The Remains of the Citadel (Economic Loss Rule in Products Cases)
By Catherine M. Sharkey. Full text here. Though its seeds may have been planted long before, the economic loss rule in products liability tort law emerged in full force at the very same moment as the doctrine of strict products liability in the mid-1960s. This moment, fueled by the fall of privity and the rise…
Continue ReadingProsser’s The Fall of the Citadel
By Kenneth S. Abraham. Full text here. William L. Prosser’s The Fall of the Citadel (Strict Liability to the Consumer) was simultaneously an analysis of the dismantling of the barriers to the imposition of strict liability for product-related injuries, an account of the sudden adoption of this form of liability beginning in the early 1960s, and…
Continue ReadingCulture as a Structural Problem in Indigent Defense
By Eve Brensike Primus. Full text here. Indigent defense lawyers today are routinely overwhelmed by excessive caseloads, underpaid, inadequately supported, poorly trained, and left essentially unsupervised. The result is a serious cultural problem in indigent defense, especially in jurisdictions where such defense is handled by lawyers lacking the community and institutional reinforcement that strong public-defender offices…
Continue ReadingThe United States Supreme Court (Mostly) Gives Up Its Review Role with Ineffective Assistance of Counsel Cases
By Paul Marcus. Full text here. Gideon v. Wainwright is arguably the most significant criminal justice decision in American history. Gideon’s recognition of indigent criminal defendants’ right to publicly funded counsel had an immediate and enormous impact on the fate of defendants nationwide. Despite the widely acknowledged problems with providing adequate representation in the years since…
Continue ReadingThe Most-Cited Articles from the Minnesota Law Review
By Fred R. Shapiro. Full text here.
Continue ReadingStanding on the Shoulders of Giants: Celebrating 100 Volumes of the Minnesota Law Review
Foreward by Rajin S. Olson, available here.
Continue ReadingNote: You Should Be Free To Talk the Talk and Walk the Walk: Applying Riley v. California to Smart Activity Trackers
By Katharine Saphner. Full text here. In 2014, the Supreme Court held in Riley v. California that law enforcement officers must obtain a warrant before searching a cell phone. Though the Court intended that this holding would provide clear guidance to law enforcement officers, it may ultimately provide even more confusion. Riley distinguishes an arrestee’s…
Continue ReadingNote: Live Long and Prosper: How the Persistent and Increasing Popularity of Fan Fiction Requires a New Solution in Copyright Law
By Brittany Johnson. Full text here. For decades, fans have written stories that extend the plotlines of popular films, novels, and television shows in a practice known as fan fiction. But with the advent of the Internet, the popularity of this practice has grown exponentially as these stories are easily posted online and accessible for free.…
Continue ReadingNote: The Shoe Doesn’t Fit: General Jurisdiction Should Follow Corporate Structure
By Seungwon Chung. Full text here. Increasingly, corporations are moving away from a centralized corporate structure toward decentralization and fragmentation of corporate functions. At the same time, the corporate general jurisdiction doctrine functions anachronistically—assuming that corporations exist solely as centralized structures. The Supreme Court’s recent decision in Daimler AG v. Bauman reflects this assumption. By drawing…
Continue ReadingThe Secret History of the Bluebook
By Fred R. Shapiro & Julie Graves Krishnaswami. Full text here. The Bluebook, or A Uniform System of Citation as it was formerly titled, has long been a significant component of American legal culture. The standard account of the origins of the Bluebook, deriving directly from statements made by longtime Harvard Law School Dean and…
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