Articles, Essays, & Tributes
Bankruptcy as a National Security Risk
By JASON JIA-XI WU. Full Text. Defense contractors lie at the heart of the U.S. national security regime. Each year, over half of the federal defense budget is allocated to contracts outsourcing military operations, projects, and services to private companies. However, defense outsourcing carries a ticking time bomb: mounting private debt. Today, the defense industry…
The Innocence Trap
By CAITLIN GLASS & JULIAN GREEN. Full Text. What makes a conviction wrongful? Developments in DNA science have led to a wave of exonerations over the past thirty years, revealing sources of error in the criminal legal process. Innocence organizations proliferated to represent people whose convictions could be overturned by newly discovered evidence. This is…
Regulatory History and Judicial Review
By TODD PHILLIPS & ANTHONY MOFFA. Full Text. The Administrative Procedure Act (APA) requires federal agencies to simply “incorporate in the rules adopted a concise general statement of their basis and purpose” after they receive comments from the public, and the Supreme Court ruled in Overton Park that courts are to adjudicate whether rules are…
The Crisis in U.S. Cancer Care: Law, Markets, and Privatization
By DANIEL G. AARON. Full Text. Cancer is surging among youth and young adults in the United States, yet, instead of public regulation addressing its root causes, we have outsourced the management of cancer to the private sector. A suite of laws, embodying faith that corporations will cure cancer, has subsidized the cancer biomedical enterprise…
The Poly Problem in Zoning: Redefining “Family” for a Changing Society
By ARIC SHORT & TANYA PIERCE. Full Text. Single-family zoning has long dictated not only where people may live but also with whom. Although extensively critiqued for perpetuating racial and economic exclusion, these laws also privilege relationships defined by blood, marriage, or adoption and marginalize nontraditional families. This Article focuses on a particularly overlooked group:…
Notes
Waging the Battle for Society’s Soul: The Constitutionality of Juvenile Transfer Legislation in the Wake of Jones v. Mississippi
By LOGAN KNUTSON. Full Text. Trying juvenile defendants as adults is a cruel, yet enduring practice in U.S. criminal law. If convicted, these youthful offenders face brutal conditions in adult prison and a lifelong stigma. Although these devastating consequences of conviction are readily apparent, juvenile transfer is insidious even absent a prison sentence or criminal…
The Skidmore Compromise: Interpreting Skidmore as a Tiebreaker to Preserve Judicial Wisdom in the Era of Loper Bright
By MITCHELL ZAIC. Full Text. ‘Law must be stable, and yet it cannot stand still.’ Here is the great antinomy confronting us at every turn. Rest and motion, unrelieved and unchecked, are equally destructive. The law, like human kind, if life is to continue, must find some path of compromise. – Judge Cardozo In the…
Headnotes
Volume 110: Fall Issue
Exceptional Cases
By EMILY CAUBLE. Full Text.
Machine Gun Funk: The Unusual Analysis of “Dangerous and Unusual”
By GREGORY S. PARKS & VIVIAN BOLEN. Full Text.
Nipping it in the Bud: The Promise and Perils of Tort Litigation in Addressing the Health Harms of High-THC Products
By REBEKAH NINAN. Full Text.
Volume 108: Symposium Supplement
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
From “Let Us Pray” to “Let Us Reconsider”
FROM “LET US PRAY” TO “LET US RECONSIDER”: THE FOURTH CIRCUIT GRANTS EN BANC REVIEW IN LUND V. ROWAN COUNTY By: Rachel Leitschuck, Volume 101 Staff Member “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . .…
Minnesota Supreme Court Elections
MINNESOTA SUPREME COURT ELECTIONS: CONSIDERING CONCERNS AND CRITICISMS By: Sara Lewenstein, Volume 101 Staff Member On, Tuesday, August 9, 2016, 173,884 voters turned out for primary elections in Minnesota.[1] In some districts, the only item on the ballot was a statewide election for a seat…
It Takes Turner
IT TAKES TURNER: HOW STORIES SHAPE US By: Maisie Baldwin, Volume 101 Staff Member Anyone who’s been on any form of social media since early 2015 has likely read Brock Turner’s name. His name has come up in a variety of contexts: evidence of the…
Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt
WHOLE WOMAN’S HEALTH V. HELLERSTEDT: A REAFFIRMATION OF REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS By: Payton George, Volume 101 Staff Member On June 27, 2016, the Supreme Court issued its ruling in the case of Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt.[1] In an opinion heralded by pro-choice supporters,[2] Justice Breyer,…
Does Mother Nature Get a Vote?
DOES MOTHER NATURE GET A VOTE? OUR NEXT PRESIDENT COULD IMPACT AMERICA’S INVOLVEMENT IN THE PARIS AGREEMENT ON CLIMATE CHANGE By: Taylor Mayhall, Volume 101 Staff Member Last December, representatives from 195 countries assembled in Paris to converse about a subject which they all felt…
Dan’s Flaw
DAN’S [F]LAW: STATUTORY FAILURE TO ENFORCE ETHICAL BEHAVIOR IN CLINICAL DRUG TRIALS By: Noah Lewellen,* Volume 99 Articles Submission Editor I. INTRODUCTION Paul, a sophomore at the University of Minnesota, bursts into a lecture hall, loudly claims to see monsters sitting in the seats, and…
Case Comment: Bhogaita v. Altamonte
EVERY DOG CAN HAVE HIS DAY IN COURT: THE USE OF ANIMALS AS DEMONSTRATIVE EXHIBITS By: Kyle R. Kroll, Volume 100 Online Managing Editor In Bhogaita v. Altamonte, the Eleventh Circuit recently decided whether to allow a dog in the courtroom as a demonstrative exhibit.[1]…
Revisiting Water Bankruptcy
REVISITING WATER BANKRUPTCY IN CALIFORNIA’S FOURTH YEAR OF DROUGHT By Olivia Moe, Volume 100Managing Editor This spring, as “extreme” to “exceptional” drought stretched across most of California—indicating that a four-year streak of drought was not about to resolve itself[1]—Governor Jerry Brown issued an unprecedented order…
Defying Auer Deference
DEFYING AUER DEFERENCE: SKIDMORE AS A SOLUTION TO CONSERVATIVE CONCERNS IN PEREZ v. MORTGAGE BANKERS ASSOCIATION By: Nicholas R. Bednar, Volume 100 Lead Articles Editor* On March 9, 2015, the Supreme Court of the United States handed down its decision in Perez v. Mortgage Bankers…
Patent Reform Primer
WHAT’S UNDER THE BRIDGE? A PATENT REFORM PRIMER By Ann E. Motl, Volume 99 Online Managing Editor Just a few years after passing the most sweeping changes in patent law since 1952, Congress is considering patent reform again.[1] Whereas the America Invents Act of 2011…
