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Finding Condorcet
Get PDFInstant-runoff voting (“IRV”) is having a moment. More than a dozen American localities have adopted it over the last few years. So have two states. Up to four more states may vote on switching to IRV in the 2024 election. In light of this momentum, it’s imperative to know how well IRV performs in practice. In particular, how often does IRV elect the candidate whom a majority of voters prefer over every other candidate in a head-to-head matchup, that is, the Condorcet winner? To answer this question, this Article both surveys the existing literature on American IRV elections and analyzes a new dataset of almost two hundred foreign IRV races. Both approaches lead to the same conclusion: In actual elections—as opposed to in arithmetical examples or in simulated races—IRV almost always elects the Condorcet winner. What’s more, a Condorcet winner almost always exists. These findings help allay the concern that candidates lacking majority support frequently prevail under IRV. The results also reveal an electorate more rational than many might think: voters whose preferences among candidates are, at least, coherent in virtually all cases
Corporations and Labor Unions in Election Law, in The Oxford Handbook of American Election Law (Eugene D. Mazo ed., 2024)
No full textThe Oxford Handbook of American Election Law offers a sophisticated overview of one of the most contested and consequential areas of American law. The book introduces the reader to election law\u27s core themes, provides summaries of its leading cases, guides the reader through key scholarly debates, and suggests areas for future research. The first book of its kind in the field, the Handbook brings together forty-seven leading scholars of election law to explore the doctrines and debates that define this field.
The book begins by explaining how election law relates to its closest academic cousins, including constitutional law and political science. It then explores the major topics in election law, including the right to the vote, the rules of running for office, the role of political parties, the dynamics of redistricting and gerrymandering, the significance of the Voting Rights Act, the intricacies of campaign finance, and the recurring controversies surrounding election administration in the United States. Each chapter of the Handbook offers the reader a careful, detailed, and thorough analysis of thorny terrain, crystallizing controversial issues and situating them within the field\u27s contemporary debates.
The book aims to reach newcomers to the field as well as more sophisticated readers who hope to gain a firmer understanding of election law\u27s many nuances, intricacies, and complexities. Unparalleled in the breadth and depth of its coverage, the Handbook is designed to serve as a resource for students, scholars, policymakers, and practitioners.https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/fac_books/1191/thumbnail.jp
Stitch Incoming: \u3cem\u3eLindke v. Freed\u3c/em\u3e’s Impact on Social-Media-Blocking Litigation
Get PDFSince at least 2016, social-media-blocking litigation against government officials who censor their online critics has been an evolving battleground for First Amendment rights of free speech and petition. In 2024, the United States Supreme Court issued its first substantive opinion on social media blocking, holding that government officials’ social media activity, even on a personal account, constitutes state action triggering constitutional scrutiny if (1) the official possessed actual authority to speak on the State’s behalf, and (2) purported to exercise that authority when she spoke on social media.
In this Article, we explain the Court’s novel two-part test for determining when a public official engages in state action on social media sufficient to support a constitutional claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Lindke v. Freed clearly (and correctly) establishes that public officials can act in their official capacity when operating a personal social media account. The Court’s default presumption in the second prong of the test, however, improperly allocates the burden of proof to private citizens in close cases to prove whether the government official subjectively intended her social media speech to be personal or official. As we show, this part of the decision is out of step with the Court’s state-action precedent and will lead to unacceptable chill and restraint of protected speech. We therefore introduce a revised standard—an objective “reasonable viewer” approach—that is more in line with long-standing First Amendment principles, which we urge the Court to adopt in future cases
Discrimination, Model Rule 8.4(g), and the ABA’s Quixotic Quest for Uniformity
Get PDFUnder American Bar Association (“ABA”) Model Rule 8.4(g), it is professional misconduct for a lawyer to engage in conduct related to the practice of law that the lawyer knows, or reasonably should know, is harassment or discrimination on the basis of race and other protected characteristics. Widespread concerns over the breadth and lack of clarity concerning the rule have triggered substantial criticism, including the refusal of multiple states to adopt this model rule. Instead, several states have responded by introducing alternative versions of Model Rule 8.4(g) or by applying older rules of professional conduct in the case of discriminatory speech or harassing conduct on the part of lawyers.
