- Colorado solon’s lawsuit claims direct voter initiatives are unconstitutional. Nice try but no go [Ilya Shapiro]
- Gail Heriot and Alison Somin on creative interpretations of the Thirteenth Amendment [Fed Soc]
- Ted Olson’s work on punitive damages provides clue to his approach on originalism [Mike Rappaport]
- Yes, Prof. Seidman, there is an Origination Clause [Shapiro, my related take]
- Justice Roberts and legislative deference [PoL]
- Easterbrook, Barnett and others: video of panel on federalism and federal power [Fed Soc] Constitutional law treatise available free online through Library of Congress [Volokh] New Podcast: Who violates the constitution–statutes or individuals? [Nick Rosenkranz, PoL]
- National Endowment for the Arts uses creative misreading to conjure up a constitutional charter for its existence [Roger Pilon/Cato]
Archive for 2013
Update: “Albino Rhino” beer brand withdrawn following human rights complaint
“Earls Restaurants will take beer sold under the 25-year-old brand off the menu after a Vancouver woman with albinism filed a BC Human Rights Tribunal complaint against the chain in 2012. The same craft beer will still be sold, but just as ‘Rhino.'” [Emily Jackson, MetroNews, Canada; earlier]
P.S. Frances Zacher at Abnormal Use on other beer-naming controversies.
Want your annual meeting to go off with no trouble? Pay up
The Economist on an unplanned (at least one hopes it was unplanned) effect of Dodd-Frank:
THE Dodd-Frank law of 2010 requires a “say-on-pay” vote for shareholders of American companies. Clever lawyers scent a payday for themselves.
One law firm in particular, Faruqi & Faruqi, has filed a series of class-action suits demanding more information about how companies decide what to pay their senior executives. It seeks to prevent its targets from holding their annual meetings until the extra information turns up. One such suit, against Brocade Communications, a Californian company, forced the suspension of the annual meeting last February. Brocade quickly settled. Faruqi’s fees were $625,000. Several other companies, not wanting to delay their meetings, have settled similar suits.
Prof. Bainbridge is reminded of the specialized group of non-lawyers in Japan known as sokaiya, who extract money from target companies by threatening (among other things) to disrupt annual meetings.
At Duke on Friday
On Friday at Duke Law School, the Duke Forum for Law and Social Change is giving its annual symposium, this year’s subject being legal approaches to obesity prevention. The organizers have kindly invited me to participate in a late morning panel, where my views are likely to differ from those of the other participants; details here.
If you’d like to book me to speak at your own event or campus, contact me directly at editor – at – overlawyered – dot – com, through the Cato Institute’s Events staff, or, if you’re associated with a Federalist Society chapter, through the Society’s national office.
Land use roundup
- CEQA: “Even California Democrats See Need for Regulatory Reform” [Steven Greenhut]
- Subject of a blog: “One man’s struggle to get a building permit for his house in San Luis Obispo County” [SLO Leaks Blog]
- Can New Urbanism be rescued from elitism? [Aaron Renn, Urbanophile]
- SCOTUS set to review land-use exactions in Koontz v. St. John’s River Water Management District case [Ilya Shapiro and Tim Sandefur, Washington Times; Adler, more; Gideon Kanner, more; Richard Epstein, Hoover]
- “Local regulations make new housing more costly” [Lisa Sturtevant and Agnès Artemel, Greater Greater Washington]
- “The First Circuit Engrafts ‘Lenses’ Onto Penn Central‘s ‘Three Factors'” [Kanner]
- Should property buffs cheer at Supreme Court’s reinstatement of owner’s claims in Arkansas Game & Fish case? [Richard Samp/WLF, Richard Epstein/PoL]
Mayor Bloomberg as paladin of civil liberties?
Yes, on the First Amendment he’s been pretty decent, but as to the rest, surely you jest, Ms. Kaminer [Jacob Sullum]
EEOC sues law firm over 75-lb. lifting requirement
“The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has sued Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice on behalf of a former office assistant who claims disability discrimination over a lifting requirement.” The job’s requirements, at the firm’s North Carolina headquarters, allegedly included moving heavy boxes of documents; according to the complaint, the law firm did not adequately consider accommodations such as letting her divide up the contents of the boxes and use push carts. Womble Carlyle declined to comment. [Debra Cassens Weiss, ABA Journal]
Class action reform proposed in Arizona
Paul Karlsgodt at Class Action Blawg reports that the bill “sets forth some specific requirements for class certification that are much more exacting than those required under federal Rule 23 and most state class action rules” and summarizes the provisions as follows (quoting directly):
- clear and convincing evidence would be required to justify a grant of class certification
- orders granting class certification would have to be supported by a detailed written statement of the reasons and evidence justifying the decision
- in assessing superiority, the court would be required to consider, among other things, ”whether it is probable that the amount which may be recovered by individual class members will be large enough in relation to the expense and effort of administering the action to justify maintaining the case as a class action”
- there would be a rebuttable presumption against class certification in cases involving claims where individual knowledge, causation, and reliance are required elements
- certification of a case as a class action would not relieve any class member of the requirement of proving individual injury or damages
- class notice must include a statement of ”the possible financial consequences for the class”
- the law would expressly provide that the plaintiff would bear the initial cost of distributing notice to the class
- appeals from orders granting or denying class certification could be taken as a matter of right the same as a final judgment, and trial court proceedings would be automatically stayed pending the appeal.
Free speech roundup
- Setting up as a freelance investigative writer? Getting insurance even for your office rental can be tricky [Romenesko]
- Among many curious Virginia blue laws: “‘any citizen … may institute’ judicial review of any book.” [Barton Hinkle]
- Whether Rupert Murdoch can buy the L.A. Times shouldn’t depend on which party holds power in Washington [Stoll, Future of Capitalism]
- “Publisher launches $3,000,000 suit against academic librarian who criticized its books” [BoingBoing, Edwin Mellen Press] “Alternative” cancer treatment entrepreneur threatens to sue dissatisfied patient [Jardin, BB]
- EU: Let’s regulate journalists [Morrissey] Russia law against pro-gay “propaganda” is part of wider speech crackdown [AP]
- Twitter’s relatively laissez-faire speech policy has advanced its success [Greg Beato]
- “Free Speech on Campus Today” [Cato podcast with FIRE’s Greg Lukianoff]
- Forbids writing about him ever again: “Judge says US-based reporter defamed Haiti’s PM” [AP/Gainesville Sun]
Obama on patent trolls
The president has some opinions on the subject [TechDirt]:
Obama: A couple years ago we began a process of patent reform. We actually passed some legislation that made progress on some of these issues. But it hasn’t captured all the problems.
The folks that you’re talking about are a classic example. They don’t actually produce anything themselves. They’re just trying to essentially leverage and hijack somebody else’s idea and see if they can extort some money out of them. Sometimes these things are challenging. Because we also want to make sure that patents are long enough, and that people’s intellectual property is protected. We’ve got to balance that with making sure that they’re not so long that innovation is reduced.
But I do think that our efforts at patent reform only went about halfway to where we need to go. What we need to do is pull together additional stakeholders and see if we can build some additional consensus on smarter patent laws.
Also: RICO claim can’t shoot down Wi-Fi patent troll [Joe Mullin, Ars Technica]