Articles, Essays, & Tributes
Green Gatekeepers
By LUCA ENRIQUES, ALESSANDRO ROMANO, AND ANDREW F. TUCH. Full Text. Products are routinely labeled “carbon neutral,” “recycled,” “biodegradable,” “ocean-friendly,” and “sustainable.” Bonds are marketed as “green” and mutual funds as “ESG,” while firms may pledge to become “net zero.” But are statements concerning environmental qualities reliable? It is often hard for consumers and investors…
Reconceptualizing “Background Principles” in Takings Law
By TIMOTHY M. MULVANEY. Full Text. Both libertarians and progressives rejoiced in the result reached by the Supreme Court in the 2023 matter of Tyler v. Hennepin County. This Article asserts that such unified celebration has overshadowed the extent to which the Supreme Court’s reasoning calls into question even our most foundational assumptions about the…
Taxing Sugar Babies
By BRIDGET J. CRAWFORD. Full Text. How people talk about tax reflects both personal beliefs and larger cultural attitudes. In many cases, whether and how a potential taxpayer understands their activities in tax terms may also reveal attitudes about themselves and the value that society assigns to those activities. This Article examines how sugar daddies…
Not-So-Special Solicitude
By KATHERINE MIMS CROCKER. Full Text. In a high-profile 2023 case about state standing to sue in federal court, Justice Gorsuch deemed it “hard not to wonder why” the majority said “nothing about ‘special solicitude.’” The silence was indeed surprising, for in a landmark decision several years earlier, the Supreme Court had declared that states…
Notes
Definite Convictions: United States v. Alt and the Seventh Circuit’s Prohibition on Defining “Beyond a Reasonable Doubt”
By SAMUEL BUISMAN. Full Text. The Seventh Circuit prohibits judges and attorneys from defining “beyond a reasonable doubt” to jurors. While United States v. Alt crystalized this prohibition in early 2023, the circuit has effectively banned definition of the phrase for much longer. Yet, a growing consensus of psychological research into the standard reveals that…
As Punishment for Arrests: Involuntary Servitude Under the Housekeeping Exception to the Thirteenth Amendment
By ELISSA BOWLING. Full Text. The Thirteenth Amendment reads: “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” Yet, in contemporary American jails and prisons, pretrial detainees have been forced to perform…
May Contain Peanuts, Eggs, and a “Natural” Solution: How to Challenge Food Manufacturers’ Harmful Use of Precautionary Allergen Labels
By JJ MARK. Full Text. Food allergies are one of the most pressing health issues of our time. Around thirty-three million Americans currently have food allergies, thirteen million of which are severe or life-threatening. These numbers continue to increase at alarming rates, with an estimated one in thirteen children being diagnosed with food allergies every…
Headnotes
Defining Common and Individual Issues in Class Actions: What a Reasonable Jury Could Do
Defining Common and Individual Issues in Class Actions: What a Reasonable Jury Could Do By Aaron D. Van Oort and John L. Rockenbach Full essay here. The distinction between common and individual issues is the single most important concept in the modern class action, and…
The Supreme Court’s Opinion in SEC v. Jarkesy Has the Potential To Be Extremely Destructive
The Supreme Court’s Opinion in SEC v. Jarkesy Has the Potential To Be Extremely Destructive By Richard J. Pierce, Jr. Full essay here. In this essay, Professor Pierce describes the legal framework within which the Supreme Court decided whether an agency could adjudicate a class…
Substance over Symbolism: Do We Need Benefit Corporation Laws?
