As a former co-counsel for Cory Maye, back in 2006 when I helped on his case when it was still in the trial court, I am delighted to report that today the Mississippi Supreme Court ruled that Maye is entitled to a new trial because of errors in the jury instructions on the defense-of-others defense. […]
Archive | 2010
Law Professors With Ph.D.s Versus Those Without Ph.D.s: Which Group Has More Scholarly Impact?
Someone should write a student note comparing the productivity and scholarly impact of entry-level law professors who have Ph.D.s with those who do not. Pick your measure of productivity and scholarly impact — citations, number of articles, etc. — and then run the numbers for the law professors who have been teaching for 10 years […]
Brief in Opposition (Plus An Amicus Brief on Our Side) in My Non-Unanimous Criminal Jury Case
An update for those people who have been interested in my certiorari petition in Herrera v. Oregon (the one that argues that the Jury Trial Clause, as incorporated against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment, should be read to require jury unanimity for a conviction in state court): A. The Oregon Attorney General’s office has […]
Geof Bradfield — A Jazz Musician Deserving of Wider Recognition
I’m always on the look-out for new jazz musicians, and one discovery I’ve made in the last two years has been a relatively obscure Chicago-based tenor player, Geof Bradfield. He reminds me a bit of Chris Potter, but he’s even more fluid and quick than Potter and has lots of ideas. He’s a real joy […]
How Do We Know What is An “Activity” for Commerce Clause Purposes?
I appreciate Ilya’s post below on the meaning of “activity” in Commerce Clause jurisprudence, and I wanted to add two brief observations: 1) If I understand Ilya’s argument, he begins with an assumption as to how much power Congress has, and he then reasons backwards to infer the meaning of “activity” in order to make […]
Truth on the Market Blog Symposium on Behavioral Law and Economics
This should be a good one: Truth on the Market is doing a blog symposium on behavioral law and economics next week (Dec. 6-7). Really outstanding lineup and a really timely subject.
Why Going Without Health Insurance Isn’t an “Activity”
Current US Supreme Court Commerce Clause precedent holds that Congress can regulate almost any “economic activity” and most “noneconomic activities” as well. The Obamacare individual mandate, however, seems to regulate inactivity – notpurchasing a product. Both Judge Steeh in the Thomas More Law Center decision and Judge Moon in the recent Liberty University ruling argue […]
“Hans Rosling’s 200 Countries, 200 Years, 4 Minutes — The Joy of Stats — BBC Four”
A statistical visualization of world health and wealth over the last two centuries. Thanks to Prof. Daniel Shapiro for the pointer. [UPDATE: Sorry, accidentally left out the link at first; just fixed it.]
Civility in Public Discourse
Peter Wehner has a very good essay on civility as a political virtue over at Commentary’s Contentions blog. An excerpt: The argument is sometimes made, directly or obliquely, that civility is merely a guise, the first step toward bipartisan compromises that betray conservative principles. And at times there is something to this critique. Civility has […]
Judge Reinhardt’s Order Denying the Motion That Asked Him to Recuse Himself
Judge Reinhardt has issued an order denying the motion that asked him to recuse himself; the order promises a longer explanation to come. For the text, see the update to my original post. If you’d like to comment, please comment on the original post.
Federalist Society Faculty Conference and Student Conference
The Federalist Society has announced the details of two conferences of interest: First, the annual Faculty Conference, aka the shadow conference that occurs along with the AALS conference every January; and second, the annual Student Conference, which will be held this year at UVA Law School on February 25th and 26 on the subject of […]
Maybe There’s Hope After All
While waiting in the airport yesterday morning flying back from Florida I looked over and saw a man intensely reading the Constitution (the Cato version). The text was already highlighted in several places and he was now underlining other passages. Turns out that it was new Congressman-elect Allen West of Florida. I’ve occasionally seen politicians […]
Happy Chanukah!
Today is the first day of the holiday. Below is this year’s big Chanukah Youtube hit.
Motion Asking Judge Reinhardt to Recuse Himself from the Prop. 8 Case
[UPDATE: See below for Judge Reinhardt’s preliminary response.] Orin blogged yesterday about the suggestion that Judge Reinhardt recuse himself from the Prop. 8 case, so I thought it would be helpful to post the just-filed motion that makes such a request. Here’s the Statement from the start of the motion (with most citations omitted), which […]
Six Types of Libertarian Arguments Against Government Action
Economist Bryan Caplan has an interesting post outlining six types of libertarian arguments against government action – “six stages of libertarian denial,” as he calls it: Libertarians set themselves apart from other political thinkers by habitually denying that government should do things. Denial is therefore at the heart of libertarian thought. Thanks to pop psychology, […]