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International law roundup

Walter Olson — Fri, 11 May 2012 12:41:52 +0000

U.N. rapporteur lectures U.S. on Indian rights, calls for “some form of land restoration” [IPSNews] “So, the UN Wants the U.S. to Return Land to Indian Tribes…” [Claudia Rosett] In Chapters 10 and 11 of Schools for Misrule, I discuss the growing cooperation between Indian land-claim activists in this country and international organizations both within and without of the U.N. system. (More: I expand theme into a Daily Caller piece).
“Union Uses NAFTA To Fight Alabama Immigration Law” [Sean Higgins, IBD]
“UN hunger expert investigates Canada” [Hillel Neuer, National Post]“Everyone’s grievances can thus be transformed into human rights violations” [Jacob Mchangama and Aaron Rhodes, Freedom Rights Project, PDF]
Admittedly, at a “lefty Quaker school in the Northeast”: “You know international law is getting some traction when your fourth-grader is being taught about the Convention on the Rights of the Child.” [Peter Spiro, OJ]
New Third Circuit opinion in remanded U.S. v. Bond case, which tested limits of treaty power, could tee up issue for another SCOTUS outing [Spiro/OJ, FedSoc Blog, Liberty and Law; earlier]
“Canada’s Much Better and Very Different Alien Tort Statute” [Ku/OJ]
Implementation of United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) could draw inspiration from U.S. experience with institutional reform lawsuits [Michael Perlin via Bagenstos]

Tags: alien, Canada, child, disabled rights, immigration law, Indian tribes, international human rights, international law

International law roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

International law roundup

Walter Olson — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 05:06:48 +0000

Supreme Court orders rebriefing in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum case, could address extent of permitted extraterritoriality in Alien Tort Statute [Kenneth Anderson/Volokh quoting John Bellinger, Point of Law featured discussion, Ilya Shapiro on Cato brief]
UN “food rights” official: trade, investment pacts should not go forward without “human rights impact assessments” [De Schutter; his paternalist food-policy agenda] UN panel reviews Canada’s record on race, lectures on need for more multiculturalism [OHCHR]
Courts still reluctant to restrain parents’ physical discipline of kids, but UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, for which ratification push is expected in the U.S. this year, could change that [Elizabeth Wilson, ConcurOp]
Golan v. Holder: “Copyright Case May Have Profound Effect on Treaty Power” [Ilya Shapiro, Jurist]
Web accessibility litigation spreads to UK [Disability Law, related on role of U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, earlier and background]
New tone under Ambassador Joseph Torsella: “Obama Comes Around on U.N. Reform” [Brett Schaefer, NRO]
Reviewing new John Fonte book Sovereignty or Submission, Temple lawprof Peter Spiro contends that trend toward transnational governance isn’t “reversible…. It’s mostly wishful thinking to suppose that we can stick to the vision of the Founders.” [OJ, earlier here, etc., and see chapters 11-12 of Schools for Misrule]
Dante’s Divine Comedy “offensive and should be banned,” per UN anti-discrimination consultancy [Telegraph]

Tags: Alien Tort Claims Act, children's rights, international human rights, international law, United Nations, web accessibility

International law roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

U.N. power grabs

Walter Olson — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 05:24:32 +0000

“On Feb. 27, a diplomatic process will begin in Geneva that could result in a new treaty giving the United Nations unprecedented powers over the Internet.” [Robert McDowell, WSJ] And: The United States and Canada are resisting French-backed plans to turn the low-profile U.N. Environmental Program into a “planetary super-agency,” in a conflict that could come to a head at a Rio conference this June. [AFP]

Tags: environment, France, international law, United Nations

U.N. power grabs is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

International law roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 05:13:07 +0000

More on John Fonte’s new book Sovereignty or Submission [FrontPage interview, W. James Antle III/Washington Times, Clifford May via Israpundit, earlier here and here] U.N. Human Rights Council finds much to criticize about U.S. rights record, including inadequate attention to rights of clean water and sanitation; State Department response to “universal periodic review”;
“The President Can’t Increase Congress’s Power Simply by Signing a Treaty” [Ilya Shapiro, Cato, on Supreme Court case of U.S. v. Bond]
Another “international norms vs. American sentencing practices” showdown headed to SCOTUS? [Hans Bader]
France, Turkey restrict talk of Armenian genocide in opposite ways, and both are wrong [Walter Russell Mead]
Transnational prosecutions on an inexorable upward arc? Depends on how you count them [Jeremy Rabkin, TAI]
International law pressed into use to remake family law and gender customs [Stephen Baskerville]
“Time to Fix the European Court of Human Rights?” [Julian Ku, Opinio Juris]
“We are fighting the caste system with capitalism”: open market in India helps Dalits [NY Times]

Tags: Europe, family law, France, India, international human rights, international law, Supreme Court, Turkey

International law roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Constitutional law roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 14:22:14 +0000

High court tees up case on ObamaCare constitutionality, potentially one of the most significant in decades [Ilya Shapiro, Cato]
“Andrew Sullivan Is Wrong About the Supreme Court and Guns” [Damon Root]
Trade groups’ advocacy: judge quashes Tillery subpoena as chilling to free association [Madison County Record]
Takings: “California’s Kafkaesque Rent Control Laws” [Richard Epstein] Things may be worse in China, though: “more than one attendee described Beijing as Kelo-on-steroids” [same]
No, the federal government can’t find authority to overstep its otherwise delimited powers by entering into treaties calling for it to do so [Shapiro]
Authors: U.S. Constitution is becoming less influential as model to foreign nations [Law/Versteeg via Zick, ConcurOp]
Fight between strip-search lawyers leaves little to imagination [Kerr]

