Georgetown University Law Center

About: Georgetown University Law Center is a based out in . It is known for research contribution in the topics: Supreme court & Public health. The organization has 585 authors who have published 2488 publications receiving 36650 citations. The organization is also known as: Georgetown Law & GULC.

The Twenty Year Test: Principles for an Enduring Counterterrorism Legal Architecture

Abstract: The United States faces three enduring terrorism-related threats. First, there is the realistic prospect of additional attacks in the United States including attacks using weapons of mass destruction (“WMD”). Second, in responding to this threat, we may undermine the freedoms that enrich our lives, the tolerance that marks our society, and the democratic values that define our government. Third, if we are too focused on terrorism, we risk losing sight of this century’s other certain threats as well as the capacity to respond to them, including the state proliferation of nuclear weapons, nation-state rivalry, pandemic disease, oil dependency, and environmental degradation.The United States should respond to these threats using all available and appropriate security tools, on offense and in defense. Law is one of the essential security tools. Law provides substantive authority to act. Law can also provide and embed an effective process of preview and review to test proposals and validate actions, ensuring that they are both lawful and effective. However, the United States has been slow, or perhaps unwilling, to adopt a legal architecture that maximizes each of these legal benefits. Instead, the political branches have generally adopted an incremental approach, or relied on the President’s authority as Commander in Chief to define the law.This paper describes four principles that should inform the design of a lasting legal architecture to counterterrorism: First, the architecture should reflect an understanding of the strategic value of law in substance, process, and policy. Second, the architecture should reflect the threats it is intended to address, including the potential catastrophic nature of the physical threat, which distinguishes this form of terrorism from that of the past. Third, with limited exception, the law should avoid absolutes — in the authority asserted; in the authority prohibited; or, in bureaucratic design. Finally, the architecture should be lasting, which means among other things that it should be “constitutionally inclusive” in design. A lasting and inclusive architecture will improve security — by maximizing the Executive’s authority to act, sustaining support for tools and policies, and improving the opportunity and efficacy to appraise U.S. actions.

Towards Post-Modern Trade Relations?

Abstract: In the years since the publication of The New Global Trading Order: The Evolving State and the Future of Trade, Dennis Patterson and Ari Afilao’s ideas have lost none of their originality and their call for reimagining the law and institutions of international trade governance remains an open challenge. The authors offer a long-term historical reframing of the relationship between trade regulation and the dominant role of the state. The analysis hinges on what the authors view as a radical shift away from the dominant model of the ‘modern’ welfare nation-state after the fall of the Iron Curtain. They argue that despite the world being ushered into a different era at this historical moment, the institutions, law and politics of trade governance remained largely unchanged. The analysis culminates in proposals for a new style of statecraft, and institutions to match, that would be better suited to the political and economic realities of our time. At the core of this transformative project lies the argument that ‘neither politics nor economics alone hold the key to unlocking solutions to the problems presented by global trade’ (1). Rather, the authors’ focus is on the relationship between the state and trade governance. They argue that the trade order reflects the dominant constitutional order of the state at different points in history, and the current crisis regarding statehood and trade governance stems from the unacknowledged disconnect between the present de facto role of the state and the de jure status quo of trade regulation. Perhaps most intriguingly, the book seeks to combine a post-modern approach to trade law and statecraft with what is in many ways a historical, progressive, rationalist perspective. The 270-page volume is organised into eight substantive chapters, each of which is prefaced by a summary thesis statement. Throughout, the authors deploy a writing style and analytical techniques that make the book eminently legible for trade and non-trade scholars alike.

Top 10 Law School Home Pages of 2009

Abstract: The website home page represents the virtual front door for any law school. It’s the place many prospective students start in the application process. Enrolled students, law school faculty and other employees often start with the home page to find classes, curricula and compensation plans. Home page content changes constantly. Deciding which home pages are good is often very subjective. Creating a ranking system for “good taste” is perhaps impossible. The ranking report "Top 10 Law School Home Pages of 2009" includes a tabulation of fourteen objective design criteria to analyze and rank 195 law school home pages. The intent was to count only objective criteria to attempt to find the best sites. All law school home pages were ranked based on a weighted analysis of these criteria. Pictures of the ten best sites are included in the report, followed by a full tabulation of all schools evaluated for the report. The goal was to include elements that make websites easier to use for sighted as well as visually-impaired users. Most elements require no special design skills, sophisticated technology or significant expenses.

The Story of Laidlaw, Standing and Citizen Enforcement

Abstract: This chapter reexamines the Supreme Court's recent Laidlaw decision, placing the decision and statutorily authorized "citizen suits" in historical and jurisprudential context. Relying substantially on interviews with lawyers on the case and clients, the chapter reviews the strategic decisions leading to the Supreme Court's unexpectedly strong reaffirmation of citizen suit standing in Laidlaw. The chapter traces the Court's uncertain standing doctrine shifts, showing how, since the fragmented 1993 Lujan decision, members of the Supreme Court adopted substantially different analytical approaches to standing. For Justices Scalia and Thomas, and perhaps a few other justices, constitutional standing analysis required judges to find a sufficiently tangible injury. Other Justices, most notably Justices Stevens, Ginsburg, Breyer, Souter and Kennedy, viewed standing through a more statutory lens. The universe of interests, goals and procedures set forth in an underlying statute would, for these justices, influence standing analysis. During the period leading up to the Laidlaw decision, lower courts and the justices themselves struggled to render standing jurisprudence coherent. Several appellate court decisions, including the Fourth Circuit's Laidlaw decision, adopted expansive reads of Lujan that threatened to destroy the viability of statutorily authorized citizen suits. The Supreme Court's Laidlaw ruling, however, strongly embraced a more deferential approach to standing and ensured the viability of citizen suits. Nevertheless, the case's tortuous and long litigation path also reveals just how difficult and often unrewarding citizen suits have become. The chapter closes by assessing the future of citizen suits and standing challenges.