Author Archive | Eugene Volokh

Cathy Seipp properly criticizes an anti-SAT piece in the L.A. Times. I’m not an expert on the SAT, but to the best of my knowlege the Times op-ed has still more problems. Just for starters, Considering GPAs instead of SATs risks favoring students who go to schools where there’s a great deal of grade inflation. […]

One of InstaPundit’s readers complains to the Washington Post about one of their articles: In addition to the selective inaccurate quoting, the Post’s copy editors didn’t catch the Copy Editing 101 glitch in the piece. A policy can’t be “too unilateral.” It’s either unilateral or it’s not. There are no degrees of unilateral, just as […]

Who said that? Well, the executive director of the ACLU, Anthony Romero: “While much of the Patriot Act is neutral legislation for civil liberties, it contains about a dozen provisions that simply go too far,” Romero added. “These dangerous provisions increase the chances that innocent Americans will be swept into terrorism investigations by removing traditional […]

An article in Sunday’s L.A. Times Calendar section (seems to be unavailable unless you’re a subscriber) reports on a new documentary about Julius and Ethel Rosenberg (“an exceptional documentary, short-listed for this year’s Academy Award, a compelling emotional narrative laced with explosive political material”), who were convicted in the 1950s of spying for the Soviets, […]

A reader writes: Say an employer/business owner — who happens to be an Orthodox Christian — interviews a prospective female employee for a job opening. During the interview she let’s it be known that she is a married mother with young children and is planning on putting them into day care if she gets the […]

Bush just appointed Judge Pickering to the Fifth Circuit, though he had been blocked in the Senate before. I’m surprised, though, that they’d lead with Pickering — why not Miguel Estrada, who seems like he’d be politically more appealing? Is he coming down the pike? Or would some nominees not be even willing to consider […]

in the Sixth Circuit, since a 500-foot circle seems to contain “750,000 sq. feet.” Such a circle actually contains pi x 500 x 500 = about 785,000 sq. feet, assuming the polling place is a dimensionless point, and a bit more for polling places that have length and width themselves (if the polling place, for […]

The Cincinnati Post reports: Common Pleas Court Judge Richard Niehaus . . . suggested this may be one of the last obscenity cases of its kind if U.S. Supreme Court rulings are considered. In an Alabama case, a woman was arrested and charged with pandering obscenity for selling “marital aids” and sex toys. Although it […]

According to a British newspaper, A PREACHER who spoke out against the “sin” of homosexuality — inflaming a Bournemouth crowd and sparking a furore over freedom of speech — was rightly convicted of a public order offence, top judges have ruled. . . . The late Mr Hammond, a preacher for 20 years, was prosecuted […]

I’m pleased to report that the Volokh Conspiracy has apparently become the federal judiciary’s go-to location for song lyrics, or at least lyrics to certain federal-judiciary-related songs. See this recent court decision. (Thanks to How Appealing for the pointer.)

A New York appellate court has just upheld — against an Establishment Clause challenge — an employment contract under which a public school district provided up to three paid days for an employee’s religious observance, apparently for any “Sabbath or other holy day” observed as a “requirement” of an employee’s religion. The case is In […]

I just found out that we were apparently finalists for Week magazine’s Blogger of the Year award, together with Mickey Kaus, Joshua Micah Marshall, Gawker, and Winds of Change; the winner was Marshall. I’m very pleased.

A California assembly committee just rejected proposed AB 600, which would among other things “prohibit any local, state, or other public agency from imposing or implementing a land use regulation in a manner that imposes a substantial burden on the religious exercise of a person” — which included “communal worship, religious meetings, religious education, and […]

George Lane, one of the plaintiffs in a state sovereign immunity vs. disabled rights law case that the Supreme Court just heard, has often been described as quite sympathetic and deserving of empathy. And surely there’s something to that; but, on the other hand, as reader Robert Schwartz points out, there are other things that […]

From the New York Times: He said he was fired by ABC in 2002 after two seasons as a commentator on “Monday Night Football” when the network had a chance to hire John Madden. Mr. Miller’s reviews had been mixed. He said he enjoyed being a sports commentator and had no ill will toward ABC. […]