SelectedWorks @ Widener University Commonwealth Law School
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Making America A Better Place for All: Sustainable Development Recommendations for the Biden Administration
No full textIn 2015, the United Nations Member States, including the United States, unanimously approved 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be achieved by 2030. The SDGs are nonbinding; each nation is to implement them based on its own priorities and circumstances. This Article argues that the SDGs are a critical normative framework the United States should use to improve human quality of life, freedom, and opportunity by integrating economic and social development with environmental protection. It collects the recommendations of 22 experts on steps that the Biden-Harris Administration should take now to advance each of the SDGs. It is part of a book project that will recommend not only federal actions, but also actions by state and local governments, the private sector, and civil society. In the face of multiple challenges and opportunities, this Article is intended to contribute to a robust public discussion about how to accelerate the transition to a sustainable society and make America a better place for all
Here’s a Policy Playbook You Can Use to Fight Climate Change
No full textThe fossil fuel industry has long been crafting state-level legislation. Now it’s our turn
Recasting the Second Fiddle: The Need for a Clear Line of Lieutenant Gubernatorial Succession
No full textLieutenant governorships originally did not exist in the United States in significant numbers. But as states were faced with the unsatisfactory results of their gubernatorial succession provisions, state constitutions were amended to provide the Governor with a built-in successor. However, despite these changes, state constitutions generally did not provide for filling lieutenant-gubernatorial vacancies. Following the ratification of the Twenty-fifth Amendment, this began to change, as states adopted lieutenant-gubernatorial succession provisions—which echoed the Twenty-fifth Amendment’s provisions for vice-presidential vacancies—in a flurry of activity. This Article focuses on the history and current reality of lieutenant-gubernatorial vacancies, exploring the absence of explicit succession provisions and the adoption of these provisions following the Twenty-fifth Amendment, and surveys how lieutenant-gubernatorial vacancies are currently filled. It then argues that states without explicit succession provisions should adopt them and discusses what factors might be considered in drafting these provisions
Automating Repossession
No full textImagine if you bought a refrigerator from BestBuy on credit and BestBuy reserved the right to disable that refrigerator remotely if you failed to pay. This is not a future fantasy; subprime car lenders have been doing something similar for two decades. Many goods are connected to networks that allow the seller of the goods to retain some measure of control over them. These “smart goods” pose several challenges to the law, notably to the rules that govern creditors’ remedies when the owner of smart goods collateral defaults on the loan secured by such collateral. A creditor with a security interest in smart goods has the technological capacity to disable such goods remotely upon the borrower’s default.Automating Repossession addresses a question that has no clear answer in commercial law – does a creditor have the right to remotely disable collateral upon its debtor’s default? As physical goods are increasingly connected to online networks in ways that allow their sellers to control their use, it is possible for secured lenders to deploy a remote and automated repossessor to disable tangible collateral in the event of a borrower’s default. Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC), which allows a secured creditor to repossess collateral upon its debtor’s default without resorting to the courts only if it can do so without a breach of the peace, does not address this practice. A handful of states have responded to the use of remote disablement by enacting amendments to their versions Article 9 of the UCC or their statutes aimed more specifically at consumer protection. In the vast majority of U.S. jurisdictions, the law is silent as to whether a remote disablement is equivalent to a self-help repossession and thus imposes no limitations on its use.This paper recognizes that remote disablement should be a permissible creditor remedy in the UCC and proposes appropriate limitations on its use. To craft appropriate limitations, the article explores the history of the breach of the peace standard in repossessions involving physical contact. Rejecting that standard for automated repossessions, the article draws from contractual, legislative, and judicial sources to suggest limitations on remote disablement that address the unique harms caused by that remedy. Those sources include contracts governing remote disablement in the subprime automobile lending industry, the handful of existing laws governing the practice, and the restrictions on self-help remedies in the laws governing physical repossessions such as evictions, digital disablement of computer software, and remedies that cross the digital-physical divide in satellite financing. The article concludes by considering the interests that might be violated when a creditor crosses the digital-physical divide to remotely disable physical collateral and makes recommendations about how the UCC should address remote disablement as a creditor remedy
Sustainability Essentials: A Leadership Guide for Lawyers
No full textSustainability Essentials is a practice guide to help anyone in the legal profession find more and better on-ramps to engage in sustainable development in their particular law practices and communities.Sustainability Essentials: A Leadership Guide for Lawyers is for you if you went to law school—or are going to law school or considering law school—to help move society and the law profession in a more environmentally, socially, and economically sustainable direction, to protect life on the planet, and to make life better for present and future generations. It is also for you if you did not have this goal in law school, but you now want to incorporate sustainable development in your practice.Sustainable development is a relatively new legal perspective, one that demands practice, patience, persistence, and great attention to what clients actually want and need. Best practices for sustainable development in law practice are a work in progress, and leadership matters. This Guide aims to help you on your journey, and to help you succeed in making your goals a reality
Immigration Law Exceptionalism and the Administrative Procedure Act
No full textImmigration law is exceptional enough to deserve an administrative law focus of its own. This is a debatable proposition because Congress weaved exceptionality into the design of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). While the APA does promote uniformity, it also incorporates plenty of give. Congress allowed itself generous opportunities to exempt areas of agency activity from the APA’s procedures. If the APA does not demand uniformity in adjudication, it seems counterintuitive to argue that any one area of administrative adjudication is exceptional. This paper argues that immigration law is indeed exceptional in administrative adjudication. Removal adjudication is abnormal because: (1) Congress’ parallel scheme for immigration adjudication has resulted in an extremely dysfunctional system; (2) it operates in a double void, with fewer constitutional protections and without the protections of the APA; (3) it relies on a vast network of civil detention; and (4) it is of a different genre than the type of regulation that drove the development of the APA. The exceptionality of immigration adjudication demands a review of administrative law doctrine with this exceptionality in mind
An Employee Home Office Expense Deduction for the New Normal
No full textCongress has continually struggled with allowing employees a deduction for unreimbursed home office expenses. Perceptions about the legitimacy and necessity of such a deduction have resulted in what many may now view as arbitrary and inequitable tax policy. As millions of employees have been required to work from home during the pandemic, there has been a tangible shifting of office space costs from the employer to the employee. Although work life will certainly return to some form of new normal, it is important that Congress realign tax policy to recognize the increased burden being shifted from employers to employees as many employees continue to work from home. This could be done by allowing employees a limited above-the-line deduction for unreimbursed home office expenses
A Primer on Netting Legal Opinions for Master Agreements
No full textThe reliance upon a netting legal opinion (“Netting Opinion”) to support over-the-counter (“OTC”) derivative transactions and related master netting agreements (“Master Agreements”) is ubiquitous across the globe. Netting Opinions provide the due diligence that allow market participants to be confident that the termination and close-out provisions of Master Agreements will be enforceable in relevant jurisdictions, whether domestic or foreign. In fact, a party will often refuse to trade with a counterparty unless the party can rely upon a Netting Opinion
Deciphering Insolvency Events in Master Agreements and Similar Finance Agreements
No full textMaster agreements typically include a range of different types of default and termination events. Given the numerous ways that a counterparty could become insolvent, it is important that market participants understand what would constitute an Insolvency Event with respect to their counterparty under the applicable master agreement, but also with respect to themselves since these are typically bilateral contracts
