The Faculty Lounge

No, The House Impeachment Proceeding Is Not Unconstitutional

As I explain today in The American Prospect:

The Conservative Legal Community Is Grasping at Straws to Defend Donald Trump

by Steven Lubet

November 11, 2019

The defense of Donald Trump has taken some strange turns lately, as allies and supporters have constantly had to change their positions—sometimes in a matter of days or hours—in order to justify the president’s shifting moods and explanations. Perhaps the greatest contortion, however, has come from an unexpected source.

Steven Calabresi, the highly respected constitutional law scholar—and my colleague at the Northwestern University Pritzker Law School—recently published an essay claiming that the House of Representatives’ impeachment proceedings are “violating the president’s constitutional rights” to “confront the witnesses against him” in a “speedy and public trial.” To reach this conclusion, Calabresi has to misapply the unambiguous provisions of the Sixth Amendment and completely ignore the equally plain terms of Article I’s definition of the impeachment power.

As a co-founder of the Federalist Society and the current chair of its board of directors, Calabresi ordinarily speaks with great authority on behalf of the conservative legal establishment, which makes this misstep all the more troubling. In the essay, Calabresi argues that “Impeachment is a legal proceeding, and just as criminal defendants have constitutional rights in criminal trials so too does Trump have constitutional rights, which House Democrats are denying him.” He then sets out the basic rights afforded to criminal defendants under the Sixth Amendment, and asserts that these rights have been denied to the president by the House of Representatives.

The opening words of the Sixth Amendment—“In all criminal prosecutions”—make it unmistakable that its provisions do not apply to impeachments, which are clearly noncriminal in nature. Impeachment by the House and conviction by the Senate cannot result in imprisonment, fine, or any other criminal penalty. Rather, the only allowable consequences are removal from office and disqualification from future office-holding.

Anita Bernstein to Receive 2020 William L. Prosser Award

Anita Bernstein, the Anita and Stuart Subotnick Professor of Law at Brooklyn Law School, has been named as the recipient of the 2020 AALS Section on Torts and Compensation Systems William L. Prosser Award.  The Prosser Award recognizes "outstanding contributions of law teachers in scholarship, teaching and service" and "a lifetime of truly outstanding contribution to the law of torts." Past recipients include Guido Calebresi (2011), Richard Posner (2012), Jane Stapleton (2013), James Henderson, Jr. (2014), Michael Green (2015), Aaron Twerski (2016),  Stephen Sugarman (2017), Marshall Shapo (2018), and Ken Simons (2019).

Professor Bernstein's law review articles include For and Against Marriage: A Revision, 102 Mich. L. Rev. 129 (2003); Treating Sexual Harassment with Respect, 111 Harv. L. Rev. 445 (1997); How to Make a New Tort: Three Paradoxes, 75 Tex. L. Rev. 1539 (1997); and Law, Culture and Harassment, 142 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1227 (1994). Her most recent book, The Common Law Inside the Female Body (Cambridge University Press 2018), will be the subject of two forthcoming symposia: one in the Northwestern Law Review Online and one in the Boston College Law Review E. Supp.

Congratulations, Professor Bernstein!

CFP: AALS Section on Commercial and Consumer Law

Commercial Law in the Digital Age

 

Program Description:

 

Emerged and emerging technological developments have created the potential for commercial transactions that may not be adequately addressed by existing commercial laws. Such innovations include distributed ledger technologies like the blockchain, new forms of digital assets like cryptocurrencies, and dynamic electronic transactions like those involving smart contracts and e-debt. 

 

Admittedly some areas of law might already have sufficient flexibility and need only be modified in order to accommodate these new transactions, while others may need significant changes or a complete overhaul. Smart contracts involving the sale and lease of goods may require changes to Articles 2 and 2A of the Uniform Commercial Code. New ways of processing payments and transferring value raise the possible need to fill gaps in Articles 4 and 4A. The use of digital assets, including cryptoassets, in secured lending entail changes to Article 9. Additionally, the increasing prevalence of electronic promissory notes likely requires a reimagining of the largely paper-based Article 3 system. For some or all of these, changes to federal law might also be required.

 

        The Section on Commercial and Consumer Law seeks to promote a careful and creative exploration of these and related issues at the 2020 AALS Annual Meeting during its program panel titled Commercial Law in the Digital Age. 

