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Remaking Rulemaking: Lessons from the History of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(b)
Full text linkThis Article uses the lost history of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(b) to provide a framework for rulemaking at the busy intersection of complex litigation and appellate finality. The drafters of the original civil rules spent more time thinking through how to efficiently combine claims and parties in civil actions—a promised benefit of the proposed law-equity merger—than about how combined claims should be dis-assembled. This failure would haunt the original Advisory Committee on Civil Rules for years. Nowhere was this more evident than in the first decades of Rule 54(b)’s existence.
Promulgated in 1938, Rule 54(b) was designed to provide for partial final judgments in multiclaim actions, but it quickly caused confusion in the courts of appeals. Leading jurists such as Jerome Frank, Learned Hand, Felix Frankfurter, and, above all, Charles E. Clark, the first reporter for the Advisory Committee and the Rules’ primary drafter, sparred over its purpose, application, and legitimacy. The debate over amending the rule was often technical. But the stakes of the controversy hinged on a fundamental issue about the scope of rulemaking authority under the Rules Enabling Act. Namely, who should work out the tensions between law and equity after their merger: the courts, Congress, or the rulemakers?
The Supreme Court resolved this debate in 1956 by tapping the rulemakers. This is the point at which a standard history of Rule 54(b) would begin. But the rulemakers’ first, abortive efforts to devise a rule of district-court procedure that would advance the goals of the law-equity merger (especially promoting efficiency in complex litigation) while respecting the separation of powers (especially the statutory policy of the final judgment rule) can provide lessons for rulemakers today as they continue to grapple with appellate finality. And as this Article concludes, those lessons provide a framework for analyzing rule proposals related to appellate finality, one that focuses the exercise of the rulemaking authority on further advancing the law-equity merger
Cuyahoga County Regional Collaboration Survey 2024
Full text linkThis report explores collaboration among local governments in Cuyahoga County using a survey of municipal and township officials, primarily mayors. The survey was fielded in late 2024 through a partnership between the Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs and the Cuyahoga County Department of Regional Collaboration and follows up on a similar survey fielded by Levin in 2018. This report summarizes findings of the survey. The report examines the extent to which municipalities in the County were collaborating with various types of external partners, including the County, other municipalities, nonprofits, and private organizations. The vast majority of respondents reported collaborating — most frequently, with the County and other local governments. The report also explores how partnerships varied across distinct functional areas of service delivery, such as finance and budgeting, land use planning, and senior services, and it assessed collaboration levels across functional areas. Two-thirds of responding communities reported collaborating in four or more functional service areas. Finally, it assessed municipal experiences with collaboration, finding that municipal leaders generally reported high levels of satisfaction with collaborative arrangements and were interested in more collaboration. However, they reported that attachment to local control and lack of resources to convene and facilitate collaboration often prevent more partnerships from occurring
Kelle Schwab interview, 01 May 2025
No full textKelle Schwab, a Cleveland-based artist, offers a compelling account of her professional journey, shaped by a diverse background in education, personal relationships, employment, and community involvement. She is the founder of Kelle Schwab Studios and the co-founder of Artzilla, an arts initiative aimed at fostering collaboration and public engagement. Originally from Pennsylvania, Schwab has lived in both San Francisco and Ohio, experiences that have significantly influenced her artistic outlook. In her reflections, she underscores the importance of public art as a means of fostering community connection and expressing shared values. She also discusses her recent mural at Progressive Field, which incorporates historically significant symbols to honor the cultural heritage of the region
Beyond Policy: Overcoming Challenges in Prosecuting Gender Persecution at the International Criminal Court
Full text linkWhile the ICC’s jurisdictional and resource constraints undoubtedly pose significant obstacles to its ability to tackle all cases of gender persecution worldwide, the Court’s efforts serve as a catalyst for progress in the field of international criminal law. By shining a spotlight on the crime of gender persecution and prioritizing its investigation and prosecution, the ICC sets a precedent for national jurisdictions to follow suit. Furthermore, the ICC’s engagement with gender-based crimes underscores the unique intersectionality of gender discrimination and conflict, highlighting the broader societal ramifications of such crimes, and the imperative to address them comprehensively.
