Juvenile Law Commons^™

Through A Glass Darkly: How Securities Disclosures Give A Distorted View Of The Economy, Gerald F. Davis

Seattle University Law Review

Our understanding of the American economy often relies on stylized facts derived from mandatory disclosures by listed corporations. Data vendors like Standard & Poor’s vacuum up 10Ks and proxy statements into databases, and scholars distill these into tentative maps. This may have been adequate for a postwar economy centered on asset-heavy manufacturers, but it is increasingly out of step with an information-based economy. Companies listed on the stock market are fewer in number and less representative than they were, light in tangible assets and people, and heavy on IP. Basic facts such as what industry they are in are increasingly …

Volume 48 Masthead, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Volume 48 Masthead

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

Corporate Scenarios: Drawing Lessons From History, Madison Condon

Seattle University Law Review

As corporations are increasingly pressed to reveal information about their exposure to climate-related risks, they are often asked to undertake and disclose the outcome of “scenario analysis.” In this exercise, corporations, including financial institutions, examine how their business would fare under different pathways the future may take. One oft-used scenario, for example, is the International Energy Agency’s “Net-Zero by 2050: A Roadmap for the Energy Sector.” This Essay presents a history of the use of scenarios as a corporate planning tool, particularly in the oil industry, arguing that it is key for understanding our present moment and the role of …

Shareholder Expression In A Time Of Heightened Political Tension, Aaron A. Dhir

Seattle University Law Review

In this article, I provide context for my forthcoming research project on shareholder proposals and racial equity audits. Since the murder of George Floyd in May of 2020, progressive shareholder actors have increasingly used the proposal mechanism to advance diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice-related goals. These proposals have frequently gone beyond requesting the usual corporate fare of diversity trainings, intersectionality workshops, affinity groups, etc. Instead, a more ambitious type of proposal asks corporate America to conduct racial equity audits, defined as “an independent, objective and holistic analysis of a company’s policies, practices, products, services and efforts to combat systemic racism …

Corporate Governance Speech, Sarah C. Haan

Seattle University Law Review

The State has always regulated the intra-firm communications that make corporate governance possible, most commonly by mandating disclosures of information by a corporation to its shareholders. Some such laws are labeled “securities regulation,” but securities regulation is a broad category that extends to speech by actors who are outside the corporate enterprise as well. Also, the conventional securities regulation category does not capture all such laws; other examples, including informationforcing mandates, can be found in state corporate law. This Article uses the term “corporate governance speech” to describe the communications among shareholders, directors, and officers through which corporate governance is …

Dark Accounting Matter, Colleen Honigsberg

Seattle University Law Review

Physicists calculate that approximately 85% of the matter in the universe is composed of “dark matter” that “does not absorb, reflect, or emit electromagnetic radiation and is therefore difficult to detect.” The S&P 500 currently trades at a price-to-book value of 4.2, suggesting that book value accounts for less than 20% of the S&P 500’s market value. The remaining 80% appears nowhere in these firms’ balance sheets—it is invisible to contemporary accounting techniques and constitutes “dark accounting matter.”

Some “dark accounting matter” is composed of factors commonly described as components of “ESG.” Human capital, for example, is an intangible asset …

The Employees’ Dilemma: Balancing Internal Reporting, Whistleblowing, And Insider Trading Risks, Geeyoung Min

Seattle University Law Review

The Essay examines how recent developments in insider trading regulations and whistleblower reward programs can lead to unintended and counterproductive results of discouraging employees from using internal reporting channels within corporate compliance programs. While the presence of a robust and well-functioning corporate compliance program is a critical factor both in mitigating the level of public enforcement actions against companies and in protecting corporate managers from liability in private litigation, these programs often provide little incentive for employees to report potential misconduct internally.

Corporate compliance programs are designed to promote the upward information flow within the company, which is essential for …

How The Antidiscrimination Law Of Commercial Transactions Really Works, Helen Norton

Seattle University Law Review

A variety of businesses now cite 303 Creative when seeking First Amendment protection for their refusal to serve certain customers based on those customers’ protected class status. How this litigation will play out remains to be seen. But future courts need not, and should not, repeat the 303 Creative Court’s misunderstanding of how the antidiscrimination law of commercial transactions actually works.

Part I of this Essay explains the Court’s longstanding understanding of the antidiscrimination law of commercial transactions, and then describes the Court’s failure to engage with this precedent in 303 Creative. Part II then identifies the 303 Creative decision’s …

Understanding The Big Three’S Wavering Support Of Environmental And Social Shareholder Proposals, Jeff Schwartz, Jefferson Jensen

Seattle University Law Review

Because of their substantial equity portfolios, BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street (the Big 3) are central players in corporate governance. It is, therefore, critical to understand how they vote. One puzzle is that their support for shareholder proposals on environmental and social matters appears to waiver. In 2020, for instance, BlackRock supported 11.1% of environmental proposals at S&P 500 firms. In 2021, it seemingly reversed course, supporting 55.2%. It then flipped again, supporting 32.1% in 2022. Such statistics suggest that the Big 3 are constantly changing their views on these topics. This Article seeks to better understand whether this is …

Volume 48 Masthead, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Volume 48 Masthead

“Pick-Up Orders” And Foster Youth In Washington, Lauren Higgins

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Green Dividends: A Case Study In Green Dividends And The Conditions For Private Ordering Solutions, Anne M. Tucker

Seattle University Law Review

This Essay introduces a novel private ordering solution to facilitate corporate investments in pro-social and environmental initiatives: Green dividends. Green dividends are an optional increase in shareholder dividends that are returned to the company to be reinvested in environmental initiatives or kept by a shareholder.

