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Presidential Interpretation and War Powers
Get PDFJudicial deference toward presidential decision making in national security has led to largely unencumbered presidential action in national security concerns. In this article, Matthew R. Trout and Tobias T. Gibson argue that presidential interpretation is a power of the president—a power that has enhanced an outsized presidential role in national security.https://scholarship.law.slu.edu/lawjournalonline/1097/thumbnail.jp
Developing a Health Care Workforce That Supports Team-Based Care Models That Integrate Health and Social Services
Get PDFAcross the country, health care professionals are joining forces to improve the health care of populations with complex social, financial, and behavioral health needs. One promising approach relies on community-based integrated health teams (CIHTs), or interprofessional teams that integrate a broad range of medical, behavioral health, and social services, offer intensive case management, and link patients to available community resources. Yet whether CIHTs fulfill their potential depends in part on policymakers enacting policies that support CIHTs delivering comprehensive, high-value care to their patients. Drawing on the insights of CIHT professionals shared with the authors, this Article highlights several factors that contribute to CIHTs’ success, namely utilizing community health workers (CHWs) to provide patients with high-touch care, including behavioral health experts on the care team, and increasing coordination between CIHTs and patients’ primary care providers. The Article then calls for federal and state policies that would promote expansion of the CHW and behavioral health workforce, provide more flexible and sustainable financing to CIHTs, and support primary care providers acquiring the financial resources, data capabilities, and personnel needed to either embedding CIHTs within their practices or coordinate with outside CIHTs
Access to Court Cases from the Supreme Court’s 2020–2021 Term: The New Majority’s Debut
Get PDFThroughout the Supreme Court’s first term without Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Court issued only a few major opinions with respect to access to the Court for civil litigants, and it issued none that discarded major precedents. Yet, in several areas, the Court demonstrated an increasingly conservative bent and began to lay the groundwork for major changes. In this Article, we discuss selected opinions from the Court’s 2020–2021 term that may have an impact on access to the courts for individuals seeking to vindicate civil and constitutional rights. In particular, it focuses on cases that may affect access for low-income and marginalized people. These opinions show the work of a Court in transition and foretell major changes to come
The Impact of Bostock v. Clayton County on Access to Health Care for LGBTQ Persons
Get PDFLGBTQ individuals face countless acts of discrimination in health care insurance and delivery. In spite of this inequality, there are zero LGBTQ-inclusive health insurance protections in over half of the United States. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act (Title VII) and Section 1557 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) are two federal statutes that prohibit discrimination, in relevant part, on the basis of sex. Both federal statutes have been greatly impacted by the Supreme Court decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, which interpreted “sex” in Title VII to include gender identity and sexual orientation. This Article explains how Bostock protects LGBTQ persons from discrimination in employer-provided health insurance under Title VII. Bostock’s scope extends beyond health insurance and into health care delivery, as demonstrated by its applicability to Section 1557 of the ACA (Section 1557). This Article demonstrates how Section 1557—where its enabling statutes do not include Title VII—should prohibit discrimination regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity. Lastly, this Article emphasizes the importance of state action, for example in public accommodations laws, in the absence of clear and explicit federal LGBTQ protections
Protecting Patients from Physicians Who Inflict Harm: New Legal Resources for State Medical Boards
Get PDFState medical boards (SMBs) protect the public by ensuring that physicians uphold appropriate standards of care and ethical practice. Despite this clear purpose, egregious types of wrongdoing by physicians are alarmingly frequent, harmful, and under-reported. Even when egregious wrongdoing is reported to SMBs, it is unclear why SMBs sometimes fail to promptly remove seriously offending physicians from practice. Legal and policy tools that are targeted, well-informed, and actionable are urgently needed to help SMBs more effectively protect patients from egregious wrongdoing by physicians.Past reviews of SMB performance have identified features of SMBs associated with higher rates of severe disciplinary actions against physicians, including political and professional independence and adequate funding and staffing. However, there has been little attention paid to elements of the state level legal framework that governs SMB licensing and disciplinary function, or what legal or policy tools would make SMBs more effective at protecting patients in serious cases.This Article offers solutions in the form of model language with commentary for five high-impact statutory provisions that address board composition and function, reporting to the board, and adjudication of disciplinary matters. It brings together consensus recommendations from an expert panel, the results of legal mapping of relevant state laws, and original legal and policy analysis. The model provisions and commentary are intended to serve as a new resource for SMBs, state legislatures, and other policymakers to encourage and support examination of existing medical practice acts to improve SMB function and better protect patients from harmful physicians.