 

Call for Papers:

 

        The Section invites the submission of abstracts or full papers dealing broadly with issues related to commercial/consumer law and technology, payment systems, the sale and lease of goods, electronic transactions, e-commerce, and commercial transactions using distributed ledger technologies and smart contracts. There is no formal paper requirement associated with participation on the panel, but preference will be given to those submissions that demonstrate novel scholarly insights that have been substantially developed. Untenured scholars in particular are encouraged to submit their work. Please email your submissions to Chris Odinet at [email protected] by Friday, August 16, 2019. The selection results will be announced in early September 2019. In additional to the confirmed speakers below, the Section anticipates selecting two to three papers from the call.

 

Confirmed Speakers:

Neil B. Cohen, Jeffrey D. Forchelli Professor of Law, Brooklyn Law School

Carla L. Reyes, Assistant Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Law, Technology & Innovation, Michigan State University College of Law

Amy J. Schmitz, Elwood L. Thomas Missouri Endowed Professor of Law, University of Missouri School of Law

 

Eligibility:

    Per AALS rules, only full-time faculty members of AALS member law schools are eligible to submit a paper/abstract to Section calls for papers. Faculty at fee-paid law schools, foreign faculty, adjunct and visiting faculty (without a full-time position at an AALS member law school), graduate students, fellows, and non-law school faculty are not eligible to submit.

 

All panelists, including speakers selected from this Call for Papers, are responsible for paying their own annual meeting registration fee and travel expenses.

CFP: AALS Section on Nonprofit and Philanthropy Law 2020 Annual Meeting

The AALS Section on Nonprofit and Philanthropy Law announces a call for papers to be presented as works-in-progress in our committee session at the 2020 AALS Annual Meeting in Washington DC from January 2-5, 2020. The panel will be held on Sunday, January 5^th, 2020 from 10:30-12:00.

The Section seeks submissions on a variety of topics and methodological approaches related to Nonprofit and Philanthropy Law. We are especially interested in receiving submissions from new and junior academics or scholars who have not previously written in the field.

Eligibility: Scholars teaching at AALS member or nonmember fee-paid schools

Due Date: Friday, August 24, 2019

Form and Content of Submission: Submissions may range from early drafts to articles that have been submitted for publication, but not articles that will have already been published by January 6, 2020.

Submission Method: please submit papers electronically in Microsoft Word format to [email protected] "AALS Nonprofit and Philanthropy Law Submission" in the email subject line.

Submission Review: Papers will be selected for inclusion in the program after review by members of the AALS Nonprofit and Philanthropy Law.

Additional Information: Unfortunately, the section is not able to provide any funding to presenters, who will be responsible for their own expenses. If you have any questions, please contact Melanie Leslie at [email protected].

 

AALS Reminder: Philly Law School Reception Tonight

It's not in the printed AALS program but if you're at the conference today, the law schools of Drexel, Penn, Temple and Villanova are co-hosting a Philadelphia Area Law Schools Reception tonight from 6 to 7:30 pm.  Join us in the Newberry Room, 3rd floor of the Hilton, for some Philly-style bites and post-holiday cheer.

AALS Alert: Philly Area Law Schools Reception In New Orleans

This one's for all of you who'll be at the AALS conference next month.  Put this must-do on your calendar:

The law schools of Drexel, Penn, Temple and Villanova are co-hosting a Philadelphia Area Law Schools Reception Friday night, January 4, from 6 to 7:30 pm.  Join us in the Newberry Room, 3rd floor of the Hilton, for some Philly-style bites (guaranteed to be every bit as good as the Étouffée you'd find in Center City Philadelphia), drinks and good conversation.  Think of the convenience of one-stop-shopping - no need to schmooze door to door when you can do it all right there in the Newberry Room.  

 

Before the JD: New AALS Study on Why Students Do or Don't Choose Law

The AALS has just released a study of 22,000 undergraduates and 2800 1L's in its effort to better understand what leads people to choose (or not choose) to pursue a JD.   Karen Sloan at the National Law Journal reports on the study.  Here is some of the juicy stuff:

Half of the undergraduates considering law school have at least one parent with an advanced degree, despite the fact that only 12 percent of people between 45 and 65 nationwide have such a degree. Put another way, applicants from economically privileged backgrounds comprise a disproportionate of the law school applicant pool.

