February 3, 2015

POS 282 INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN LAW
In class today, Tuesday 2/3, I distributed two handouts: an article by Brittany Maynard written prior to her own assisted suicide last November, and my version of the Glucksberg case brief. We first talked about the concept of assisted suicide, as exemplified by Brittany Maynard's death. We then started the case brief of Glucksberg. We went over Supreme Court citation form (and the order in which the parties are listed). We went over the federal court system organization, including both the Court of Appeals three-judge panels, and the rehearings en banc. We went over the possible causes of action in any legal case, listing the six most common ones. In discussing the previous Cruzan case, we went over levels of persuasion (burden of proof) from beyond a reasonable doubt, down to clear and convincing evidence, to preponderance of the evidence. We went over the methodology used by the Court to decide if the constitution does forbid the criminalization of assisted suicide, both in how the right gets described, and the analysis of the historical record. Those were the first two issues that I thought the Glucksberg Court dealt with. We will continue with the rest of the Court's opinion, as well as Souter's concurrence, on Thursday. The assignment for Thursday 2/5 is to read the two handouts; review Glucksberg and the case brief, and read and prepare for yourself (not handed in or graded) a case brief of Lawrence v. Texas, pp. 68-72 of the text.


POS 383 AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONAL LAW
In class today, Tuesday 2/3, I distributed one handout, my version of an outline of McCulloch. I first discussed the textbook's praise of the division of power between the state and central government. We discussed the parallel federal and state court systems, and such examples of cooperative federalism as Obamacare. We then started going through the McCulloch opinion, looking for the structure of the opinion. We looked for what questions Marshall was addressing, and what his answers were. We got as far Marshall's reply to Maryland's plea that they can be trusted not to tax the federal bank out of existence ("confidence"). We will pick up at that point of McCulloch on Thursday, and then go on to discuss the Dred Scott case. The additional assignment for Thursday 2/5 is to read in the text through p. 356 and to try an outline (not handed in or graded) of New York v. U.S., following the format of my McCulloch outline. Also, please remember to bring your text to class each day.