April 28, 2017

POS 282 INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN LAW
In class today, Friday 4/28, I collected the Gaeth case briefs, and hope to return them on Monday. I distributed 2 handouts: my version of the Gaeth case brief, and the U.S. Supreme Court case of V.L. v. E.L. We first went over Gaeth, including the three possible versions of the service by publication issue, and the facts that go to each of the different versions. I discussed the changes to the MRCivP that followed Gaeth, both in the text of the rule, and in the advisory committee notes. We then returned to subject matter jurisdiction, I reviewed the Maine case that I discussed last time, Landmark Realty v.Leasure. I talked about a U.S. Supreme Court case, Bowles v. Russell, that gave a very different interpretation of what is meant by subject matter jurisdiction. I gave an introduction to today's handout of V.L. v. E.L., which goes over the rules of Full Faith and Credit and subject matter jurisdiction in the context of a same-sex adoption case.
The assignment for Monday May 1 is to review Swoboda v. Hero Decks (previously assigned) and to read today's handout of V.L. v. E.L.


POS 384 CIVIL LIBERTIES
In class today, Friday 4/28, I distributed one handout, the Summaries of the Arguments in the Supreme Court briefing in Trinity Lutheran Church v. Comer. We finished our discussion of Boerne v. Flores. We went over the question of Congressional power under Section 5 of the 14th Amendment, and how the Court majority found that RFRA was not enforcement by appropriate legislation. We also looked at the concurring and the dissenting opinions in the case. We talked also about RFRA under federal statutes (e.g. Hobby Lobby) and RLUIPA (using a different source of Congressional power). We began to discuss the situation in Locke v. Davey, in which the state of Washington argued that it was free not to aid religion with the use of its college scholarships, even though it would be permitted to do so under the Establishment clause if it wanted to do so.
The assignment for Monday May 1 is to review the majority opinion in Locke (previously assigned), to read the Locke dissent, and to read today's handout.