Undergraduates who are interested in an advanced degree report seeing more information on campus about master’s degree, Ph.D.s and Masters in Business degree than about law school, and say their college professors talked about those programs more than a J.D.

The overall cost of a law degree and poor work-life balance were the reasons cited most often by undergraduates for potentially not going to law school, and the three-year length of J.D. programs was another common deterrent.

Location was the most important criterion for choosing a school, according to the first-year students. But the other criteria shifted according to Law School Admission Test scores. Those with scores of 165 or higher were more concerned with the status and prestige of campuses, while respondents with lower scores weight bar pass rates and overall costs more heavily.

Law school comes on the radar of many students quite early. More than half of law students begin thinking about law school before they get to college, and a third consider it even before high school.

Hiring Announcement: St Thomas University School of Law

ST. THOMAS UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW seeks to fill entry-level tenure-track or, lateral tenure-track,-position(s) beginning in Fall 2019 in the areas of: Contracts, Business Associations, Tax Law, Criminal Law & Procedure, Evidence, Health Law, Tax Clinic, Academic Support and Bar Prep. Other doctrinal areas may be considered depending on the institutional needs. All applicants must have a strong academic record and be committed to outstanding teaching, scholarship and service. Prior teaching experience preferred.

St. Thomas University School of Law trains lawyers capable of applying legal principles to address and solve problems in an increasingly complex and changing society. The rigorous academic program of the Law School emphasizes lifelong learning and scholarship in a personalized, caring environment under Catholic auspices with a diverse student body and faculty. To this end, the Law School remains committed in teaching, scholarship, and service, to fostering a public order of human dignity, to training lawyers sensitive to the needs of the region’s underrepresented communities, and to expanding access to professional opportunities which includes active partnerships with business, government and the South Florida community.

St. Thomas encourages applications from all candidates, including women and minorities, who will contribute to our stimulating and diverse cultural and intellectual environment.
The Faculty Recruitment Committee will review applications on a rolling basis, and anticipate attending the AALS Faculty Recruitment Conference in October 2018. Applicants should send a cover letter indicating teaching and scholarly interests, a curriculum vitae to Professor Mark Wolff, Chair Faculty Recruitment Committee at St. Thomas University School of Law, 16401 NW 37th Avenue, Miami Gardens, FL 33054 or email [email protected].

AALS CFP: New Voices in Legislation

This just in:

The AALS Section on Legislation & Law of the Political Process is pleased to announce that it will host a “New Voices in Legislation” program during the 2019 AALS Annual Meeting in New Orleans, LA. This works-in-progress program will bring together junior and senior scholars in the field of legislation for the purpose of providing the junior scholars with feedback and guidance on their draft articles. Scholars whose papers are selected will present their work in small panel sessions. A senior scholar will moderate each panel and lead discussion about the draft article.

Eligibility: The New Voices Program will be open to full-time faculty members from AALS member schools who are untenured or have been tenured for two years or less. All scholars, whether or not presenting a paper or moderating a discussion, are welcome to attend the program and participate in discussions.

Submission Requirements: Submissions should be drafts of articles relating to legislation and the law of the political process, including articles related to legislative structure, the legislative process, the budget process, statutory interpretation, and deliberation. Submissions should be near completion and should not exceed 30,000 words, including footnotes. The purpose of the program is to provide junior scholars with feedback that can be incorporated into their works-in-progress; as a result, articles are ineligible for the program if they are expected to be in print at the time of the program in January 2019. However, articles that already have been submitted to journals for publication, and accepted for publication, are not ineligible for this reason.

Submission Process: To be considered for participation in the program, please email a copy of the paper and abstract to Anthony O’Rourke, [email protected], by Sunday, October 1, 2018. Selected participants will be notified in early November 2018. Final drafts of those who are selected must be submitted by December 15, 2018.

