October 5, 2012

POS 282 INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN LAW
In class today, Friday 10/5, we first went over some aspects of the Bragg (assigned case brief) case that might be confusing. We went over the concept of a Terry stop, from the 4th amendment case that allows the police to briefly detain and question a person without having "probable cause". We discussed the different standards of review by appellate courts involved in factual issues ("clear error") versus legal issues ("de novo"). We went over why U.S. constitutional issues dealt with by the First Circuit Court of Appeals (our circuit) are not mandatory authority over the Maine Supreme Court faced with those same constitutional issues. And finally, I reminded the class that in my case brief format, there is no segment that relates the story of a case, or the background facts; the "key facts" segment of the case brief only includes those specific circumstances that are relied on by the court to decide the operative legal question.
We then finished the Katko case brief. We looked at why the cited U.S. Supreme Court case was not treated as mandatory authority. We went over the failure of Briney's lawyer to properly object to the punitive damages jury instruction, and how the Iowa Supreme Court dealt with that. We then went over the two objections by the dissenting Justice. We went over four levels of mental state regarding the injurious conduct (intent, knowledge, recklessness and negligence) and then examined the difference between the intent that the dissenting Justice thought should be required under Iowa common law versus the intent that was included in the jury instructions. Finally we looked at the dissenting Justice's view of punitive damages.
The assignment for Wednesday 10/10 is to continue working on the Bragg case brief, and, in addition, read and prepare to discuss pp. 32-36 of the text.

POS 359 FEDERALISM
In class today, Friday 10/5, only one student in the class showed up. Looks like the early vacation bug hit hard. When we are all in class again on Wednesday, we will continue with the previously assigned Ginsburg dissent, as well as the two previously assigned adjuncts to her dissent, the Scalia concurrence in Gonzalez v. Raich, and the NFIB Joint Dissent discussion of the Necessary and Proper Clause. The assignment is to continue work on Assignment #1.

POS 359 THE CURRENT SUPREME COURT TERM
In class today, Friday 10/5, we continued with the Grutter dissenting opinions. looking at both the Kennedy and Scalia dissents. We will finish up with the Thomas dissent when we convene again on Wednesday. Rearding the Thomas dissent, I asked the class to go through it and give a one sentence label to each of the seven numbered parts of the opinion. The additional reading for Wednesday 10/10 is to read the Petitioner's Brief in Fisher v. University of Texas. To access the brief, go to the supremecourt.gov site, select Merits Briefs/ Online Merits briefs (which takes you to the ABA site). select October 2012, and then scroll down to Week 2, Fisher v. University of Texas. Select Petitioner's Brief, although we'll be reading all 3 of the merits briefs, so you may as well print them all now.