In moving forward, the ICC should continue refining its approach to addressing gender-based crimes and overcoming the challenges inherent in prosecuting gender persecution. Moreover, collaboration between the ICC and national jurisdictions is essential to ensure a coordinated and holistic response to gender-based violence. By leveraging the expertise and resources of both international and domestic legal systems, we can work towards a future where perpetrators are held accountable, victims receive the justice they deserve, and gender-based violence is eventually eradicated from our societies
Courting Oblivion Part III: Enacting a Chelsea Manning Act of Oblivion and Amnesty
No full textThis is the third and final part of the three-part Courting Oblivion series on the legal concept of oblivion, meaning legal forgetfulness, letting go of the past, or forgiveness, usually to predicate a second chance, a restart, or even an era of reconstruction. This Article begins with an exposition of former President Donald J. Trump’s several indictments, including his indictment under the Espionage Act of 1917. It explains how, even while being charged for espionage, Trump and other nonwhistleblower suspects appear to unfairly benefit from a double standard.
The Article gives an exposition of the origins of whistleblower protections in the United States tracing back to a 1778 statute that was enacted after Benjamin Franklin’s revolutionary act of whistleblowing. It also explores the “right to know” vindicated by John Adams during the revolution, before he betrayed his own views by signing the Alien & Sedition Acts into law. It discusses the enactment of the Espionage Act of 1917, certain whistleblower protection statutes, and relevant jurisprudence.
Then, this Article puts the case against Chelsea Manning in legal-historical context. It explains Manning’s position as the first internet whistleblower, and how her case became the crowning achievement of Obama’s experimental “war against whistleblowers” that President Trump attempted to standardize in Reality Winner’s case as though these criminal cases legitimately arose from nonexistent strains of feudal scandalum magnatum precedent in the United States. Finally, it demonstrates why Manning’s trial was unjustly prosecuted, why Manning deserves oblivion and amnesty, and how Congress can extend oblivion and amnesty to her.
This Article sets forth the terms and provisions that Congress should consider enacting in the Chelsea Manning Act of Oblivion and Amnesty. It especially explains how this act should either repeal or amend the Espionage Act in its entirety, by meaningfully distinguishing whistleblowers, irresponsible parties, and actual spies. Furthermore, it demonstrates how Congress can proactively initiate a third period of reconstruction in America through oblivion and amnesty.
This Article concludes the Courting Oblivion series by honoring the contributions of queer, transgender, and intersex people, to the law framed by the writings of Flannery O’Connor. It honors especially those like Marsha P. Johnson, Pauli Murray, and Chelsea Manning, who reached across color lines to create opportunities for justice. It ultimately calls upon Congress to exemplify Joan Didion’s “singular power of self-respect” according to the superior grace of Eve Babitz’s works by finally doing right by whistleblowers, who deserve our forgiveness and our penance
Making Criminal Penalties Collar-Blind on the Federal Level
No full textThis paper is intended to be the first in a series of papers that addresses whether lower income individuals suffer all of the following at much higher rates than their percentage of the population would suggest should be the case: (1) police stops for questioning; (2) arrests; (3) prosecutions; (4) convictions; and (5) lengthy post-conviction incarcerations. In particular, this first paper addresses the question of whether prison sentences imposed for “blue-collar crimes” are significantly longer than prison sentences imposed for “white-collar crimes.” In general, “blue-collar crimes” refer to crimes that are committed by individuals who possess blue-collar professions and “white-collar crimes” refer to crimes that are committed by individuals who possess white-collar possessions.
I practiced as a criminal defense lawyer shortly after I graduated from law school. As a defense counsel, I represented an elderly, homeless, alcoholic man named George, who was facing 20 years in prison for having broken into a friend’s liquor store at night to steal a 20.5 million to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for securities fraud, which amount, in turn, represented only 4% of the 45 million to the SEC for insider trading, but Countrywide indemnified Mozilo for $20 million of that amount. Following Mozilo’s settlement with the SEC, the U.S. Department of Justice dropped its pending prosecution of Mozilo for criminal fraud, despite the fact that he was one of the main causes of the 2007-2008 mortgage crisis. In that crisis, in the U.S. alone, approximately ten million people lost their homes, approximately one million people became homeless, approximately nine million people lost their jobs, and approximately 9.8 trillion dollars in people’s wealth evaporated.
The criminal justice system’s disparate treatment of George and Angelo has haunted me for years. In order to further investigate whether this disparity is merely anecdotal or endemic to our criminal justice system, several students at St. Thomas University Benjamin L. Crump College of Law and I reviewed all of the sentences imposed by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida for each blue-collar crime and each white-collar crime during the first quarter of 2019. Section I of this paper introduces the paper. Section II discusses the cases of George and Angelo, one a blue-collar defendant and the other a white-collar defendant. Section III discusses the history of sentencing for white-collar crimes in the U.S. in general. Section IV explains the methodology employed in the study of all prison sentences imposed by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida in the first quarter of 2019. Section V discusses the results of the study, which revealed that the federal judges in this court, during that time period, imposed significantly longer sentences for blue-collar crimes than for white-collar crimes. Section VI considers some of the possible explanations for the results of this study, and Section VII concludes.
