Study

This course is intended as an introduction to experimental research, legal theory, and caselaw on jury decision making.  Although the topic overlaps considerably with areas of basic decision making--e.g., the heuristics and biases literature--the focus will be mostly on applied research looking at the decisions of real (or simulated) jurors.

This seminar will examine how legal advocacy shapes law and public policy at the federal level, with an evolutionary focus on the strategic use of litigation and regulation opportunities to develop various legal doctrines. It will draw upon case histories of public interest litigation, administrative law advocacy, legislative development, and popular opinion strategies. Each weekly seminar will focus on one or two legal concepts that resonate beyond health law alone but have been developed and adapted by the various tools of health care advocacy. It will trace progression from an initial foundational case to more contemporary echoes in litigation and regulation. Topics will include the commerce power and federal mandates, standing, severability, statutory interpretation, federalism, antitrust application to health care professions, judicial review of administrative practices and policies, waivers and administrative discretion, public health mandates, ERISA, information transparency, religious freedom, and the power of the purse. Our class will examine how attorneys and their allies can play either offense or defense, or even switch roles, as the stages of policy debates shift. It will include an introduction to a host of contemporary issues in health law and policy that carry broader lessons for other advocacy efforts. The seminar will provide a balanced representation of competing viewpoints while showing how respective sides can engage in various regulatory and litigation activities to advance, negate, or alter the status quo. Study of the diverse and often-shifting legal problems encountered by a single industry, particularly one as important and complex as health care, may appeal to students generally interested in public policy and in law and economics, not just health care, as well as those interested in sharpening their skills in legal advocacy through involvement in litigation and administrative rulemaking. Relatively early selection of potential paper topics is advised.

The course will examine the regulation of NCAA athletics and the enforcement of NCAA rules. It will examine in detail several high profile NCAA cases including those involving Penn State, Miami and UNC-Chapel Hill.

Issues in the legal regulation of sexuality and gender identity are among the most contested in US law today. Issues which either have been litigated in US courts in recent years or are currently being litigated include the ability of same-sex couples to marry, people’s access to contraception or abortion, as well as the ability of LGBTQ persons to access health care, public accommodations, employment, and education without discrimination. This course takes an interdisciplinary approach to the investigation of the legal regulation of human sexuality and gender identity. It examines the historical and jurisprudential foundations of these legal constructs with insights developed through feminist and queer theory. These disciplines will be deployed to better understand the scope of the rights to sexual and gender equality, liberty, and autonomy available to people not only in theory, but in fact, and not only at the national level, but at the state and local levels.

The objective of the course is to introduce students to important issues concerning the theory and doctrine of statutory interpretation through exposure to cutting-edge legal scholarship. The colloquium will feature bi-weekly presentations of works-in-progress by leading scholars of statutory interpretation, legislation, and administrative law. In the week preceding each presentation, students will read and discuss foundational materials (a mix of academic commentary and case law) on topics related to the work-in-progress.

Students may opt to prepare six short (5-10 page) papers in response to each work-in-progress, which would be due in advance of the presentation and used to stimulate discussion. Alternatively, students may write one longer research paper (roughly 30 pages) dealing with a topic of their choice related to the themes of the class. Students who take the latter option may use the colloquium to satisfy the upper-level writing requirement.

This seminar will focus on the most important and most controversial aspects of evidence law, including new technologies like AI, and electronic/digital evidence. The seminar also explores controversial areas of the evidence rules where change has been called for (sometimes for decades) but has not yet occurred.

This writing and experiential course will provide students with the opportunity to practice several different types of persuasive writing used in federal litigation. The students will work on a hypothetical case involving an employment discrimination matter. The students will follow the case from the administrative agency level, to the filing of a complaint in federal court, through the discovery process, and culminating in the filing and arguing of a motion for summary judgment. In addition to writing, the students will have the opportunity to interview a client and a witness and to practice their oral advocacy skills in a mock meeting with a partner and a mock hearing. This course will be useful for anyone interested in practicing in federal court and/or pursuing a federal clerkship at the trial court level.