Note:Funding Information: The research was supported by a grant from the Greenwall Foundation..Declaration of Interests: None to declare
Employment Status for “Essential Workers”: The Case for Gig Worker Parity
Get PDFThis Article explores what I call the “essential worker paradox”: During the pandemic, gig workers have been recognized as providing critical and important services. At the same time, the law has yet to recognize gig workers fully and to commit to providing them with the same basic protections as employees. The Article argues that the stark difference in treatment between gig workers and regular employees has long created unfairness. While views of gig work as a side hustle or work driven by customer convenience may have prevailed in the past, now the meal delivery driver and the on-demand grocery shopper are recognized as providing important services. And a shift in the way gig work is now viewed as essential has come with newly awarded benefits, like pandemic unemployment assistance and paid sick leave, which were not available to gig workers in the past. As such, the events of the pandemic have moved—at least some—gig workers closer to parity with traditional employees. This Article argues that because of their heroic efforts during the pandemic, they have earned employee status
Tribal Water Rights and Tribal Health: The Klamath Tribes and the Navajo Nation During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Get PDFPublic health measures to combat COVID-19, especially in the first year before vaccines became widely available, required individuals to be able to access fresh water while remaining isolated from most of their fellow human beings. For the approximately 500,000 households in the United States and over two million Americans who lacked access to reliable indoor running water, these COVID-19 measures presented a considerable added challenge on top of the existing risks to their health from an insecure water supply.
Many of these people were Native Americans, whose Tribes often lack fully adjudicated, quantified, and deliverable rights to fresh water. To highlight the critical role that water rights played in Tribes’ capacities to cope with the pandemic, this essay compares the Klamath Tribes in Oregon, who after 40 years of litigation have relatively securely established themselves as the senior water rights holders in the Klamath River Basin, to the Diné (Navajo Nation), whose reservation—the largest in the United States—covers well over 27,500 square miles of Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico but largely lacks quantified water rights or the means to deliver water to households. While access to water was not the sole factor in these two Tribes’ vastly different experiences with COVID-19, it was an important one, underscoring the need for states and the federal government to stop procrastinating in actualizing the water rights for Tribes that have been legally recognized since 1908
Preventing Maternal Deaths: A Critical Feminist Approach to Maternal Mortality in the United States
Get PDFWith roughly 700 women dying each year as a result of pregnancy and/or delivery complications, the United States has the highest rate of maternal deaths in the developed world. As each year passes, the maternal death rate continues to increase, despite the fact that sixty percent of these deaths are preventable. Factors such as quality care, receiving accurate and timely medical diagnoses, and recognizing urgent maternal warning signs all contribute to the preventability of deaths and why women, particularly women of color, so often fall victim to this tragic phenomenon. As an effort to address maternal death in the United States, the Preventing Maternal Deaths Act (“PMDA”), a federal law designed to improve data reporting and investigation of maternal death within individual states, was enacted in 2018. The PMDA’s goal is to support state maternal mortality review committees (“MMRCs”) in their efforts to improve health care quality and health care outcomes for mothers. The PMDA, for five years, annually allocates twelve million dollars to interested states to either create new MMRCs or to support already existing MMRCs. Through a critical pragmatist feminist lens, this Article argues that the PMDA has a crippling reliance on arbitrary data collection and fails to require or enforce any solution that would be beneficial to women before, during, and after pregnancy. The PMDA simply funds the collection of data, and by failing to enforce systematic and institutional solutions, prevents women from getting the care and attention they truly need. As a result, the PMDA’s effectiveness is disappointingly limited, despite its aim to provide a comprehensive approach to combating the issue of maternal death in the United States. Looking forward, this Article suggests that the PMDA be revised to reflect the women-centered and social action principles of pragmatist feminism
2022 MLB Lockout: Time to Re-Examine Baseball\u27s Antitrust Exemption
Get PDFIn this article, Adam Renfro examines the legal basis for Major League Baseball\u27s antitrust exemption in light of ongoing lockout in Major League Baseball. This article also discusses ongoing and current threats to the exemption and asserts that the exemption should be abolished once and for all.https://scholarship.law.slu.edu/lawjournalonline/1087/thumbnail.jp
Proposed Bill in Missouri Senate to Lower Personal Injury Statute of Limitations to Two Years
Get PDFThe Missouri legislature is considering a bill that would drastically lower the statute of limitations for personal injury claims. What factors should be considered when determining the length of a statute of limitations? In this article, Sarah Thompson discusses the interests that are at stake, some arguments in support, and some arguments in opposition to lowering statutes of limitations.https://scholarship.law.slu.edu/lawjournalonline/1088/thumbnail.jp