Green dividends pose an alternative to the current gridlocked debate that corporations can’t, won’t, shouldn’t, and shouldn’t even try to act in pro-social or environmental ways. Turning the common refrains on their head converts each narrative into an element for a successful private ordering solution: authority, accountability, shareholder buy-in, and government- backed enforcement. With Green …

Does Climate Disclosure Work To Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions? Emerging Evidence Suggests Cautious Optimism, Cynthia A. Williams

Seattle University Law Review

Significant regulatory resources have been spent developing global, voluntary climate and sustainability disclosure standards, such as the TCFD, TNRD, and ISSB’s Sustainability and Climate Disclosure standards, or domestically required disclosures, such as in the EU and in the U.S. Thus, it is important to evaluate whether this disclosure, particularly voluntary, qualitative disclosure, will have the power to shift the allocation of capital, will have a significant effect on the management of climate risk within firms, and ultimately will reduce climate change risk and biodiversity loss.

In this Article, several interrelated questions will be discussed. First, what does the empirical evidence …

Volume 48 Masthead, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Volume 48 Masthead

De/Reconstructing Delinquency, Eduardo R. Ferrer

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Hundreds of thousands of children are brought under the jurisdiction of delinquency courts every year in the United States. Despite the reality that most children engage in delinquent behavior during their adolescence, poor children, children of color, children with disabilities, and children who identify as LGBTQIA+ comprise a disproportionate number of those who become delinquency system-involved. These disparities exist by design. Their origins can be traced back to the flawed first principles upon which the juvenile court was built and, specifically, to the unduly expansive legal definition of delinquency that has undergirded the jurisdiction and power of the juvenile court …

Book Review, Rumyana Van Ark Et Al., Children’S Rights, ‘Foreign Fighters’, Counter-Terrorism: Children Of Nowhere (2024), Mark A. Drumbl

Scholarly Articles

The focus of Children’s Rights, ‘Foreign Fighters’, Counter-Terrorism: Children of Nowhere is on foreign fighters who join terrorist groups, ISIS, and other entities engaged in armed conflict in Syria and Iraq. Counterterrorism measures, and the threats of terrorist attacks, have triggered a degradation and distortion of law. I have noted this following the 9/11 attacks and the concomitant refusal to treat children associated with terrorist groups as protected child soldiers. Whereas child soldiers in distant African conflicts are largely seen in the centers of global power as ‘faultless, passive victims’ of a pathological society, child terrorists taken as disruptive of …

Lost Innocence, Mateo Valdivieso

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Human trafficking is defined as involving “force, fraud, or coercion to obtain some type of labor or commercial sex act” (U.S. Department of Homeland Security). It disproportionately affects vulnerable populations, particularly children within the U.S. welfare system. This research aims to analyze the characteristics of this system that produce vulnerabilities in welfare children that heighten their risk of being trafficked. The study focuses on socio-economic, psychological, and environmental vulnerabilities, examining how these factors, combined with increased internet accessibility, exacerbate the risks of trafficking. Using a qualitative approach, the research uses secondary data from peer-reviewed journal articles, government reports, and reputable …

How Does The Modern Supreme Court Treat The Idea Of Retribution In The Context Of Capital Punishment?, Paige Forsberg

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This thesis explores the modern U.S. Supreme Court's treatment of retribution in the context of capital punishment, analyzing how justices have framed and justified the death penalty as a form of justice. Through the examination of key Supreme Court rulings and legal arguments, this study evaluates the evolving role of retribution in the Court’s decisions on death penalty cases, highlighting how judicial reasoning has shifted over time in response to legal, philosophical, and societal developments.

Retribution, long considered one of the primary justifications for capital punishment, is examined through a nuanced lens in this study. While historically viewed as a …

Child-Taking, Diane Marie Amann

Scholarly Works

A ruling group at times takes certain children from their community and then tries to remake them in its image. It tries to rid the child of undesired differences, in ethnicity or nationality, religion or politics, race or ancestry, culture or class. There are too many examples: the colonialist residential schools that forced settler cultures on Indigenous children; the military juntas that kidnapped dissidents’ children; and today’s reports of abductions amid crises like that in Syria. Too often nothing is done and the children are lost. But that may be changing, as the International Criminal Court is seeking to arrest …

University Of The District Of Columbia Law Review, University Of The District Of Columbia Law Review

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Legally Sanctioned Takings Of Black Children: How Slavery Reverberates In The Modern Child Welfare System, Abigail Mitchell

The Scholar: St. Mary's Law Review on Race and Social Justice

This article explores the link between the taking of Black children from their families perpetrated as part of American slavery and modern takings in the modern family policing system. This article posits that underpinning both systems is a pervasive paternalism that purports to be benevolent but has been weaponized to systematically traumatize Black children and villainize Black parents. This article takes a sweeping historical perspective and connects the same discourse used to justify slavery to that which has permeated the modern family policing system.

