(x-posted from what's i guess become Teh Regular BlogIf there is one professional violation that the guild of American lawyerdom cannot stand, it is UPL: Unlicensed Practice of Law. Translation: You've got to get bar certification (a very expensive and exhausting process!) if you're going to hold yourself out as qualified to give reliable legal ( Read more... )

Senator Specter finally went back and read the Suspension Clause, I see. Hooray for the Constitution!

Or maybe he just read my earlier post. I prefer to think the latter.

Consider the following quotes.U.S. Constitution, Art. I sec. 9.
The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it. [emphasis added]

Justice Antonin Scalia, dissenting in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507 (2004).Many think it not only inevitable but ( Read more... )

I was looking at OYEZ.org's SCOTUS profiles last night (procrastination, anyone?), and I realized an interesting demographic disproportionality:

Five of the nine sitting justices are Catholics.

Nothing against Catholics, they've been plenty marginalized in American history. But considering that only a quarter of the US population self-identifies ( Read more... )

Via CNNMoney.com:UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT MIDDLE DISTRICT OF FLORIDA ORLANDO DIVISION ( Read more... )

From this week's ABA Journal eReport Answers of the Week:
Some years ago, a colleague of mine was representing the wife in a divorce proceeding. The wife asked what could be done. The lawyer went through the steps: motion for an order of enforcement; a wait for the court to act; service of the order on the husband; if continued failure to pay, a ( Read more... )

Boston Globe (4/30/06): Bush Has Claimed Authority to Unilaterally Nullify 750+ Laws Passed by Congress
ETA: NYT (5/5/06): OpEd on Bush's Unconstitutional VetoAs the NYT Editors point out, this explains why Bush has famously never yet vetoed a law passed by Congress. He doesn't need to. After all, the veto power has two pesky little drawbacks: it ( Read more... )

It's Class Preregistration period, which puts me in Berserker-in-a-Music-Store mode with all the sexy classes: International Human Trafficking, Transnational Lawyering Practicum, Refugee Law and Policy, National Security and the Law of the Sea, etc etc etc. But I know that I have to get some "bread-and-butter" classes on my transcript (e.g. Con Law ( Read more... )

Nabbed from SCOTUSblog: GULC put up an audio file of the Hamdan oral arguments, for anyone who's interested. I heard some extended clips last night on the News Hour with Jim Lehrer, and it certainly does not sound like Solicitor General Clement's finest hour. I know y'all've been mooning over Prof K's hunky visage below, so now you can hear his ( Read more... )

NYT has the initial AP writeup of the orals.

For a more thorough account, check out Lyle Denniston's post on SCOTUSblog. Denniston is optimistic about a 5-3 vote for federal jurisdiction and against the military commissions, though at least one other observer thinks it'll turn out exactly the other way ( Read more... )