CASE PREVIEW


By Noam Biale

on Oct 28, 2022
at 8:05 pm

On Tuesday, the justices will hear argument in Jones v. Hendrix, the latest in a string of cases that raise profound questions about the rights of prisoners who claim to be innocent to challenge their convictions. Last year, the court restricted the ability of state prisoners to develop new evidence to support claims that their attorneys failed to investigate leads that could have shown they were factually innocent. Jones involves a federal prisoner who is legally innocent – the conduct a jury found he committed isn’t a crime. But should that fact relieve him from his 27-year prison sentence? In the Supreme Court’s habeas corpus jurisprudence, the answer is never simple. Indeed, the case comes before the court as a three-way split: the petitioner, Marcus DeAngelo Jones, challenged his conviction in a federal habeas petition under 28

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By Ronald Richenburg

Today, Saturday, 11 December 2021, is an important anniversary that no longer receives the commemoration that it deserves, being the 90th anniversary of the Statute of Westminster 1931. [1]  This was an act of the United Kingdom Parliament in which, most importantly, it was explicitly stated that no future act would extend or be deemed to extend to any of what were then known as the British dominions other than at the request and with the consent of the dominion in question.  Most of the limitations on the legislative powers of the dominions themselves were also removed.

It was only by a long and complicated process of evolution that the dominions became fully independent states, and one of the most important landmarks in that process was the passage of the Statute of Westminster.  Yet it seems that outside the field of constitutional law the statute is little

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Professors Bertrall Ross and Micah Schwartzman ’05 of the University of Virginia School of Law have become members of the American Law Institute. The ALI announced its elections Friday.

There are now 34 members of the UVA Law faculty currently affiliated with the institute, which produces scholarly work meant to update or otherwise improve the law. The organization includes judges, lawyers and law professors from the US and around the world who are “selected on the basis of professional achievement and demonstrated interest in improving the law,” according to the institute’s website.

Ross, who joined the faculty in 2021, is the Justice Thurgood Marshall Distinguished Professor of Law. He teaches and writes in the areas of constitutional law, constitutional theory, election law, administrative law and statutory interpretation.

Ross’ research is driven by a concern about democratic responsiveness and accountability, as well as the inclusion of marginalized communities in administrative and

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By Meredith Capps

On Wednesday, October 12th, Paul Goldstein, the Stella W. and Ira S. Lillick Professor of Law at Stanford Law School and of counsel at Morrison & Foerster LLP, spoke at the International Association of Law Libraries Annual Course about legal approaches in the U.S. and abroad to copyright law governing “orphan works” (copyrightable works for which a rights-holder cannot be identified).  He began his talk by describing an instance in which he advised a non-profit entity hoping to digitize photographs taken of antiquities and make those photographs available online, when a diligent search to establish the origin of the works would be expensive, and potentially fruitless.  Though he advised the organization to take an intermediate approach, conducting a reasonable search but relying on the fair use doctrine to provide legal protection should an unknown rights holder raise a claim, the group ultimately decided not

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News

The American Law Institute Launches Restatement of the Law, Constitutional Torts

The American Law Institute Launches Restatement of the Law, Constitutional Torts

PHILADELPHIA — The American Law Institute’s Council voted today to approve the launch of the Restatement of the Law, Constitutional Torts. The project will be led by Reporters John C. Jeffries, Jr. of University of Virginia School of Law and Pamela S. Karlan of Stanford Law School.

The project will examine the law of 42 USC 1983, which provides an individual the right to sue state government employees and others acting “under color of state law” in the federal court for violations of federal law. Actions under 1983 are the dominant vehicle for securing money damages for federal rights, especially constitutional rights. The project also will cover Bivens[1] actions, the analogous cause of action for violations by a federal officer. Among other topics, the Restatement will cover governmental immunities from suit, local government liability for official policy

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Level Up Your Law Firm Billing Policy

While billing policy might not be the most exciting topic, it’s essential. After all, law firms need to be paid for their work at the end of the day!

If you haven’t already developed a billing policy at your law firm, now is the time to start. By documenting your law firm billing policy, you can save time, generate more revenue, and ensure all members of your team (and even clients!) understand the process.

Developing your law firm billing policy

While billing seems straightforward, unfortunately, there’s lots of risk for miscommunication which can lead to bottlenecks, unpaid bills, and wasted costs. For example, attorneys taking too long to approve bills or adding too many edits can cause a delay in bills getting sent out. Or, the accounting team may have to spend hours upon hours chasing clients for payment. Often,

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Today on our live Legaltech Week roundtable at 3 p.m. ET, we are joined by guest panelist David Horrigan, discovery counsel and legal education director at Relativity, for an advance look at RelativityFest, which convenes next week in Chicago.

David Horrigan

Our panel of legal tech journalists and bloggers will also discuss the week’s top stories in legal tech and legal innovation, including the NetDocuments acquisition of Worldox.

Attendance is free, but, if you have not already done so, you need to register, which you can do here. Register once and you are signed up for all future sessions.

Our lineup changes from week to week, but our regular panelists include:

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“People often say history repeats itself, but we allow history to repeat,” Commissioner Nury Turkel said in his conversation with Stephanie Barclay, a professor at the Notre Dame Law School, this Monday. In the talk, Turkel detailed the ongoing genocide against the Uyghur people in China.

Turkel, who was born in a Chinese “re-education” camp, is the first US educated Uyghur-American lawyer. He was appointed commissioner of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom in May 2020 by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. He also recently published a book — “No Escape: The True Story of China’s Genocide of the Uyghurs.”

Turkel began his remarks by describing the situation of the Uyghur people, who are a Muslim ethnic group native to the Xinjiang region in China.

“The Chinese government has locked up anywhere between 2 to 3 million Uyghurs in industrial secure concentration camps that the world has not

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The Decline of Natural Law:
How American Lawyers Once Used Natural Law and Why They Stopped

by stuart banner

oxford university press, 264 pages, $49.95


Dending on one’s perspective, natural law is either a dead letter or a pivotal issue. No contemporary lawyer or judge would cite natural law in a courtroom or judicial opinion. Few philosophers or theologians, on the other hand, would discuss moral law without highlighting natural law. That division has not always been so. Stuart Banner has done us a great service by charting the rise and fall of natural law in American jurisprudence alongside accompanying historical and cultural developments.

His thesis is simple: At the time of the American founding, natural law was an integral part of our social and legal culture and was regularly used by American lawyers, judges, and law professors through the mid-to late 1800s. After that time,

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“There is no dispute that the Pulitzer Board’s award to those media outlets was based on false and fabricated information that they published,” he blustered. “The continuing publication and recognition of the Prizes on the Board’s website is a distortion of fact and a personal defamation that will result in the filing of litigation if the Board cannot be persuaded to do the right thing on its own.”

And this week he’s back, posting on his Dear Diary page:

The Russia, Russia, Russia hoax has been totally debunked. The fake news media covered it incorrectly—reporting exactly the opposite of what actually happened.

Yet, the Pulitzer Board has not rescinded the prizes they awarded for reporting that was inaccurate, inept, and corrupt.

In order to restore the credibility of the Pulitzer Prizes, the Pulitzer Board should take away prizes from all who got it wrong.

Additionally, it would be

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