Mississippi College School of Law
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How Far Have Standards of Decency Evolved in Fifteen Years? An Update on Atkins Jurisprudence in Mississippi
Full text linkIn 2002, the United States Supreme Court handed down Atkins v. Virginia, holding that the Eighth Amendment prohibits the execution of people with intellectual disability. In the years since that ruling, some change has occurred, but questions remain. This article will examine significant developments in Atkins jurisprudence during that time period. It will look at the two post-Atkins United States Supreme Court cases, and the development of the law - in Mississippi especially, but also to some extent in other jurisdictions that still have the death penalty
Parks and Separation: How the Mississippi Legislature Decided Just Compensation in Bay Point Properties, Inc. v. Mississippi Transportation Commission
Full text linkAt first glance, Bay Point comes across as the standard, run-of-the-mill eminent domain case: the government contracts with a citizen for an express easement over privately-owned land limited to a certain use; the government then exceeds the scope of that easement, resulting in a taking. Governmental taking is usually not anything outside of the norm. But with a potential seven billion dollars\u27 worth of federally funded highway projects destined for Mississippi highway only a Presidential signature away from being approved, this decision is not one Mississippi landowners should ignore. Further, the crux of Bay Point lies with an issue of separation of powers. Because of the Supreme Court of Mississippi\u27s holding, gone are the days when the judiciary determines just compensation in takings cases involving the state\u27s highway department. Instead, courts will yield to statutory provisions of the legislatively determined result. Justice Gorsuch, in dissenting to the United States Supreme Court\u27s denial of a writ of certiorari in the case, seemed to recognize the national implications of the Bay Point decision and encouraged the Court to take up [the issue] at its next opportunity.
This Note argues the Supreme Court of Mississippi erred in its approach in Bay Point by relying on Mississippi Code section 65-1-123, instead of common law abandonment precedent
The Work-Rule Doctrine Doesn\u27t Work After Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Products
Full text linkThis Note is about an existing plague on employment-law jurisprudence in the Fifth Circuit. Small and big companies alike can terminate an employee for no discriminatory reason but then be tagged with a lawsuit that has a fair chance of success, just because the disgruntled former employee is willing to lie or the parties disagree over the facts. This is true even though no evidence of actual discrimination exists. The work-rule doctrine changes at-will employment to good-will employment under the guise of federal employment discrimination statutes. Whatever your position is on the longstanding at-will employment regimes, there can be no doubt that discrimination statutes do not, by their text, outlaw adverse employment decisions that are unrelated to a statutorily-protected trait. But in the Fifth Circuit, these clear statutory limitations are subverted by the work-rule doctrine
Protecting Sincerely Held Religious Beliefs : Lessons From Mississippi HB 1523
Full text linkThe United States Supreme Court\u27s revolutionary ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, which guaranteed marriage equality for homosexual couples in every state, gave life to a new challenge in the area of free exercise of religion: to what extent should persons with religious objections to same-sex marriages be forced to participate in them? Should a Christian baker be legally required to bake a wedding cake for a homosexual marriage to which he or she objects? Must a county clerk with religious objections to homosexual marriage sign a marriage license for a same-sex couple?
In an attempt to pre-empt these types of issues, Mississippi\u27s legislature passed House Bill 1523 which protects three sincerely held religious beliefs. The bill extends protections to those who hold the belief that: (a) Marriage is or should be recognized as the union of one man and one woman; (b) Sexual relations are properly reserved to such a marriage; and (c) Male (man) or female (woman) refer to an individual\u27s immutable biological sex as objectively determined by anatomy and genetics at time of birth