This Article discusses the ongoing dialogue between the states and the ABA concerning the kind of form a rule regulating discrimination and harassment within the profession should take. The Article highlights some of the complex issues involved through an examination of several high-profile cases involving controversial speech on the part of lawyers and in light of the ABA’s longstanding goals of promoting greater clarity and uniformity concerning the rules of professional conduct. It also examines the potential for some of these state alternatives to provide rule makers with greater insight into the benefits and potential drawbacks of relying upon Rule 8.4(g) or other legal ethics rules designed to deal with the issue of discrimination in the legal profession. Ultimately, the Article concludes that the values of clarity and uniformity should give way to the values of innovation and experimentation at the state level
Exploring the Powell Archives at Washington and Lee University School of Law
Get PDFWashington and Lee University School of Law has the distinct honor of housing the archives of Virginia lawyer and Supreme Court of the United States Justice Lewis F. Powell Jr. he mission of the Powell Archives is to collect, preserve, and facilitate access to the rare and unique materials held by the Wilbur C. Hall Law Library. Virginia attorneys have access to the Powell Archives and Special Collections, a valuable resource for legal research and exploration
Smouldering Semantics
No full textLaw privileges remedies such as incarceration and, in the case of the ICJ, satisfaction, restitution, and compensation. Diverse remedies, like divestment and shareholder activism, remain marginal. It is indeed refreshing to me that the protests roiling university campuses do not call for criminal prosecution, or ICJ denunciation, but rather for divestment and thereby open a conversation about wider causal elements. Law also privileges a reductionism--there is one blameworthy entity at fault, namely, the defendant, the respondent, or the accused. Such a parsimonious approach obscures the broader forces that conspire to seed the loneliness and abandonment that, to me, is a sine qua non of genocide and other atrocity crimes. The pain of the Palestinian people in Gaza derives to differing degrees from multiple sources, including the actions (and noteworthy omissions) of many states well beyond Israel as well as the conduct of Hamas itself. In the end, then, the eager embrace of international law and judicial institutions--a premise of this symposium in the case of Gaza--may fail to foreground more expansive language that resonates with broader audiences and addresses the multiple overlapping causes of atrocities
Sights, Sounds, and Sensibilities of Atrocity Prosecutions (Mark A. Drumbl & Caroline Fournet eds., 2024)
No full textThis book unlocks the look, sound, smell, taste, and feel of justice for massive human rights abuses. Twenty-nine expert authors examine the dynamics of the five human senses in how atrocity is perceived, remembered, and condemned. This book is chockful of images. It serves up remarkably diverse content. It treks around the globe: from Pacific war crimes trials in the aftermath of the Second World War to Holocaust proceedings in contemporary Germany, France, and Israel; from absurd show trials in Communist Czechoslovakia to international courtrooms in Arusha, Phnom Penh, and The Hague. Readers embark on a journey that transcends myriad dimensions, including photographic representations of grandfatherly old torturers in Argentina, narco-trafficking in Mexico, colonialisation in India, disinformation and misinformation pixelated in cyberspace, environmental degradation in Cambodia, militarism in Northern Ireland, and civil rights activism in Atlanta. Sights, Sounds, and Sensibilities of Atrocity Prosecutions reimagines what an atrocity means, reconsiders what drives the manufacture of law, and reboots the role of courtrooms and other mechanisms in the pursuit of justice. It unveils how law translates sensory experience into its procedures and institutions, and how humanistic inputs shape perceptions of right and wrong. This book thereby offers a refreshing primer on the underappreciated role of aesthetics, time, and emotion in the world of law.https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/fac_books/1180/thumbnail.jp
Enforcing International Law Against Corporations: A Stakeholder Management Approach
Get PDFThere is an important but oft neglected relationship between the problems of corporate governance and international law. Corporate managers grapple with how to respond to society\u27s demands that their enterprises do better when it comes to protecting people and the planet. These demands take many forms, including increased pressure for “sustainability” and “environmental, social, and governance” (“ESG”) measures. These demands are made in response to the economic, social, environmental, and political crises facing our world and a recognition of the responsibility of corporations and other business actors to contribute to their resolution. What is often unrecognized is that many of these crises occur because corporations fail to follow international law. Corporate misdeeds often arise from the violation of international law norms on human rights, environmental protection, sustainable development, and use of force, among others. International law can guide corporate managers on meeting the public\u27s demand for more responsible business practices if they would only follow it.
The problem is enforcement: Many corporate actors do not abide by international law because the international legal order lacks adequate mechanisms to ensure their compliance. Specifically, an international legal order based on enforcement by state actors may fail to produce robust corporate compliance because, on many occasions, governments are unwilling or unable to ensure that corporations within their jurisdictions obey international law. This Article borrows insights from stakeholder management to reveal that corporate actors frequently align their behavior to conform to the values and expectations of a range of non-state actors--corporate stakeholders--such as consumers, employees, insurers, financial institutions, investors, industry organizations, and non-governmental organizations (“NGOs”), among others. These stakeholders can address important gaps in the international legal order by offering incentives that nudge corporate actors toward compliance with international law. This Article develops a typology of enforcement strategies practiced by corporate stakeholders: predicative, facilitative, direct, and amplification. It emphasizes the multiple audiences for international law enforcement: The actions of corporate stakeholders not only change the preferences of the targets--the corporate actors--to comply with international law, but also the incentives of the intermediaries--other corporate stakeholders--to enforce international law. This Article thereby contributes to the scholarship on who enforces international law, why they do so, and if they can be relied upon to do it again. In so doing, it provides corporate stakeholders with a framework to contextualize their own individual efforts and to calibrate their efforts with those of other stakeholders for more effective enforcement of international law
W&L Law Library Newsletter, Vol. 4, Iss. 1 (Dec. 2024)
Get PDFW&L Law Library Newsletter, Volume 4, Issue 1 (December 2024).https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/llnewsletter/1006/thumbnail.jp
Transnational Blame Attribution: The Limits of Using Reputational Sanctions to Punish Corporate Misconduct, in States, Firms, and Their Legal Fictions (Melissa J. Durkee ed., 2024)
No full textThis volume offers a new point of entry into questions about how the law conceives of states and firms. Because states and firms are fictitious constructs rather than products of evolutionary biology, the law dictates which acts should be attributed to each entity, and by which actors. Those legal decisions construct firms and states by attributing identity and consequences to them. As the volume shows, these legal decisions are often products of path dependence or conceptual metaphors like “personhood” that have expanded beyond their original uses. Focusing on attribution, the volume considers an array of questions about artificial entities that are usually divided into doctrinal siloes. These include questions about attribution of international legal responsibility to states and state-owned entities, transnational attribution of liabilities to firms, and attribution of identity rights to corporations. Durkee highlights the artificiality of doctrines that construct firms and states, and therefore their susceptibility to change.https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/fac_books/1193/thumbnail.jp