Articles
Artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled tools have produced a myriad of injuries, up to and including death. This burgeoning technology has caused scholars to ask questions, such as, How do we create a legal framework for AI? Because AI creators have acknowledged that even they do not know the capacities of their technology for good or bad outcomes, this Article argues that an existing framework, strict liability, is an appropriate fit for harms arising from this new technology because a party need not prove negligence to prevail. Strict liability was uniquely developed to handle those activities that are “abnormally dangerous.”
By Renee Henson
The U.S. Supreme Court’s new conservative supermajority is gaslighting the American public. This Article takes a systematic look at key cases from the Court’s October 2021 Term through the lens of gaslighting. It describes these cases as being part of what it dubs the Court’s “gaslight docket,” a descriptor that provides a useful and potentially unifying theoretical framework for analyzing and understanding the Court’s recent onslaught of rights-diminishing precedents.
By Kyle C. Velte
“Jurors may not understand the science, but they can count [the experts].” To date, thirty innocent people have been falsely convicted in the United States of assault or homicide of children in their care. The prosecution mechanism for achieving these wrongful convictions was the use of experts to testify to “shaken baby syndrome” or “abusive […]
In McDonough Power Equipment, Inc. v. Greenwood, the Supreme Court reaffirmed that a litigant is entitled to a fair trial but not a perfect one, because there is no such thing as a perfect trial. When allegations of juror misconduct arise, prompting claims of an unfair trial, courts are reluctant to pierce the secrecy of the […]
By Melanie Cecelia Regis
[PDF] As surveillance cameras and other ubiquitous devices record more events in the world, appellate courts are being flooded with video and sound recordings, usually in digital form, as part of the record below. Such digital evidence offers substantial potential benefits in proving or disproving facts at trial. But that evidence can also pose associated challenges […]
By Judge Jack M. Sabatino
[PDF] Essays
The struggle for civil rights has never been black and white; multiracial coalitions have been imperative in fighting for equality under the Constitution. With the creation of the new Hon. Nelson A. Díaz Professorship in Law, Temple University Beasley School of Law has brought important recognition to the role Latinxs have played in this movement. […]
By Chief Judge Juan R. Sánchez and Sarah Zimmerman
[PDF] Comments
“Who knows who might be the target of the well-read man?” It appears conservative legislators fear it will be them. In May 2021, the first of a wave of politicians passed laws restricting discussions of race and racism in classrooms across the country. These laws and policies began as a political response to the 2020 racial reckoning in the United States. Conservative activists turned their attention to critical race theory (CRT), “a practice of interrogating the role of race and racism in society,” and attempted to “turn it toxic” by ascribing to it definitions of “Black-supremacist racism” and “wokeness.” Public schools, from kindergarten to universities, became the center of this culture war, and restrictions on “wokeness” spread like wildfire through 138 school districts by September of 2022, requiring schools to remove books and curb diversity of thought in classrooms.
These prohibitions focus on books and curricula representing diverse experiences—for example, of the 1,648 books that were banned between July 2021 and June 2022, 674 have either prominent LGBTQ+ characters or LGBTQ+ themes, 659 have prominent characters of color, and 338 explicitly address race and racism. Discussions of race and racism, gender identity, and diversity have been chilled from elementary schools to universities. Ultimately, this Comment argues that protections for teacher speech aimed at fostering the success of all students must outweigh states’ attempts to impose their own “orthodoxy of viewpoints” to the detriment of the nation’s youth.
By Chelsea Sissom
“Just kidding!” Do these words offer comfort following a threat? “It was only a joke.” Do these words elicit forgiveness? “It’s funny because it’s true.” Would it be funny if it were not true? “Can’t you take a joke?” Should anyone have to laugh at being threatened? This Note argues that American jurisprudence should reflect the
conventional wisdom that the answer to these questions is “no.”
By Josh Rosenberg Daneri
Many public accommodation acts (PAAs) allow for the weaponization of civil rights law by socially and economically dominant groups. For a manageable scope, this Comment focuses on the use of PAAs to hinder gender equity. PAAs fail to engage with the reality that women, trans, queer, and nonbinary persons are systemically disadvantaged by a cultural hierarchy that privileges cisgender males over those with other gender identities. The PAAs perpetuate inequity by failing to distinguish between remedial actions and bigoted actions. By providing the most privileged with the same protections as the most vulnerable, PAAs preclude the creation of safe public spaces for vulnerable populations, under the guise of preventing “discrimination.” Yet safe public spaces are necessary for rectifying the effects of a long history of gendered oppression, underinclusiveness, and imbalanced public health. Systemically oppressed groups need to feel safe in public spaces to ensure that these individuals can fairly access public amenities and to improve gender equity in America.
By Tess Frydman
The field of administrative law is facing a moment of unprecedented upheaval. For almost forty years, Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. has been the central pillar of administrative law guiding the interpretation of congressional acts by federal executive agencies. The Chevron doctrine has promoted good governance and democratic accountability by directing […]
Despite assurances that the only problem with American policing is that there are “a few bad apples,” police departments nationwide seem less capable than ever of plucking “bad apple” officers from their ranks. Scholars attribute this inability to remove officers to many sources, including shoddy internal investigations; police union collective bargaining agreement provisions; and unique […]
Does the Bill of Rights protect convicted felons who have completed their punishment? Generally, yes—so long as they are American citizens or resident aliens. While one might reasonably claim that this is undesirable as a matter of public policy, “the Constitution disables the government from employing certain means to prevent, deter, or detect . . […]
Locky, Phoenix, WannaCry, DarkSide, NotPetya, Hades. Do these names sound familiar? They have each touched the lives of individuals across the globe, generated revenues in the seven to eight figures, and managed to stand out in a field crowded with other actors. No, these are not the names of Disney antiheroes. They are not TikTok […]
“Abortion is an immoral, base crime; and he who aids and abets in its commission . . . is guilty of an act involving moral turpitude.” “Moral turpitude” is as redundant as the phrase “ATM Machine.” Morality is folded into the concept of “turpitude.” The term—turpitude—itself is old. Its Latin cognate appears as far back […]