More Than Troubling: The Alarming Absence Of ‘Troubled Teen Industry’ Regulation And Proposals For Reform, Morgan Rubino

Journal of Legislation

This Note will advocate for immediate and wide-reaching legislative action on juvenile residential treatment. Part I will provide a brief history of the origins of the Troubled Teen Industry ("TTI") and the most common types of facilities operating today. Part II will analyze some of the limited state legislation on the TTI, along with the Stop Institutional Child Abuse Act pending before Congress. Finally, Part III will lay out the most pressing injustices and abuses that arise out of the TTI and argue that an integrated framework of local and federal legislation, including the adoption of state bills of rights …

A Psa On The Csaa: How The Child Soldiers Accountability Act Should Guide The United States’ Approach To Criminalizing The Recruitment Of Minors Into Gangs, Chandler Marshall

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

The use and recruitment of child soldiers in situations of armed conflict has been widely documented over the past century, discussed in the media and in academia, and condemned by prominent members of the international community. Beginning in the 20th century, international legal frameworks were developed to protect children in vulnerable communities across the globe and punish those responsible for their recruitment in regions of armed conflict. While the international community and the United States have taken great strides to protect children from recruitment and militarization, the United States lacks any effective domestic laws to protect vulnerable children on American …

The Post-Ongwen Case Period And The Reconciliation Process In Northern Uganda: Local Communities As A Site Of Knowledge, Christelle Molima Bameka

Scholarly Articles

By providing victims with more space in the Ongwen case, the International Criminal Court (icc) has significantly contributed to the healing of the trauma and community reconciliation in northern Uganda. That said, this court has also raised issues that could affect local efforts to achieve peace, namely the positioning of victims of child soldiers vis-à-vis criminal child soldiers. Drawing on qualitative data collected through focus group discussions with some community members from locations under investigation by the icc, this sociolegal study examines the victims’ narratives about child soldiers and the different ideas of human rights that emerge. Then, it explores …

A History Of Corporate Law Federalism In The Twentieth Century, William W. Bratton

Seattle University Law Review

This Article describes the emergence of corporate law federalism across a long twentieth century. The period begins with New Jersey’s successful initiation of charter competition in 1888 and ends with the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002. The federalism in question describes the interrelation of state and federal regulation of corporate internal affairs. This Article takes a positive approach, pursuing no normative bottom line. It makes six observations: (1) the federalism describes a division of subject matter, with internal affairs regulated by the states and securities issuance and trading regulated by the federal government; (2) the federalism is an …

Stakeholder Capitalism’S Greatest Challenge: Reshaping A Public Consensus To Govern A Global Economy, Leo E. Strine Jr., Michael Klain

Seattle University Law Review

The Berle XIV: Developing a 21st Century Corporate Governance Model Conference asks whether there is a viable 21st Century Stakeholder Governance model. In our conference keynote article, we argue that to answer that question yes requires restoring—to use Berle’s term—a “public consensus” throughout the global economy in favor of the balanced model of New Deal capitalism, within which corporations could operate in a way good for all their stakeholders and society, that Berle himself supported.

The world now faces problems caused in large part by the enormous international power of corporations and the institutional investors who dominate their governance. These …

Henderson And The Objective Observer Standard: The Future Of Race-Conscious Standards Post-Students For Fair Admissions, Gabriela Dionisio

Seattle University Law Review

On June 29, 2023, the Supreme Court of the United States decided Students for Fair Admissions v. President & Fellows of Harvard College, which struck down race-conscious admissions policies. Within just a year after its ruling, Students for Fair Admissions has already had a sweeping impact, reaching beyond higher education. Although the Supreme Court did not indicate whether Students for Fair Admissions applies to sectors beyond higher education, law firms, and other employers have already modified their diversity policies and initiatives, erasing race and company diversity considerations. Given those dramatic changes, there is growing fear that Students for Fair Admissions …

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, …

Public Primacy In Corporate Law, Dorothy S. Lund

Seattle University Law Review

This Article explores the malleability of agency theory by showing that it could be used to justify a “public primacy” standard for corporate law that would direct fiduciaries to promote the value of the corporation for the benefit of the public. Employing agency theory to describe the relationship between corporate management and the broader public sheds light on aspects of firm behavior, as well as the nature of state contracting with corporations. It also provides a lodestar for a possible future evolution of corporate law and governance: minimize the agency costs created by the divergence of interests between management and …