Jun

19

Unoriginal Thoughts on Appellate Procedure

Posted by: | June 19, 2011 | 6 Comments

Earlier this week, the Wisconsin Supreme Court issued its decision in State ex rel. Ozanne v. Fitzgerald and State ex rel. Huebsch v. Circuit Court for Dane County.  The decision has rightly generated a good bit of commentary about open government, separation of powers, etc.  My goal here is to clarify a very limited but [...]

Jun

19

Do Changes in Benefits for Public Employees Violate the Contracts Clause?

Posted by: | June 19, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Paul Secunda has a new paper on SSRN that considers under what circumstances statutory changes affecting public-employee benefits might violate constitutional restrictions on the impairment of contracts.  Paul particularly focuses on a very timely case study: Wisconsin’s recent budget-repair bill and its impact on city employees in Milwaukee.  Here is the abstract: The recent spate [...]

Jun

16

Defendant Can Raise Tenth-Amendment Challenge to Her Conviction, SCOTUS Rules

Posted by: | June 16, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Earlier today, in Bond v. United States (No. 09-1227), the Supreme Court ruled that the defendant should have been permitted to raise a Tenth-Amendment challenge to the chemical-weapons statute that she was convicted of violating.  In response to her indictment for violating 18 U.S.C. § 229, Bond had argued that the conduct with which she is [...]

Jun

16

Sentencing Judge May Not Lengthen Prison Term in Order to Promote Rehabilitation

Posted by: | June 16, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Earlier today, the United State Supreme Court ruled that federal judges may not impose or lengthen a defendant’s sentence in order to promote rehabilitation.  In Tapia v. United States (No. 10-5400), the district judge apparently selected a sentence at the very top of the recommended guidelines range in order to give Tapia time to complete the Bureau [...]

Jun

16

How My Legal Education Has Shaped My Perception of the World: Reflections After the Completion of My Second Year

Posted by: | June 16, 2011 | Leave a Comment

As the month is now halfway gone, I offer these thoughts in an attempt to fulfill my guest-blogging obligations and hopefully to hear how others feel their experience within legal academia has shaped their perception of the world.  To be completely honest, I have struggled to think of a topic to write about, but I [...]

Jun

16

“I Don’t Have to Take Any Time for This”

Posted by: | June 16, 2011 | Leave a Comment

The Supreme Court will once again address alleged Brady violations by the New Orleans District Attorney’s Office.  Earlier this week, the Court granted certiorari in Smith v. Cain (No. 10-8145), in which Smith alleges that the prosecutor suppressed a veritable boatload of exculpatory evidence in his murder trial.  I’ve only read the cert. petition, which obviously has a [...]

Jun

15

Levels of Transformativeness

Posted by: | June 15, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Brian Frye has an interesting post up over at Concurring Opinions on Friedman v. Guetta, a recent Central District of California copyright case involving an altered photograph of Run-D.M.C. Somewhat like Fairey v. AP, the issues on summary judgement included whether the original photograph was copyrightable and whether Guetta’s use of it was fair. (You [...]

Jun

15

Avoiding the “Every School Left Behind” Inevitability

Posted by: | June 15, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Maybe, in 2001, it seemed like 2014 was too far away to be worth much worry. In 2011, it’s not so far away. Not that it’s clear what is going to be done now about what was one of the more idealistic, well-intended, but ridiculous, notions ever put into federal law. In 2001, and with [...]

Jun

14

Kearney Recognized as “Lawyer of the Year”

Posted by: | June 14, 2011 | Leave a Comment

The Milwaukee Bar Association recognized our own Dean Joseph D. Kearney as “Lawyer of the Year” at its annual meeting earlier today.  In presenting the award, MBA President Michael J. Cohen particularly cited Kearney’s ambitious vision for Eckstein Hall and his leadership in bringing that vision to life.  Cohen noted that our new facility will [...]

Jun

14

Marquette Law Review Article Sparks Debate on Use of Dictionaries to Decide Legal Cases

Posted by: | June 14, 2011 | Leave a Comment

A recent article in the Marquette Law Review was featured in Adam Liptak’s “Sidebar” column for the New York Times earlier this week.  Liptak wrote about the increasingly common citation of dictionaries in Supreme Court opinions: A new study in The Marquette Law Review found that the justices had used dictionaries to define 295 words or [...]

Jun

13

Pension Concessions Request Puts MPS Union in an Unhappy Place

Posted by: | June 13, 2011 | 1 Comment

The Milwaukee Teachers’ Education Association, the union for Milwaukee Public Schools teachers, had two lines of defense against making  concessions as the financial squeeze on MPS tightened. The first was that, due to langauge in the bill backed by Gov. Scott Walker and Republican legislators, if the MTEA agreed to any changes in its contract, which [...]

Jun

11

Seventh Circuit Says Begay and Chambers Must Be Applied Retroactively

Posted by: | June 11, 2011 | 1 Comment

Retroactivity has been in the news a lot lately, thanks to the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s ongoing consideration of whether to give already-sentenced defendants the benefit of more favorable crack guidelines. But crack defendants are not the only inmates serving extraordinarily long terms based on recently discarded aspects of federal sentencing law.  Earlier this week, the Seventh [...]

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