Senior Scholars: If you are interested is serving as a commentator for one of the junior papers, please contact Anthony O’Rourke, [email protected]

Call for Papers—Judicial Diversity in Transnational Courts — AALS 2019 New Orleans

 The AALS Sections on European and African Law invites submissions of paper proposals for the upcoming panel, “Judicial Diversity in Transnational Courts,” which will take place at the 2019 AALS Annual Meeting (New Orleans, January 2-6 2019). Submissions from junior scholars are encouraged. Confirmed speakers include Laurence Burgorgue-Larsen, Professor at the Sorbonne Law School at the University Paris I; Josephine Jarpa Dawuni, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Howard University; Sally J. Kenney, Newcomb College Endowed Chair Professor, Tulane University; and Iyiola Solanke, Professor of Law, Leeds University, UK. The proceeds of the panel will be published as a special issue of the Connecticut Journal of International Law.

Program Summary: Why do so few women and people of color serve on transnational courts and tribunals? Given the paucity of seats available to each nation on the international bench, it should be easy for states to nominate, vote, or appoint them in greater numbers. Yet, despite a series of initiatives to increase gender parity, women, particularly women of color, continue to be conspicuously underrepresented on these courts. Why does it matter? There is now an extensive body of scholarship discussing the reasons why domestic judiciaries might strive for more diversity, including increased legitimacy, dispelling stereotypes, higher quality decision-making and outcomes, and internal institutional change. Are there additional, specific benefits to greater judicial diversity to be expected at the transnational level? Convening leading scholars in the fields of equality law and transnational courts, this panel will address these questions with a special focus on European and African regional courts. 

Submission guidelines:

• To be considered, submit a title and abstract (300 words maximum) to Mathilde Cohen ([email protected]) and Fernanda Nicola ([email protected]) by August 15, 2018.
• Paper drafts will be due on December 15, 2018 to be circulated among panel participants. Final papers will be due on March 1 and should be between 7,000 and 8,500 words.

AALS CFP: Corruption and Legitimation

This just in:

The Anthropology & Law and Law & Social Science Sections invite paper proposals for a joint panel on “Corruption and Legitimation,” to be held at the 2019 meeting of the American Association of Law Schools (New Orleans, January 2-6, 2019). How does government corruption work and what effects does it have? Equally importantly, what constitutes corruption in any given society, and how do we recognize corruption’s inverse, legitimation? The panel seeks to address these questions from a range of methodological and disciplinary perspectives.

We welcome proposals for papers that discuss, among other topics, local perceptions of government action; the conditions for its validity in particular places; debates in legal, scholarly, or popular work about what constitutes corruption; as well as research analyzing recognized corruption and its effects. We hope this panel will lead to a stimulating discussion about both the corruption in government and the malleability of the very concept of corruption.

Confirmed speakers include:

Mary Fan, University of Washington
Eugene Mazo, University of Baltimore
Christopher Robertson, University of Arizona
Mary Szto, Valparaiso University 

We will select the remaining panelists through this call for papers.

Please send an abstract (around 500 words) outlining the paper that you’d like to present by May 1, 2018, to Anya Bernstein ([email protected]) and David Kwok ([email protected]).

 

The Role of Evidence in Social Science

There is no law school in the U.S. (nor, I would venture, in the U.K.) where the curriculum fails to address the importance of social science to law practice. Regrettably, social scientists do not always understand that the lessons can also run in the other direction, especially when it comes to the marshaling of facts. This became apparent to me when I read a review of my recent book, Interrogating Ethnography, on the British website Social Science Space.  The reviewer, a consulting sociologist named Robert Dingwall, panned the book, which of course happens to every author.  But he also missed the entire point of the subtitle – Why Evidence Matters – which I fear may tell us something more troubling about the practice of sociology.

Dingwall, who is co-editor of the SAGE Handbook of Research Management, is highly skeptical of documentary fact-checking, which he considers a “second-best method.” Yes, documentation has its limitations. But so do human informants, witnesses, and interview subjects, whose statements, as lawyers well know, are predictably affected by poor memory, self-interest, skewed perspective, implicit biases, the desire to please, and sometimes outright prejudice or deception. Dingwall may believe that ethnographers can effectively weed through all that, but the best of them – for example, Matthew Desmond, Mary Pattillo, Terry Williams, Kathryn Edin, and, again, Mitchell Duneier – realize that documentary fact-checking is an essential tool for social scientists.  Interrogating Ethnography therefore illustrated various means of fact-checking ethnographies, with results that ranged from disproof to solid verification.

