May 2. 2014

POS 282 INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN LAW
In class today, Friday 5/2, I first reminded the class that the exam will be Wednesday from 9:00-10:00. If you are missing any handouts, you must email me with what you need by Tuesday evening. We then started discussing the concept of personal jurisdiction. We discussed domicile and service of process. We then went over Robey v. Hinners, going through both the preliminary question of whether the issue of personal jurisdiction could still be raised, and then the substantive question of whether Hinners' contact with Kentucky were sufficient to allow the Kentucky Court system to assert jurisdiction over Hinners. (By the way, Kentucky and Missouri do share a land border.) Along the way, we also discussed conflict of law rules, full faith and credit, statutes of limitation, and federal diversity jurisdiction. See you Wednesday at 9:00.

POS 384 CIVIL LIBERTIES
In class today, Friday 5/2, I first reminded the class that the exam will be Wednesday from 10:30-11:30. If you are missing any handouts, you must email me with what you need by Tuesday evening. I collected the Drake papers, and I plan to return them on Wednesday. We then talked about how the case should come out (assuming that the Court grants cert, something that's on their agenda to try to decide again today). The class was almost unanimous that the N.J. law should be ruled unconstitutional, given Heller's language about the right to self-defense. See you Wednesday at 10:30.


POS 359 THE CURRENT SUPREME COURT TERM
In class today, Friday 5/2, I went over the recent 4th Amendment case of Navarette v. California, which allowed the use of an anonymous tip as providing reasonable suspicion for a traffic stop. I also briefly discussed this week's opinion in EPA v. Homer City, which endorsed the power of the EPA to come up with a formula regarding emissions that travel from state to state, even in the absence of Congressional language that would allow such a formula. I hope that you have a good summer, and will continue to follow the exploits of the Court.