There are a number of possible explanations for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida’s disparate treatment of blue-collar crimes and white-collar crimes on the federal level. This disparity, however, appears to be based largely on the assumption of both the U.S. Congress and the U.S. Sentencing Commission that white-collar crimes are less serious than blue-collar crimes, which assumption is nonsensical for a number of reasons discussed in the paper. In any case, all possible explanations for the significant disparity in sentencing for blue-collar crimes and white-collar crimes by federal judges in general and by the judges of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida in particular should be rigorously investigated. Furthermore, this disparity in sentencing, if it is to be maintained, must be justified by one or more stronger rationale(s) than the nonsensical assumption that white-collar crimes as a group are less serious than blue-collar crimes as a group. Our U.S. system of justice deserves no less
Shale Investment Dashboard in Ohio Q1 and Q2 2024
No full textThis report presents findings from an investigation into shale-related investment in Ohio, looking at up, mid, and downstream activities. The investment estimates are for January through June of 2024. The report also includes an estimate of cumulative investment into shale in Ohio from 2012 through June 2024. Prior biannual investments are included in previously posted reports that are available from Cleveland State University
Diverse Presentations of Aphasia: A Comparative Analysis of Polysynthetic and Analytic Languages through Kanien\u27keha (Mohawk) and English Morphology and Syntax
No full textThis paper looks to compare two linguistically diverse languages, English and Kanien\u27keha, a native American language commonly known as Mohawk. The comparison will revolve around the morphology and syntax typologies of these two languages. In addition to the morphological and syntactic comparison, I will discuss how aphasia presents itself in different language typologies, placing this comparison onto English and Kanien\u27keha. The research questions I look to answer are: How does word formation and sentence structure differ between English and Kanien\u27kéha? Does aphasia present differently in analytic and polysynthetic languages like English and Kanien\u27kéha? The morphological data and syntactic data are be obtained by analyzing speech from a Kanien\u27keha language corpus and a native English speaker informant. The information regarding aphasia will be based on research findings. The goal of this research is to bring a deeper understanding of the Kanien’keha language and its speakers and that this preliminary research will lead to further study of aphasia across multiple polysynthetic languages and in turn lead to a more equal access to care for these communities. Additionally, more research into diverse languages manifestations of aphasia will inevitably lead to a better understanding of the condition as a whole
Prevalence and Predictors of Depression and Other Mental Health Disorders in Brazilian Adults with Intellectual Disabilities: a Population-Based Secondary Analysis
No full textObjectives To investigate the occurrence of depression and mental health disorders other than depression among Brazilian people with intellectual disabilities, analysing data from a national household survey. Design Cross-sectional epidemiological study using data from the 2019 National Health Survey (PNS). Setting Brazil, nationwide data collection in urban and rural private households. Participants 272 499 individuals, among whom 1.2% (n=3198) reported intellectual disabilities. Primary outcome measures Self-reported depression and mental health disorders other than depression (anxiety, panic, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, psychosis or obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD)), either isolated or comorbid. Results Among people with intellectual disabilities, 43.2% reported at least one mental health disorder versus 13.7% without disabilities. In adults aged 0–59 years, intellectual disability was associated with higher odds of depression (adjusted OR (aOR) 3.25, 95% CI 1.76 to 6.00), mental health disorders other than depression (aOR 12.23, 95% CI 7.52 to 19.90) and depression associated with other mental health disorders (aOR 14.34, 95% CI 7.92 to 25.96). In older adults (≥60 years), risks also remained elevated: depression (aOR 1.71, 95% CI 1.04 to 2.79), mental health disorders other than depression (aOR 4.33, 95% CI 2.09 to 8.94) and depression associated with other mental health disorders (aOR 2.98, 95% CI 1.49 to 5.95). Women with intellectual disabilities were more likely to report depression and multimorbidity, while men more often reported non-depressive disorders. Poorer self-perceived health was consistently linked to worse outcomes across age groups. Conclusions Mental health disorders and their comorbidities are significantly more prevalent among people with intellectual disabilities in Brazil. These findings highlight the urgent need for inclusive, equitable and specialised mental healthcare policies