This brings us to the heart of Dingwall’s review, which is his defense of Alice Goffman’s On the Run. I had no plans to revisit these issues – having already said my piece – but Dingwall’s argument presents a good opportunity to elucidate the role of factual accuracy in social science.

AALS CFP: Structural Facilitation Of Property Markets

This just in:  

The Section on Property Law is pleased to announce a Call for Papers from which at least
one presenter will be selected as a panelist for the Section’s program to be held during the AALS
2018 Annual Meeting in San Diego on Thursday, January 4, 2018 from 10:30 a.m. to 12:15 p.m.

Topic Description:

A variety of legal doctrines, systems, and institutions have emerged
over time to facilitate the effective operation of markets in property by adding
value to property assets, adding certainty to and streamlining the process of
property transactions, adding accessibility to property, or otherwise proving
greater security for property rights. At other times, informal norms may
emerge to accomplish similar aims.

These structural facilitators are, indeed, sometimes features of the
property system itself (component parts of its governance) and at other times
operate outside but ancillary to the system. Some of these arise spontaneously
by market demands while other elements of the property law infrastructure
may or may not be possible only by means of government intervention in the
markets.

Some facilitators are deliberately designed to benefit the property
system, while others simply have that effect. Some are arguably designed to
enlarge “freedom” while others could be described as restricting “freedom” in
order to save it, i.e. intentionally placing limits on autonomy to enhance the
value of the property rights that remain.

Examples of such facilitators that may be discussed by the panelists
include: information systems like recording regimes or registries; traceability
mechanisms like blockchain technology; content limits like the numerus
clausus principle; fairness, equality, and anti-discrimination principles geared
toward enlarging property ownership markets; prohibitions on certain
restraints on alienation; or at other time restraints on alienation like with
fraudulent conveyancing doctrines. Land use and public law systems
themselves create a legal infrastructure designed to facilitate property
ownership or to manage property conflicts. Other examples of facilitating
industries or polices could include: big data; financial markets; banks and real
estate financing; brokers; title and other insurance; and tax preferences,
among others.

AALS CFP: Legal Implications of Social and Political Activism in Sports

This just in:

AALS Section on Law and Sports Co-sponsored by the AALS Section on Contracts

When QB Colin Kaepernick kneeled during the national anthem at NFL games during the 2016 football season, he quickly became a symbol of a renewed era of athlete activism, triggering collegiate and professional athlete activists across the country to join demonstrations and sparking national conversations about racism and police brutality. But athlete activism is much broader, extending to philanthropic work such as NFL wide receiver Brandon Marshall’s efforts to spread mental health awareness and Lebron James’ funding of college scholarships for inner-city youth. Professional athletes’ willingness to take public stands on political and social issues is reflected and reinforced by sports entities’ social responsibility initiatives. For example, the NCAA relocated men’s basketball championship games out of North Carolina in response to a state law that curbed anti-discrimination protections for transgender people. Most sports leagues and governing bodies regularly participate in socially responsible causes.

In short, the sports industry has adapted the tenets of corporate social responsibility to fit its uniquely visible profile and serve its communities. Consequently, a constant stream of information can be found in news reports that showcase league, team and player efforts to make sports healthier and safer at all levels, improve literacy, create and fill jobs, address gender and racial inequalities, fight disease and poverty, prevent substantive abuse, address domestic violence, and clean up the environment. However, in staking out positions on political, social, and health questions, sports industry participants face legal ramifications and risk.

This program examines both public and private law issues that arise whenever individuals and organizations among the complex network of relationships that define the sports industry try to make socially responsible choices or engage in social or political activism. For example, public expression from professional athletes may be circumscribed by their collective bargaining agreements and league/team personal conduct codes. Morality clauses in endorsement contracts may be triggered by an athlete’s statements or actions. The ability of leagues to implement their social responsibility programs is heavily affected by the buy-in of their constituent teams. Athletes and other sports entities may require reverse morality clauses to ensure their rights to disassociate from corporate relationships when company conduct leads to public opprobrium. First Amendment considerations must be reconciled with contractual obligations.

