Militaries are increasingly targeting “dual-use objects”—objects that serve both civilian and military purposes. Drawing on an original dataset of the U.S. military’s airstrike reports and ground reporting in Iraq and Syria, this Article illustrates how targeting such "dual-use objects" has undermined critical legal protections for civilians.
For incarcerated plaintiffs, meaningful discovery is essential to proving and exposing wrongdoing in prison. Yet prison discovery is broken. This Article explores the extensive written and unwritten barriers to evidence gathering in prison, and, through a 200-case study, reveals courts’ central role in both perpetuating—and potentially resolving—this crisis.
This Feature argues that constitutionally unenumerated yet nonetheless fundamental rights require judicial protection, but only from unequal infringements. Because these infringements often result from nondiscriminatory motives, particularly the desire for benefits without cost, current law doesn’t provide protection. This Feature explores a novel proposal for judicial protection for these rights.
Freight railroading today is profitable but fails workers, consumers, and communities in serious ways. This Note argues that both the railroad industry’s financial success and its operational shortcomings are legacies of deregulation in the 1970s and 1980s and considers alternatives, some old and some new.
This Note uncovers the history of how the Brigham Young University Police Department blurred the boundaries between criminal law and church doctrine. These practices included sting operations that used students as undercover agents to target morals offenses. Such tactics illustrate the risks of religiously affiliated policing as it spreads nationwide.
This Essay argues that when Justice Department officials order subordinate lawyers to consider inappropriate partisan goals in making charging decisions, prosecutors must prioritize their fiduciary obligation to seek justice on behalf of the public. It further elaborates how courts and Congress can support them in this choice.
This Essay examines the rise of originalism and textualism within the Supreme Court’s intellectual-property jurisprudence. Due to its intense dynamism, intellectual-property law exposes the failures of these methods, which detach law from social reality and human goals, and highlights the need for an alternative jurisprudence of purpose.
The prospect of productively leveraging litigation loss should not insulate decisions about whether and how to litigate from scrutiny. Examining contemporary LGBTQ litigation, this Essay shows how winning through losing, which is contingent on factors advocates assess before litigating, only makes sense within a less juriscentric and more multidimensional approach.
Rulemaking agencies have always faced the risk of getting sued. But they have not traditionally faced the risk of getting sued for failing to discuss their risk of getting sued. They do now, thanks to Ohio v. EPA. This Essay traces that decision’s odd origins and troubling implications.
This Essay examines the overlooked long-term costs generated by restricted charitable gifts to the government. It reveals that gift compliance disputes are surprisingly frequent and costly to litigate. The authors propose that governments adopt gift acceptance policies that subject donor-imposed restrictions to rigorous review, public comment, and formal approval.
From 1919 to 1969, the Offices of the Legislative Counsel in the Senate and House drafted precedential opinions to advise lawmakers on constitutional and subconstitutional questions. This Article lifts the curtain on this institution, revealing a hidden system that worked to reify congressional power and stymie a rising juristocracy.
This Collection critically examines legal issues in the U.S. territories and explores pathways for reform. These four Essays challenge the emerging “Law of the Territories” framework, document the ABA’s discrimination against territorial lawyers, address reproductive and economic injustices rooted in colonialism, and analyze Congress’s historical role in territorial taxation.
This Collection explores how to better protect workers against the harms of an expanding gig economy and an increasingly automated workplace. It offers three distinct and interconnected perspectives on the legal, regulatory, and policy interventions that could empower workers to navigate the shifting landscape with flexibility, security, and dignity.
In this Exchange, Daniel S. Harawa and Michael R. Ulrich examine the implications of United States v. Rahimi for the future of Second Amendment rights. Together, these pieces reveal how Rahimi exposes deep tensions and inconsistencies within the Roberts Court’s Second Amendment jurisprudence.