BY CHENG-CHI (KIRIN) CHANG. Full essay here. Benefit corporation laws have gained traction as mechanisms to integrate societal and environmental objectives into business operations, yet they are arguably superfluous within the existing legal framework. The prevailing belief that corporations must prioritize shareholder wealth above all…
A Great American Gun Myth: Race and the Naming of the “Saturday Night Special”
By Jennifer L. Behrens and Joseph Blocher. Full Text. At a time when Second Amendment doctrine has taken a strongly historical turn and gun rights advocates have increasingly argued that gun regulation itself is historically racist, it is especially important that historical claims about race…
Refining the Dangerousness Standard in Felon Disarmament
By Jamie G. McWilliam. Full Text. To some, 18 U.S.C. 922(g) is a necessary safeguard that keeps guns out of the hands of dangerous persons. To others, it strips classes of non-violent people of their natural and constitutional rights. This statute makes it a crime…
“Proven” Safety Regulations: Massachusetts 1805 Proving Law As Historical Analogue for Modern Gun Safety Laws
By Billy Clark. Full Text. Concerned by the public health threats posed by certain firearms, the Massachusetts legislature enacts a law to set safety standards for firearms in the Commonwealth. Firearm dealers across the State, including some of the leading manufacturers of the day, not…
Curbing Gun Violence Under PLCAA and Bruen: State Attorney General–Driven Solutions to the Surging Epidemic
By David Lamb. Full Text. At the same time that the deadly toll of gun violence continues to grow in the U.S., now taking nearly 50,000 lives per year, federal lawmakers and courts have increasingly constrained government authorities’ tools for fighting the epidemic. Pursuant to…
De Novo Blog
NO PLACE LIKE HOME . . . UNLESS YOU CAN’T GET IN: THE LACK OF NON-DELIVERY PROTECTIONS FOR MINNESOTA TENANTS
By Cheyenna González Pilsner, Volume 108 Staff Member On August 2, 2023, Identity, a new housing complex near the University of Minnesota, notified its tenants they would be unable to move in on the lease-given day of August 27, 2023, citing construction delays.[1] This notice…
MICHIGAN’S NEW POINT OF NO RETURN: EVOLVING AGE RESTRICTIONS ON MANDATORY LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE
By Chad Berryman, Volume 108 Staff Member In July 2022, the Michigan Supreme Court decided People v. Parks, in which it held that mandatory life without parole sentences for eighteen-year-olds convicted of first-degree murder violate the Michigan Constitution’s prohibition of cruel or unusual punishment.[1] This ruling…
GRISHAM FLEXES HER GUNS: HOW TO FIRE BACK AT STATE EXECUTIVE ACTION
By: Sam Black, Volume 108 Staff Member On Friday, September 8th, New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham issued an emergency order suspending the right to carry firearms in public across Albuquerque and the surrounding county for at least thirty days in response to a spate…
WHEN TOTAL DOESN’T MEAN COMPLETE: WHY COURTS SHOULD ADOPT THE STATE CREATED NEED THEORY
By: Dylan Schepers, Volume 107 Staff Member Introduction It was the black of midnight in mid-March 2020. Four police officers approached the front door of an apartment in Louisville Kentucky prepared to execute a drug-related search warrant.[1] Breonna Taylor and her boyfriend Kenneth Walker were…
STATE CONSTITUTIONAL A(MN)DMENTS: NOW IS THE TIME FOR THE MINNESOTA LEGISLATURE TO AMEND THE MINNESOTA CONSTITUTION WITH THE EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT
By: Evan Dale, Volume 107 Staff Member As the U.S. Supreme Court has retreated on its protection of individual rights,[1] state constitutions have taken on a renewed interest. This became as evident as ever in 2022. With the Supreme Court stripping the rights of women…
MIFPA WITHOUT ICWA: ASSESSING THE FATE OF THE MINNESOTA INDIAN FAMILY PRESERVATION ACT IF THE INDIAN CHILD WELFARE ACT IS OVERTURNED IN BRACKEEN v. HAALAND
By: Ryan Liston, Volume 107 Staff Member The United States and the colonies that predated it have a sordid past when it comes to the treatment of Indigenous people.[1] Among the countless examples of mistreatment, one particularly shameful practice was separating Indigenous children from their…
A TEST OF PRECEDENT, POLICY & HUMANITY: AN ANALYSIS OF FLORIDA’S PROPOSED EXPANSIONS TO STATE CAPITAL PUNISHMENT LAW
By: Adam Kolb, Volume 107 Staff Member The death penalty is primitive.[1] The death penalty is ineffective and garners increasing disapproval.[2] The death penalty—though constitutionally challenged and curtailed[3]—is legal in the United States.[4] Now, the extent of its legality is set to be tested yet…
THE CONFEDERATE STAKES OF AMERICAN LAW: THE PARTISAN RISK TO THE FULL FAITH AND CREDIT CLAUSE AND A CONSTITUTIONAL CRISIS IN THE MAKING
By: Jordan Boudreaux, Volume 107 Staff Member Article IV, Section 1 of the Constitution requires that “Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other state.”[1] Conceptually, the Full Faith and Credit Clause…
FREE SPEECH ON CAMPUS SIDEWALKS: SUPREME COURT MAY TAKE AIM AT FIRST AMENDMENT FORUM BALANCING TEST IN KEISTER
By: John M. Stack, Volume 107 Staff Member Keister v. Bell is the latest major case petitioned to the Supreme Court to confront classifying the status of a public forum for First Amendment purposes.[1] While the Court is unlikely to grant certiorari, if they do…
I (DON’T) KNOW IT WHEN I SEE IT: THE DANGERS OF DEEPFAKES
By: Ryken Kreps, Vol. 107 Staff Member[1] Deepfakes are images, videos, or audio clips created by artificial intelligence that show people doing whatever the deepfake creator wants to show them doing with eerie accuracy.[2] Part I of this Post discusses the background of deepfakes and…