The program will include a speaker selected from this Call for Papers. The selected author will participate in the Section’s annual program on Thursday, January 4, 2017 from 10:30 a.m.-12:15 p.m. in San Diego, California. Only full-time faculty from AALS member institutions are eligible to submit papers. Authors must rely on their own institutions for funding to attend the conference.

The Journal of Legal Aspects of Sports will consider proposals submitted in response to this Call for Papers for inclusion in a Special Issue on Athlete Activism and Sports Industry Social Responsibility scheduled for publication in August 2018 and guest edited by Professors Arthur Miller (NYU Law) and Jodi Balsam (Brooklyn Law).

The deadline to submit a draft paper or abstract is Monday, August 21, 2017. Please e-mail your submission to Professor Ettie Ward, Chair of the Section on Law and Sports, at [email protected] Members of the Section’s Executive Committee will review submissions and communicate decisions by late September 2017.

Charlottesville, the Jim Crow South, and the Nazis

Brent Staples op-ed that links the Jim Crow South to the Nazis from last May is making the rounds again today, for obvious reasons.  One of the things Staples does is mention Jim Whitman's important new book, Hitler's American Model.  I posted a little bit about this last June, which I want to repost now:

James Whitman's fabulous new book Hitler's American Model explores the Nazis' use of American precedents on race laws.  There's a lot to say about it; I'd like to focus here on the fact that Whitman's book is much, much more about how Nazis thought about the US than about what the law in the US was, or whether there was some causation or "transplantation" from the southern US states to the Nazis.  The Nazis were plenty capable of coming up with vicious race laws all by themselves -- but this is largely the story of how Nazi lawyers interpreted and spoke about the US' history of conquering Native Americans and then segregating African Americans.  (There was, of course, criticism by the Nazis of the breakdown of the strict line separating the races in the US.)  If this had been written in the 1950s, at the height of the myth and symbol school of American studies, it would have been called something like "The image of southern US law in the Nazi legal mind."  Let me say to legal historians, you really need  to read this book, soon.  As I told a colleague this afternoon, this is the best book I've read in legal history in years, in large part I think because it seems so fresh.  I've read books that are deeper but none in recent years that seem so original and iconoclastic.

I've been obsessed with the Nazis of late (probably like a lot of readers).  Though I guess my interest in this goes back to the day as as a graduate student when I watched a bunch of Nazi era films at the Harvard film archives.  How, I continue to wonder, did the person who wrote and starred in Das Blaue Licht become a leading filmmaker for the Nazis?  I mean, my god, isn't that all about unjust persecution?  Did Leni Riefenstahl ever consider in her later years what her younger self (who wrote about the persecution of the witch) would have thought of the Nazis?  Maybe not.  I guess that's how self-delusion  works.

To return to my story, Whitman talks about a lot of things that are of interest to American legal historians, especially how the Nazis had a form of legal realism.  This will cause me to rewrite at least somewhat my essay on Karl Llewellyn's lost work against lynching.  But one of the more astonishing insights of many in Whitman's book is that Heinrich Krieger, who published a major study of the American race laws in 1936 also published an article, on Native Americans in the George Washington University Law Review in 1935.  Holy cow.  (And here I am thinking that the defense of the Confederacy and the constitutional vision of the pre-Civil War south in the Yale Law Journal in 1921 was bad).  To be fair, Krieger's article is really about how the Constitution does not quite cover the category of dependent citizenship that had been assigned to Native Americans.  If you didn't know Krieger was a Nazi lawyer, you wouldn't get that sense from this article, with maybe a few asides (such as a remark about the degeneration of Native Americans at 284).  Though there are some other places where he seems to doubt the wisdom of recognizing that Native Americans have the same rights as other citizens. (at 307-08.)  (And if you're interested in reading Krieger's book I've scanned it in here.)

I'm going to spend some time thinking all of this through, though I'm really slow at reading German these days, so this is going to be a long-term project for me.  What interests me most about this book is the legal theory and how American law looks through the eyes of the Nazis.  And how the Nazi perspective aligns -- or not -- with how we now think about the US' long history with race.  One comment stuck with me from Whitman -- that the Nazis complained that the Americans tried to hide some of their grosser race laws.

The image is of the Lee Statue in Charlottesville.

