February 24 roundup

DC readers: speaking at Cato next Thurs. afternoon

Attention readers in the Washington, D.C. area: I’ll be speaking at a Cato Policy Forum next Thurs., March 3, at 4 p.m. at the Cato Institute auditorium, discussing my new book Schools for Misrule: Legal Academia and an Overlawyered America. Roger Pilon, who directs Cato’s program of legal studies, will be the moderator, and commenting on my remarks will be one of the most distinguished federal judges, the Hon. Douglas Ginsburg of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. The event is free, but you do need to register in advance here, where you’ll find more details. There’ll be a reception afterward and a chance to buy the book. Please introduce yourself and mention that you’re an Overlawyered reader!

$6.7 million awarded after drunk student’s fall

“A judge has awarded more than $6.7 million to the family of a Northeastern University student who fell down a set of stairs at a Boston bar in 2007 and died after a night of drinking. The judge’s award comes about three months after a jury ruled the bar violated the city building code but was not liable for the 21-year-old man’s death.” [Boston Globe; Herald; MyFoxBoston]

SCOTUS, 6-2: vaccine suits preempted

James Beck explains and Orac has some strong views as well (“I’m afraid Justice Sotomayor borders on the delusional when she blithely proclaims that courts are so good at efficiently disposing of meritless product liability claims.”) More: Kathleen Seidel and footnotes.

P.S. But preemption does not carry the day in an automotive case, Williamson v. Mazda.

Wisconsin: a frisky-union vignette

Headline from last August, recalled by James Taranto: “Milwaukee teachers union files suit over lack of Viagra coverage.” The lack of coverage for erectile dysfunction drugs amounted to sex discrimination, according to the complaint. [Journal-Sentinel]

More on the Wisconsin union showdown from Cato Institute scholars Chris Edwards (Virginia has much sharper restrictions on public-employee unionism than what Gov. Scott Walker is proposing), Neal McCluskey (for the kids? really?), David Boaz (president, with his entire political machine, “is inserting himself into a medium-sized state’s battle over how to balance its budget,” Roger Pilon (unions’ quarrel is with voters) — and see also this 2009 background paper on the unsustainable costs of some union victories.

“Tobacco tax hike was a backroom deal”

The Supreme Court should strike down the multistate compact by which state attorneys general carried out the Great Tobacco Heist of a decade ago, argues Hans Bader of the Competitive Enterprise Institute [Washington Times and CEI; earlier here, here]. I’ve discussed the MSA at chapter length in my book The Rule of Lawyers as well as in shorter form here and elsewhere.

P.S. AEI’s Michael Greve analyzes the legal background at Balkinization.