September 12, 2012

POS 282 INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN LAW
In class today, Wednesday 9/12, we started going over the briefing of the VSDA case. We first covered citation form, including the organization of the federal court system, the various treatment of the order of the naming of the parties, and the various publications that report decisions in the federal court system. We also went over original objective, cause of action, trial court defense and prior proceeding. We will pick up with present proceedings on Friday. The assignment for Friday 9/14 is to continue working on the VSDA case brief.

POS 359 FEDERALISM
In class today, Wednesday 9/12, we went over some differences between the Articles of Confederation versus the Constitution. We covered Articles I, II, and part of III, finding their analog in the Constitution. We will continue with this comparison (perhaps in less detail) on Friday. The additional assignment for Friday 9/14 is to read pp. 61-73 of the text.

POS 359 THE CURRENT SUPREME COURT TERM
In class today, Wednesday 9/12, I distributed one handout, the list of oral arguments for the October 1 session of the Supreme Court. We continued our discussion of the Greenhouse book, going over the distinction between cases that raise statutory issues versus constitutional issues, and I went over three distinct types of constitutional issues: individual rights versus government control, federal power versus state power, and separation of power questions between the three branches of government. We also discussed the power of the Congress to strip the federal courts of jurisdiction over specific types of cases, as well as to decide how the federal court system is organized. The assignment for Friday 9/14 is to read through p. 82 of the text.