AALS CFP: Legal Competency at the Crossroads: Mental Disability & Family Law

This just in:

Co-Sponsored by the AALS Sections on Disability Law, Family and Juvenile Law, and Law, Medicine, and Health Care

Legal competency, the law’s recognition of an individual’s personhood and agency, represents a conceptual cornerstone for law and mental disability scholars. The success of the disability rights movements in fostering greater public support for economic and social rights for people with mental disabilities has generated, at least rhetorically, broader support for the law’s recognition of the decisional capacity of people with mental disabilities in these areas. The scope of scholarly inquiry has expanded in recent years from curbing state encroachment in private decision-making to crafting positive theories of rights for people with mental disabilities in sexuality, reproduction, marriage, and parenting.

This panel seeks to bring together legal scholars across several fields to explore emerging theory and doctrine in family law for people with mental disabilities. With its emphasis on intersectionality and cross-pollination, panelists will discuss such issues as assisted reproductive technology, parental termination, and sexual access. An explicit goal of this panel is to develop a research agenda for this emerging interdisciplinary area of legal scholarship. The Family Court Review, an interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed journal, has agreed to publish the program proceedings. For more information on publication guidelines and recent issues, see http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/%28ISSN%291744-1617;jsessionid=0F04F41C5579A8C616CC83AA114B131F.d03t04.

We encourage academics at all levels and from a broad range of backgrounds including but not limited to law and mental disability, disability rights, health law, and particularly family law to submit proposals for consideration. Please e-mail your abstract to Jasmine E. Harris at [email protected] by Wednesday, August 23rd.

AALS CFP: Keeping Up With The Changing Face Of The American Family

This just in:

Keeping Up with the Changing Face of the American Family

The AALS Sections on Family and Juvenile Law, Children and the Law, and Aging and the Law are pleased to announce a call for papers from which two to four presenters will be selected for the section’s program at the AALS 2018 Annual Meeting in San Diego, California. We will have a joint, half-day program with two consecutive panels. The date and time of the joint program is Friday, January 5, 2018 from 9 am - 12 noon. The two panels will be divided based on general topics, such as caregiving, family formation and regulation, family dissolution, or structural legal policy impacting children, parents, the elderly or families as a whole.

Here is an overview of the panel subject matter:

The composition and structure of the American family has changed significantly in the last 65 years. From the decline of marriage and fertility to the increase in blended families, interracial relationships, and single parenthood, the face of the family is visibly different. The legalization of same sex marriage, the rise in the number of working women and fathers who share in household and childcare responsibilities, and the growing number of aging family members who need daily care has also impacted how families function. In some ways federal and state family laws precipitated these changes and opened the door for the new trends, but in other ways the law has been mired down in tradition, making it more difficult for the modern family to operate. This panel explores the ways in which family law and other related laws lie behind the curve in areas such as reproduction, custody, companionship, and caretaking. Panelists will also examine the various consequences of this gap between law and the realities of families today, as well as consider ideas and current efforts being made to close the divide.

We ask that submissions fall generally or specifically under the above topics. The papers will be published in a 2018 symposium volume of Family Law Quarterly, the scholarly journal of the American Bar Association Section on Family Law. If you are interested in submitting your paper for consideration, please send it to [email protected] by August 21, 2017. Please use “AALS Call for Papers Submission” as the subject line of your email. We are particularly interested in submissions from junior faculty. Papers should be no longer than 11,000 words and no more than 100 footnotes. Papers that have been accepted for publication are not eligible for consideration because panelists will be publishing their papers in the Family Law Quarterly.

A committee appointed by the section chairs will review the submitted papers and notify the authors of the selected papers by September 25, 2017. All panelists, including the panelists selected from this call for papers, are responsible for paying their own annual meeting registration fee and travel expenses. If you have any questions about the call for papers or the Family Law Quarterly symposium, please contact Jessica Weaver.

AALS CFP: Professional Responsibility 2018 Works In Progress

This just in:

AALS Section on Professional Responsibility Call for Papers – 2018 AALS Annual Meeting  

The AALS Section on Professional Responsibility invites papers for its program “Professional Responsibility 2018 Works in Progress Workshop” at the AALS Annual Meeting in San Diego. Two papers will be selected from those submitted.  

