Overlawyered » animal rights

April 18 roundup

Walter Olson — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 04:05:17 +0000

“MPAA: you can infringe copyright just by embedding a video” [Timothy Lee, Ars Technica]
NYC: fee for court-appointed fire department race-bias monitor is rather steep [Reuters]
Larry Schonbron on VW class action [Washington Times] Watch out, world: “U.S. class action lawyers look abroad” [Reuters] Deborah LaFetra, “Non-injury class actions don’t belong in federal court” [PLF]
Will animal rights groups have to pay hefty legal bill after losing Ringling Bros. suit? [BLT]
You shouldn’t need a lobbyist to build a house [Mead, Yglesias]
“Astorino and Westchester Win Against Obama’s HUD” [Brennan, NRO] My two cents [City Journal] Why not abolish HUD? [Kaus]
“Community organized breaking and entering,” Chicago style [Kevin Funnell; earlier, NYC]

Tags: animal rights, bloggers and the law, Chicago, class action settlements, class actions, fair housing, land use and zoning, loser pays, mortgages, movies film and videos, NYC, real estate

April 18 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

April 9 roundup

Walter Olson — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 04:12:25 +0000

Forfeiture-happy customs agents bedevil family flying to Ethiopia [Volokh]
Lawmakers, ABA ex-bigs back campaign to grant law license to illegal alien [Miami Herald]
“NYT reports the FDA is stunned democracy requires they answer to elected political leaders as part of enacting laws” [@CraigBruney]
When did doghouses become a crime? [Alex Ballingall/Maclean's via @amyalkon]
Why Tennessee, famous for distilleries, used to have so few of them [Nashville City Paper via @radleybalko]
ESPN tells only one side of Title IX story [Eric McErlain, Daily Caller; Saving Sports]
Greece: “At the health department they were told that all the shareholders of the company would have to provide chest X-rays” [Mark Perry]

Tags: alcohol, animal rights, bar associations, FDA, forfeiture, immigration law, regulation and its reform, Tennessee, Title IX

April 9 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

April 3 roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 04:02:19 +0000

In time for Easter: egg prices soar in Europe under new hen-caging rules [AP]
For third time, the Environmental Protection Agency backtracks on claims of harm from gas “fracking” [Adler; U. Texas study on drinking water safety, CBS Dallas] Yes, there’s a plaintiff’s lawyer angle [David Oliver] Don Elliott, former EPA general counsel, on why his old agency needs cutting [Atlantic] Blow out your candles, coal industry, and so good-bye [Pat Michaels/Cato, Shikha Dalmia]
Following the mad logic wherever it leads: “State Legislators Propose Mandatory Drug Testing of Judges and Other State Officials” [ABA Journal]
Proposal: henceforth no law may run to greater length than Rep. Conyers’s copy of Playboy [Mark Steyn]
Creative American lawyers: “Carnival cruise ship briefly seized in Texas” [AP]
“Overlawyered” is the title of a new commentary in The New Yorker, not related to a certain website [Kelefa Sanneh]
Repressive Connecticut “cyber-harassment” bill [Volokh, Greenfield, Popehat] And now, not to be outdone, Arizona… [Volokh]

Tags: agriculture and farming, animal rights, Arizona, bullying, Connecticut, cruise ships, Environmental Protection Agency, harassment law, illegal drugs, oil industry

April 3 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Free speech roundup

Walter Olson — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 04:16:34 +0000

Keeping prosecutors busy? Georgia lawmaker files bill that would make Internet defamation a crime [Fulton County Daily Report]
Sarkozy calls for law banning visits to pro-terror websites [Ken Paulson, First Amendment Center]
“Ron Paul Campaign Drops Effort To Identify Anonymous Videographer” [Paul Alan Levy]
Playboy caused how many divorces? Junk science in the service of big-government conservatism [Andrew Stuttaford, NRO] How Santorum’s plans to get porn off internet go beyond GWB’s [Josh Barro] Contra Santorum, “arrival of Internet was associated with reduction in rape incidence” [Steve Chapman]
“Brian Deer and the British Medical Journal File An Anti-SLAPP Motion Against Andrew Wakefield” [Popehat]
Iowa passes law penalizing animal rightsers who spy on farms [Reuters, earlier] Illinois turns thumbs down on “ag-gag” proposal [Steve Chapman]
“What’s happened to free speech in Britain?” [Alex Massie, John O'Sullivan/NRO, earlier here and others]

Tags: animal rights, France, free speech, Iowa, libel slander and defamation, online speech, Ron Paul, terrorism, United Kingdom

Free speech roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

February 9 roundup

Walter Olson — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 05:07:43 +0000