Tags: constitutional law, eminent domain, First Amendment, guns, international law

Constitutional law roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

August 10 roundup

Walter Olson — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 05:34:24 +0000

Maine Supreme Court agrees that not having to show up in court might be reasonable accommodation for plaintiff claiming PTSD disability [Volokh]
Guess how much Richard Kreimer, the New Jersey homeless guy, has made in his many lawsuit settlements [Newark Star-Ledger, PoL]
Given the problems with business-method patents, you can see why banks would want to dodge them [Felix Salmon]
Contempt: “Calling the jailing of a person ‘civil’ doesn’t mean they put curtains on the cell windows.” [Greenfield]
“Class Counsel Request $90.8M In Fees In Black Farmers Case” [BLT]
Law school accreditation, recusal standards, international law among topics in new issue of Federalist Society’s ABA Watch;
Electricity-wise, EPA puts the squeeze on the juice [Andrew Grossman, Heritage; Weston Hicks, AgendaWise; Tatler]

Tags: banks, contempt, disabled rights, international law, Maine, patent law, recusals, Richard Kreimer

August 10 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Only unsophisticates fear international law. Right?

Walter Olson — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 18:19:34 +0000

Well, no, actually, wrong, as I explain in a new Cato post taking issue with left-of-center commentator Garrett Epps.

Tags: international human rights, international law

Only unsophisticates fear international law. Right? is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

July 18 roundup

Walter Olson — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 13:13:46 +0000

Per New Jersey court, overly sedentary home office job can result in valid worker’s comp claim [Courier-Post, NJLRA]
Trial bar’s AAJ denies it played “direct” role in backing “Hot Coffee” [WaPo, some background]
“Cop repeatedly harasses waitresses, never disciplined. Feds defend their civil rights by . . . suing the restaurant.” [Palm Beach Post via Radley Balko]
On “unauthorized practice of law” as protective moat around profession’s interests, Britain does things differently [Gillian Hadfield via Andrew Sullivan; related, Larry Ribstein] Forthcoming book by Robert Crandall et al urges lawyer deregulation [Brookings]
“The Treaty Clause Doesn’t Give Congress Unlimited Power” [Ilya Shapiro, Cato on Golan v. Holder case headed to Supreme Court]
The small bank regulatory shakedown blues [Kevin Funnell] Why is the Department of Justice including gag orders as part of its enforcement decrees against banks on race and lending? [Investors Business Daily via PoL] “Emigrant fights back against mortgage-discrimination suits” [Fisher, Forbes] Dodd-Frank squeezing out community banks [Funnell]
“North Carolina to Seize Speeding Cars That Fail to Pull Over” [The Newspaper] “With what, a tractor beam?” [James Taranto]

Tags: AAJ, banks, constitutional law, harassment law, hot coffee, international law, mortgages, New Jersey, North Carolina, traffic laws, workers' compensation

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

Push for “national human rights institution” in U.S.

Walter Olson — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 14:04:20 +0000

James P. Kelly III offers some reasons for skepticism [Federalist Society Engage; note especially discussion of "economic rights" on pp. 64 et seq.] And from the “when we say it, it’s alarmism” file: “The Regulatory Turn in International Law” [Jacob Katz Cogan, HILJ/Opinio Juris]

Tags: international human rights, international law

Push for “national human rights institution” in U.S. is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

International human rights law roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 13:52:21 +0000

Recent clips on a subject treated in much more detail in Schools for Misrule:

Claim: Wisconsin Gov. Walker’s reforms to public sector labor law violate international human rights [HRW, Mirer/Cohn, FoxBusiness (views of Marquette lawprof Paul Secunda)] Related: UAW threatens charges against automakers [ShopFloor]
Per some advocates, “right to health” has emerged as an “established international legal precept” even if it is “still to be fully embraced in the United States” [Friedman/Adashi, JAMA]
GWB at risk of arrest if he visits Europe? Or are some of his enemies just posturing? “Bush trip to Switzerland called off amid threats of protests, legal action” [Atlantic Wire, WaPo, Daily Dish and more, Frum Forum, more and yet more]
Oh, good grief: Tennessee solon “proposes law to make following Shariah law a felony” [Tennesseean] More states prepare to join unsound “ban all recogition of international law” movement [Ku, OJ] Background: Volokh.
For those interested in the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples recently given a favorable nod by the Obama administration, a copy of the text is available here [CWB]
“Conceptualizing Accountability in International Law and Institutions” [Anderson, OJ]
Human rights initiative in UK: “Rapists and killers demand right to benefits” [Telegraph] European Court of Human Rights, Human Rights Acts “merely pretexts for judicial activism, argues Alasdair Palmer” [Telegraph]
Claim: U.S. is odd-country-out in international law. Reality check please [Bradford, Posner et al, OJ]
Opponents charge trying Pennsylvania 13 year old for murder as adult could violate international law [AI]

Tags: George W. Bush, Indian tribes, international human rights, international law, labor unions, medical, Tennessee, United Nations, Wisconsin

International human rights law roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system