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION:  

This workshop will be an opportunity to test ideas, work out issues in drafts and interrogate a paper prior to submission. It will pair each work in progress scholar with a more senior scholar in the field who will lead a discussion of the piece and provide feedback. Successful papers should engage with scholarly literature and make a meaningful original contribution to the field or professional responsibility or legal ethics.  

ELIGIBILITY:  

Full-time faculty members of AALS member law schools are eligible to submit papers. Preference will be given to junior scholars focusing their work in the area of professional responsibility and legal ethics. Pursuant to AALS rules, faculty at fee-paid law schools, foreign faculty, adjunct and visiting faculty (without a full-time position at an AALS member law school), graduate students, fellows, and non-law school faculty are not eligible to submit. Please note that all faculty members presenting at the program are responsible for paying their own annual meeting registration fee and travel expenses.  

PAPER SUBMISSION PROCEDURE:  

Two papers will be selected by the Section’s Executive Committee for presentation at the AALS annual meeting.  

There is no formal requirement as to the form or length of proposals. However, the presenter is expected to have a draft for commentators one month prior to the beginning of the AALS conference.  

The paper MUST be a work in progress and cannot be published at the time of presentation. It may, however have been accepted for publication and be forthcoming.  

DEADLINE:  

Please email submissions to Ben Edwards, Associate Professor, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, William S. Boyd School of Law, at [email protected] on or before September 30, 2017. The title of the email submission should read: “Submission – 2018 AALS Section on Professional Responsibility.” 

 

AALS CFP: New Voices In Legislation

This just in:

AALS Call for Papers: “New Voices in Legislation”

AALS 2018 Annual Meeting

The AALS Section on Legislation & Law of the Political Process is pleased to announce that it will host a “New Voices in Legislation” program during the 2018 AALS Annual Meeting in San Diego, CA. This works-in-progress program will bring together junior and senior scholars in the field of legislation for the purpose of providing the junior scholars with feedback and guidance on their draft articles. Scholars whose papers are selected will present their work in small panel sessions. A senior scholar will moderate each panel and lead discussion about the draft article.

Eligibility: The New Voices Program will be open to full-time faculty members from AALS member schools who are untenured or have been tenured for two years or less. All scholars, whether or not presenting a paper or moderating a discussion, are welcome to attend the program and participate in discussions.

Submission Requirements: Submissions should be drafts of articles relating to legislation and the law of the political process, including articles related to legislative structure, the legislative process, the budget process, statutory interpretation, and deliberation. Submissions should be near completion and should not exceed 30,000 words, including footnotes. The purpose of the program is to provide junior scholars with feedback that can be incorporated into their works-in-progress; as a result, articles are ineligible for the program if they are expected to be in print at the time of the program in January 2018. However, articles that already have been submitted to journals for publication, and accepted for publication, are not ineligible for this reason.

Submission Process: To be considered for participation in the program, please email a copy of the paper and abstract to Evan Zoldan, [email protected] by Sunday, October 1, 2017. Selected participants will be notified in early November 2017. Final drafts of those who are selected must be submitted by December 15, 2017.

Senior Scholars: If you are interested is serving as a commentator for one of the junior papers, please contact Evan Zoldan, [email protected]

CFP: AALS Section on Law & Religion Award for Excellence in Scholarship

The AALS Section on Law & Religion is once again soliciting papers for consideration for its annual Award for Excellence in Scholarship, to be given at the AALS Annual Meeting next January. All fellows at AALS Member Schools, as well as faculty members with ten years or less experience as faculty members, are eligible. The award is given annually to a paper either published or to be published by July 15 of this year, that has made an outstanding scholarly contribution to the field of law and religion.

Any faculty member at an AALS member school can nominate up to one paper for the award. Nominations should be sent directly to Professor Haider Ala Hamoudi ([email protected]) as Chair of the Prize Committee. Nominations must be received by August 15.

Haider Ala Hamoudi, Chair, Prize Committee
Professor Of Law
Associate Dean For Academic Affairs
University Of Pittsburgh School Of Law
(412) 624-1055
[email protected]

Robin Fretwell Wilson, Chair, Law & Religion Section
Roger and Stephany Joslin Professor of Law
University of Illinois College of Law
504 East Pennsylvania Avenue
Champaign, Illinois 61820
217.244.1227 (office)
[email protected]