- Jury tells Marriott to pay $55 million after stalker takes nude video of TV personality from adjoining hotel room [Business Insider]
- R.I.P. John Sullivan, long-time advocate for lawsuit reform in California [Sacramento Bee]
- Colleges, speed cameras, and surveillance on buses in my latest Maryland policy roundup; paid leave, publicly financed conference centers and criminalizing drinking hosts in the one before that;
- AAJ, the trial lawyers lobby, “panned companies’ method of fighting class actions as unfair after member accused it of using the same strategy” [John O’Brien, Chamber-backed Legal NewsLine]
- In the 1920s, battling chain stores was part of the mission of the Ku Klux Klan [Atlas Obscura]
- Class-action lawyer Goodson, “husband of Supreme Court justice, recommended 2 firms that got state auditor contract” [Arkansas Democrat-Gazette]
- “Indian court issues summons to Hindu monkey god Hanuman” Again? [Lowering the Bar]
Archive for March, 2016
Birth control pills, over the counter
“Oregon is making hormonal birth control legally available without a doctor’s prescription, and California is set to follow suit. This is great policy, and the rest of the country should follow this example.” [Megan McArdle]
Hayek on the public demand for a strong man
We must here return for a moment to the position which precedes the suppression of democratic institutions and the creation of a totalitarian regime. In this stage it is the general demand for quick and determined government action that is the dominating element in the situation, dissatisfaction with the slow and cumbersome course of democratic procedure which makes action for action’s sake the goal. It is then the man or the party who seems strong and resolute enough “to get things done” who exercises the greatest appeal. “Strong” in this sense means not merely a numerical majority – it is the ineffectiveness of parliamentary majorities with which people are dissatisfied. What they will seek is somebody with such solid support as to inspire confidence that he can carry out whatever he wants.
— Friedrich von Hayek, The Road To Serfdom, chapter Ten, “Why the Worst Get On Top.” More: Aesop on the Frogs Who Wanted a King, at Cato.
Labor and employment roundup
- Immigration-related rules on the one hand, national-origin discrimination rules on the other: “Employers could get sued for following the law” [Sean Higgins, Washington Examiner]
- Should anyone doubt labor relations as an academic field tilts way left, here are numbers [Mitchell Langbert, Econ Journal Watch]
- Connecticut high court opens door to letting kids of dismissed workers sue employers for lost consortium, on top of suits filed by the parents themselves [Daniel Schwartz]
- Obama scheme to yank millions of workers off salaried status is a real economic menace [Trey Kovacs, CEI, earlier]
- Panel discussion marks 80th anniversary of National Labor Relations Act with lawprofs Richard Epstein and John Raudabaugh, Bill Samuel (AFL-CIO) and Mark Schneider (Machinists), moderated by Hon. Joan Larsen of Michigan Supreme Court [Federalist Society video, National Lawyers Conference]
- “Employment-related class action settlements hit high in 2015” [12th annual Seyfarth Shaw Workplace Class Action Litigation Report via Staffing Industry Analysts] EEOC Employee Charge trends, annual report [Hiscox, and note map on p. 4 of employee lawsuit hotspots including Illinois, California, Nevada, and New Mexico]
“When this happens firefighters are praised, but then disciplined.”
“Two Virginia volunteer firefighters were suspended for transporting an 18-month-old girl to the hospital in a fire engine last Saturday, ultimately saving her life.” When the girl had a seizure, the two were first to respond and took her to a Fredericksburg hospital. “[Captain James] Kelley said they were suspended because their fire engine is licensed as a ‘non-transport unit’ and doesn’t have the proper restraints and medications that an ambulance would have. He said when this kind of thing happens firefighters are praised, but then disciplined.” [FoxNews]
Candidates’ flip-flops on international trade
“After years of similar pandering, the GOP doesn’t have a good response to Trump’s trade demagoguery. But there is one.” [William Watson, Cato; Scott Lincicome, The Federalist]
Environment roundup
- Eminent domain on the silver screen: “Wild River” (1960) starring Montgomery Clift and Lee Remick tells story of TVA’s taking of the last parcel for a dam [Gideon Kanner]
- Berkshire Hathaway: up to now, climate change has not produced more frequent insured weather-related events [Tyler Cowen]
- Erin Brockovich goes on the Dr. Oz show to spread doubts about fluoride in drinking water [Hank Campbell, ACSH; more Brockovich follies]
- California declares relatively unprocessed “aloe vera whole leaf extract” to be a dangerous chemical, which means it can be added to the Prop 65 list; note however that the refined aloe vera used in consumer products is not so included [Conkle Law]
- Some environmentalists plan to sue fund managers who don’t act against global warming [The Guardian, Nature]
- A tale of Superfund joint and several liability: “How tort reform helped crack down on polluters” [Ross Marchand, R Street Institute]
- “Great Moments in US Energy Policy: In the 1970’s, The US Government Mandated Coal Use For New Power Plants” [Coyote]
Update: mandatory oppression studies at American University
We noted in January that American University, in Washington, D.C., was considering a drastic overhaul of university rules in response to the demands of social-justice activists. Now it’s moving forward: although some of the more extreme details have been dropped, or at least go unmentioned, a February 29 letter from President Neil Kerwin proposes a mandatory oppression studies course for first-years, additionally “address the subject matter in at least one other required course selected from the AU curriculum.” Plus: racial hiring!
Upcoming speeches
I’ll be speaking over the next two weeks in Philadelphia, St. Louis, D.C., and Maryland’s Eastern Shore:
Tues. March 8, Washington, D.C., Common Cause “Blueprint for a Great Democracy” conference, panel on Article V constitutional convention proposals.
Mon., March 14, Philadelphia, Temple Law School Federalist Society, on the life and work of Justice Scalia.
Tues., March 15, Centreville, Md., Queen Anne’s County Republican Club, on redistricting.
Tues., March 22, St. Louis, Mo., Intercollegiate Studies Institute debating Michael Farris on Article V constitutional convention proposals.
For details on any of these events, or to invite me to address your group, inquire at editor -at – overlawyered – dot – com.
Maryland falters on LEOBR reform
Following a series of episodes including the death of Freddie Gray in a Baltimore police van, sentiment seemed to run high for reconsidering at least some of Maryland’s “Law Enforcement Bill of Rights” law, which erects tenure-like obstacles to firing or disciplining police over suspected misconduct. But critics say by the time a commission’s recommendations made it to legislative consideration, they had been watered down to accomplish relatively little and even give the state’s police unions more power than before [WBAL, Jim Giza/Baltimore Sun]