Ninth Circuit panel strikes down California’s Prop 8 [Volokh, Kerr, Magliocca, Lithwick, Steve Chapman]
Judge dismisses PETA “killer whales enslaved” case [Caroline May/Daily Caller, CNN, earlier]
“Patent Troll Claims Ownership of Interactive Web – And Might Win” [Joe Mullin/Wired, earlier; more on testimony by Web father Tim Berners-Lee] Update: Ding Dong! Jury rejects claim;
“Further Analysis of the Bottle-Rocket Case” [Lowering the Bar, earlier]
As patients suffer: “The War Over Prescription Painkillers,” start of a Radley Balko series [HuffPo parts one, two so far]
Richard Epstein on federal fiat and Yale disciplinary procedure [Defining Ideas] Under new-style rules at Yale, will a professor even be aware he’s been accused and henceforth is to be “monitored”? [KC Johnson]
Jim Copland testimony on abuses in government contingent-fee litigation [Manhattan Institute, PDF] “Parens patriae” proposal to replace class actions with state attorney general suits, but with private entrepreneurial bar still in saddle [Adam Zimmerman/Prawfs on Myriam Gilles/Gary Friedman, SSRN]

Tags: animal rights, attorneys general, class actions, colleges and universities, Ninth Circuit, patent trolls, pharmaceuticals, same-sex marriage, Yale

February 9 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

January 6 roundup

Walter Olson — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 12:04:01 +0000

Senate takes a bathroom break for five minutes, and Obama uses recess appointments to install unconfirmable nominees. Legal? [Roger Pilon via National Right To Work, Richard Epstein, Mark Calabria, Adler link roundup]. What the New York Times thought back then about recess appointments; what it thinks now.
Pepsi defense: our bottling would have dissolved that dead mouse into something jelly-like [Althouse, MC Record via AW]
Federal panel proposes slashing definitional thresholds so as to enable diagnosing of hundreds of thousands of new child lead poisoning cases [AP]
“Appeals Court Rules Husband Can Be Charged Criminally For Reading Wife’s Email” [Doug Mataconis, Outside the Beltway]
Its original goals accomplished, Voting Rights Act “preclearance” lurches on. SCOTUS should review [Cato amicus brief by Ilya Shapiro and Anna Mackin, further]
“‘Karma’ Facebook post leads to criminal charges” [Fox Tampa via Balko]
As senator, Santorum sought extensive new federal powers to regulate pet dealing, scaring many animal rescue groups [NCRAOA, PDF]

Tags: animal rights, Barack Obama, lead paint, Voting Rights Act

January 6 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

By reader acclaim: “PETA Sues SeaWorld for ‘Enslaving’ Killer Whales”

Walter Olson — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 15:07:58 +0000

“People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is accusing the SeaWorld parks of keeping five star-performer whales in conditions that violate the 13th Amendment ban on slavery. SeaWorld depicted the suit as baseless.” The action may further an “ongoing, intense debate at America’s law schools over expansion of animal rights.” [AP; related on that academic background, including the role of star lawprofs like Cass Sunstein and Larry Tribe, here, here, here, and here]

Tags: animal rights, law schools, Schools for Misrule

By reader acclaim: “PETA Sues SeaWorld for ‘Enslaving’ Killer Whales” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

September 29 roundup

Walter Olson — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 05:57:37 +0000

ABA, NFIB protest NLRB “persuader” disclosure regulations [ABA Journal, Schwartz, earlier] Might regs place replacement workers’ home addresses in hands of unions? [Labor Union Report, Boyle, Daily Caller]
Swiss animal welfare law is catalyst for founding of guinea pig matchmaking service [Spiegel/Cowen]
“Jail time for overdue library books” [Lowering the Bar]
Busybody lawprof (at a different law school) continues to sue Catholic U. demanding coed dorms [WSJ Law Blog, Mystal/AtL]
So does air pollution cause childhood asthma, as the American Lung Association claims in its ads? [Hayward] “Obama’s Smog Standard Capitulation Enrages Environmentalists” [AW]
A look inside the Shell Nigeria Alien Tort cases [Goldhaber, AmLaw]
In the mail: Garner’s Dictionary of Legal Usage (Bryan Garner)

Tags: Alien Tort Claims Act, animal rights, colleges and universities, labor unions, Switzerland

September 29 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Pet shop banners

Walter Olson — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 12:10:15 +0000

The San Francisco board of supervisors will consider a measure that would ban the sale of all pets in the city [L.A. Times, Outdoor Life, Telegraph (U.K.)] (& welcome Above the Law readers)

Tags: animal rights, San Francisco

Pet shop banners is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Banning hidden farm videos?

Walter Olson — Thu, 12 May 2011 19:10:55 +0000

Lawmakers in at least three states have proposed new laws criminalizing the taking of photos on farms without permission of the owner — and sometimes going much further than that, too. The idea is to stop animal-welfare activists from compiling unauthorized footage of allegedly inhumane conditions. I comment on that — and on some related photography and farm issues — at Cato at Liberty.

Tags: agriculture and farming, animal rights, photography, privacy

Banning hidden farm videos? is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system