesiae. The First Amendment's agnosticism with respect to the liberty of the Church is not ultimately normative. Catholics and others who merely seek religious "accommodation," as with the HHS mandate, for example, are agents of a status quo that illegitimately has comfortable self-preservation as its highest value. It is Catholic doctrine that "creation was for the sake of the Church," not for the sake of, say, religious freedom. The paper argues that the contingent constitution of …

Separate Is Inherently Unequal, Unless You're Religious: The Peculiar Constitutionalization Of Religious Segregation, Franciska Coleman

Buffalo Public Interest Law Journal

This article seeks to explain how a relative newcomer to constitutional anti-discrimination jurisprudence, secular identity, has managed to gamer a far higher degree of protection than historically suspect classes, such as race and gender. It attributes this phenom- enon to the "separate but equal" model of equality inherent in the doctrine of "separation of church and state." It notes that, despite acknowledging that government segregation is per se unequal in the Brown decision, the Supreme Court has continued to enforce religious segregation as a requirement of the Establishment Clause. In doing so, the Court has created a new type of …

Transforming Juvenile Justice: Making Doctrine Out Of Dicta In Graham V. Florida, Jason Zolle

Michigan Law Review First Impressions

In the late 1980s and 1990s, many state legislatures radically altered the way that their laws treated children accused of crimes. Responding to what was perceived of as an epidemic of juvenile violence, academics and policymakers began to think of child criminals as a "new breed" of incorrigible "superpredators." States responded by making it easier for prosecutors to try and sentence juveniles as adults, even making it mandatory in some circumstances. Yet in the past decade, the Supreme Court handed down four opinions that limit the states' ability to treat children as adults in the justice system. Roper v. Simmons …

Interpreting The Wisconsin Constitution, Daniel R. Suhr

Marquette Law Review

The Wisconsin Constitution is the state’s fundamental law and is often the final authority over important issues of public moment. When interpreting a provision in the state constitution, the Wisconsin Supreme Court relies on three primary sources: the plain meaning of the text, the legislative and ratification history surrounding the clause, and construction by the legislature. The second and third sources that the Court uses to resolve constitutional cases are significantly flawed for both practical and jurisprudential reasons.

By contrast, the Wisconsin Supreme Court focuses first and foremost on the text when interpreting statutes. The Court only turns to history …

The Role Of The Federal Judge In The Constitutional Structure: An Originalist Perspective, Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain

San Diego Law Review

Join me now in examining some of the structural features of our Constitution. And let’s do so by focusing upon cases that have come before my court—the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, the second highest federal court in the land, inferior only to the Supreme Court of the United States. My goal is to present, in modest outline, an originalist perspective on the federal judge’s role, particularly my role as a circuit judge, in the constitutional order.

Holmes, Cardozo, And The Legal Realists: Early Incarnations Of Legal Pragmatism And Enterprise Liability, Edmund Ursin

San Diego Law Review

The theory of enterprise liability is associated with the tort lawmaking of the liberal California Supreme Court of the 1960s and 1970s. Legal pragmatism, in turn, is associated with the conservative jurist Richard Posner. This Article explains that early incarnations of each can be found in the works of four giants in American law: Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Judge—later Justice—Benjamin Cardozo, and the Legal Realists Leon Green and Karl Llewellyn. As will be seen, these scholars and judges shared a common view of the lawmaking role of courts. Stated simply, this shared view was that judges are lawmakers and policy …

Altering Attention In Adjudication, Chris Guthrie, Jeffrey J. Rachlinski, Andrew J. Wistrich

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Judges decide complex cases in rapid succession but are limited by cognitive constraints. Consequently judges cannot allocate equal attention to every aspect of a case. Case outcomes might thus depend on which aspects of a case are particularly salient to the judge. Put simply, a judge focusing on one aspect of a case might reach a different outcome than a judge focusing on another. In this Article, we report the results of a series of studies exploring various ways in which directing judicial attention can shape judicial outcomes. In the first study, we show that judges impose shorter sentences when …

Climate Regulation As If The Planet Matters: The Earth Jurisprudence Approach To Climate Change, Glenn Wright

Environmental and Earth Law Journal (EELJ)

It is now beyond doubt that humans are having an enormously detrimental impact on the natural world. In the face of the incredible environmental challenges we face, new and radical ideas have emerged about how we should regulate human behavior. This paper briefly focuses on the failure of current legal regimes to address climate change, and considers how climate governance would look under the Earth Jurisprudence approach: setting our laws within the context of fundamental principles of ecology and planetary boundaries. Consideration is given to how existing legal concepts could be used to achieve this vision. The paper concludes that …

Land Ethic Under Attack: Keystone Xl And The War Over Domestic S(Oil), Heather Culp

Environmental and Earth Law Journal (EELJ)

The Keystone XL pipeline has caused recent controversy and renewed the debate over the future of fossil fuels in the United States. The project pits largely conservative groups, who argue that the pipeline will create jobs and decrease America’s dependence on foreign oil, against environmental advocates, indigenous tribes, and private landowners, who are attempting to fend off the project because they believe it will displace them of their own lands as well as disrupt the natural ecosystems that lay in the pipeline’s path. In the wake of a presidential veto of the project and renewed sentiment by the pipeline’s …

Permitting Problems: Environmental Justice And The Miccosukee Indian Tribe, Charles Prior

Environmental and Earth Law Journal (EELJ)

The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians is a federally recognized tribe that works and resides in the Everglades region of the State of Florida. The Miccosukee have been battling lax water quality standards through lawsuits since the 1990’s. Recent rulings in federal court held that the State of Florida has failed to comply with the Clean Water Act and ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to set nutrient criteria for the water bodies in the state of Florida until the Florida Department of Environmental Protection complies with the Clean Water Act.

This article uses the principles of environmental justice to analyze ways …

Mapping The Terrain Of Earth Jurisprudence: Landscape, Thresholds And Horizons, Anne Louise Schillmoller, Alessandro Pelizzon

Environmental and Earth Law Journal (EELJ)

This paper investigates central ideas in the emergent field of Earth Jurisprudence. It suggests that development of conceptual and practical frameworks for an earth justice system predicated on rights of nature is currently at a nascent stage, but such ‘creative uncertainty’ provides scholars and practitioners with opportunities to identify and articulate new conceptual frameworks which avoid some of the hazards of human exceptionalism.

Part I suggests that the concept of ‘rights of nature’ rests upon contestable epistemological and ontological claims and that an effective Earth Jurisprudence will require a continual negotiation of interpretative disagreements and frameworks for action.

Part II …

State Conservation As Settler Colonial Governance At Ka‘Ena Point, Hawai‘I, Bianca Isaki

Environmental and Earth Law Journal (EELJ)

This paper argues, by illustrating, that liberal multiculturalism and natural resources are interlinked strategies of settler colonial governance in political debates surrounding the construction of a “predator-proof” fence for conservation purposes across Native Hawaiian lands of deep cultural and historical significance at Ka`ena Point, a state wilderness park in Hawai`i. First, this paper shifts debates framed in terms of the seeming recalcitrance of Native Hawaiian cultural practitioners to recognize the necessity of natural resource management. Second, it considers how these political debates are repeated in the context of legal questions over the forms through which Native Hawaiian cultural claims may …