With Romney just having gotten to 30% on InTrade, I thought you might want to practice saying “Y’all were nominating Romney” in Latin: Nominabamini Romney. UPDATE: This is what I get for carrying this around in my head for a long time and then typing it without thinking. What I meant was: either “Nominabamini, Romney”, […]
Archive | June, 2011
A Good Term for the Federal Circuit on Patent Law
Going into this Term, the Federal Circuit had a fairly unenviable record—virtually every one of its judgments under review had been reversed or vacated since January 2008. The sole exception, last Term’s Bilski v. Kappos, was nominally an affirmance, but because basically no one on the Court agreed with the Federal Circuit’s rationale, “it did […]
Statutory Rape Law Held Unconstitutionally Open to Selective Enforcement, As Applied to Sex Between Two Minors
The Ohio Supreme Court just held this yesterday in In re D.B.; it’s a very important decision, and since the court expressly rested its holding on its view of the U.S. Constitution, not of the Ohio Constitution (see footnote 2 for the reason), I think there’s a substantial chance — not a certainty, but a […]
Justice Scalia Questions Auer Deference
In a separate concurring opinion in Talk America v. Michigan Bell Telephone Co., Justice Scalia raises concerns about so-called “Auer deference,” under which Courts grant agencies Chevron-like deference to agency interpretations of their own regulations. It is comforting to know that I would reach the Court’s result even without Auer. For while I have in […]
Justice Scalia’s Sykes Dissent
Justice Scalia’s dissent in Sykes v. United States chastises his colleagues for continuing a futile effort to bring clarity to what constitutes a “violent felony” under the Armed Career Criminal Act. It begins: As the Court’s opinion acknowledges, this case is another in a series.” More specifically, it is an attempt to clarify, for the […]
No More New York Twins
It had to happen sooner or later, and today was the day. This morning the Supreme Court decided Sykes v. United States, the first case in which Justices Kagan and Sotomayor disagreed on the judgment. Beyond the disagreement of the Court’s newest justices, it also featured an interesting line-up. In Sykes the Court held that […]
OT01 Clerks Support Alison Nathan
Alison Nathan has been nominated for a judgeship on the Southern District of New York, and I was very impressed by this letter in support of her nomination signed by almost the entire complement of law clerks who clerked on the Supreme Court when Alison was clerking for Justice Stevens. Of particular interest, I believe […]
Debate on Libya and the War Powers Act
By David Kopel on June 9, 2011 12:56 am in Constitutional Law, Global Governance/World Government, International Human Rights Law, International Law, Russia
Featuring British NGO representative Leslie Vinjamuri (pro-intervention, sees no legal problem), American peace activist Robert Naiman (anti-intervention, considers the intervention unconstitutional), and me (pro-intervention, but opposed to Obama doing it in violation of the Constitution and the War Powers Act). On the RT (formerly, “Russia Today”) television program “Crosstalk.” 27 minutes.
Prof. Sonja West on the “My Ex-Girlfriend Killed Our Baby” Billboard Case
I asked Prof. Sonja West (University of Georgia) whether she had some thoughts on the case, because she had written two articles that relate to the question: The Story of Me: The Underprotection of Autobiographical Speech and The Story of Us: Resolving the Face-Off between Autobiographical Speech and Information Privacy. She was kind enough to […]
Public Employment and Private Messages
A reader asks: Is a sitting Congressman’s Twitter (or other social networking account) his or her own private property even when used for official communication? With respect to Rep. Weiner, he used his Twitter account for both personal and official communication. Could his tweets be a misappropriation of government resources? Obviously, if he had used […]
40 Out of 50 Indiana State Senators Sign Amicus Brief Supporting Right to Use Force to Resist Unlawful Police Entry
The brief supporting the petition for rehearing was filed in Barnes v. State, the decision Orin blogged about last month. The brief was also signed by 31 of the 100 Indiana House of Representatives members, but the overwhelming support in the Senate struck me as especially striking. The brief argues that the Indiana self-defense statute, […]
Mr. Herbert Spencer, call your office
Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal said today, in oral arguments before the Eleventh Circuit, that the individual mandate provisions of the health-care law “may violate the constitution of Ayn Rand, but they do not violate the Constitution of the United States”.
More on the Single-Subject Rule
Those who were interested in the guest posts on the subject last week by Profs. Rick Hasen and John Matsusaka might also be interested in this article by Prof. Michael Gilbert (U. Va.). The abstract: Empirical studies have examined the effects of law and politics on judicial decision-making, but many legal scholars are dissatisfied with […]
District Judge Reaffirms Decision Striking Down Ban on Corporate Contributions to Candidate Campaigns
I blogged about the original decision here, and about an earlier appellate court decision to the contrary here. After the original decision striking down the ban, the district asked for more briefing in light of a Supreme Court precedent that the parties and he hadn’t cited, but yesterday he reaffirmed his earlier decision; Prof. Rick […]
The Durbin Amendment and the Seizure of Sunk Capital
Interesting perspective by Jim DeLong in The American today on the underlying logic of the Durbin Amendment and its focus on incremental cost as the exclusion of costs for maintenance of the underlying network building and maintenance costs.