January 13, 2011

POS 359--The Current Supreme Court Term
In class today, Thursday 1/13, I started by quickly going over two decisions of the Supreme Court released on Tuesday this week, Mayo v. U.S. (social security taxes on medical residency "stipends") and Ranson v. FIA Card Services (the right in bankruptcy to take a car-ownership deduction if the debtor is not making car loan or lease payments). We spent the remainder of the class going over the Snyder Brief. We discussed the threads throughout the brief of the concepts of public/private figure, matters of public concern, actual facts/hyperbole. We went over the use of precedent, involving following, extending, and distinguishing precedent. The assignment for Tuesday 1/18 is to read Phelps' (Respondents') Brief, (available through the Supreme Court website through the same path as you used for the Snyder Brief).

POS 282--Introduction to American Law
In class today, Thursday 1/13, I distributed one handout, a template for our case briefs. We discussed some concepts from the introductory section of Chapter 1, and we also went over both the Federal Court system and the state of Maine Court system. We also covered citation format in the Federal Court system. We discussed the relationship between the Bill of Rights and the 14th Amendment, and briefly talked about the strange history of that amendment. Finally, we started our discussion of the AAC case, using the brief template to discuss the introductory parts of that decision. We got as far as "Prior Proceedings" in the brief. The assignment for Tuesday 1/18 is to finish the AAC brief, using the template explanations to figure out what goes (and, just as importantly, what does not go) in each segment. We will discuss your case briefs on Tuesday, but this assignment will not be handed in or graded.