Less Safe in the Ivory Tower: Campus Sexual Assault Policy in the Trump Administration

ABSTRACT

Since the late 20th century, the federal government has regulated colleges’ and universities’ handling of campus sexual and gender-based violence (CSGBV). Although the arc of history has bent toward establishing greater protections for victims of such violence, new proposed regulation by the U.S. Department of Education under the Trump administration focuses more heavily on ensuring due process rights for students accused of CSGBV. Most recently, in November 2018, U.S. Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos submitted a proposed rule change to the regulation of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. This article provides the historical context for this most recent proposed federal regulation of CSGBV and discusses the criticism of this proposal that, if it is implemented, students would become less safe in the ivory tower.     

What do forensic analysts consider relevant to their decision making?

In response to research demonstrating that irrelevant contextual information can bias forensic science analyses, authorities have increasingly urged laboratories to limit analysts' access to irrelevant and potentially biasing information (Dror and Cole (2010) [3]; National Academy of Sciences (2009) [18]; President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (2016) [22]; UK Forensic Science Regulator (2015) [26]). However, a great challenge in implementing this reform is determining which information is task-relevant and which is task-irrelevant. In the current study, we surveyed 183 forensic analysts to examine what they consider relevant versus irrelevant in their forensic analyses. Results revealed that analysts generally do not regard information regarding the suspect or victim as essential to their analytic tasks. However, there was significant variability among analysts within and between disciplines. Findings suggest that forensic science disciplines need to agree on what they regard as task-relevant before context management procedures can be properly implemented. The lack of consensus about what is relevant information not only leaves room for biasing information, but also reveals foundational gaps in what analysts consider crucial in forensic decision making.     

Three cheers for liberal modesty

ABSTRACT

Many liberals have been immodest in postulating that their own progressive, secular liberalism is the only one that can be justified in public reason. In Liberalism’s Religion, I articulate a more modest theory of liberalism and religion. While I personally endorse progressive secular liberalism, I argue that it is only one of the reasonable conceptions of liberal justice. This liberal modesty has profound, hitherto unnoticed implications for (i) the role of religious arguments in the public sphere, (ii) the legitimacy of religious establishment, and (iii) the justifiability of religious exemptions. In this article, I defend these three claims by providing replies to my critics.     

Congressional Vote Options

Numerous accounts reveal that congressional leaders often secure “hip‐pocket votes” or “if you need me” pledges from rank‐and‐file legislators. These are essentially options on votes. Leaders exercise sufficient options—pay legislators to convert to favorable votes—when those options will yield victory. Otherwise, they release the options. A model shows that this optimal strategy for leaders produces many small victories, few small losses, and losses that are, on average, larger than victories. We find precisely these patterns, hence strong evidence for vote options, in Congressional Quarterly key votes from 1975 through 2001 and in non‐key votes from the 106th Congress (1999–2000).     

REACH: A Step Change in the Management of Chemicals

The EU has regulated chemicals since the late 1960s using both general and sectoral legislation, and exposure-based, hazard-based and risk-based decisions. A new proposal from the European Commission – on the Registration, Evaluation and Authorization of Chemicals (REACH) – will build on the experiences of the existing legislation and introduce some new concepts in the management of chemicals. This article is aimed at assessing the current chemical control mechanisms in the EU and those put forward in REACH to demonstrate how REACH is a new paradigm in chemicals management. REACH will carry forward today's experience and approach to the management of chemicals in the EU and introduces some novel aspects, such as utilizing market-based mechanisms and putting into operation the 'substitution principle'.     

RICO: The genesis of an idea

In 1970, the Congress enacted the Organized Crime Control Act. Title IX of the 1970 Act is the Racketeer Influence and Corrupt Organization Act or RICO. This Act had its origins in legislation going back as far as 1934, but coming forward to 1961. The 1970 Act borrowed ideas from this earlier legislation, principally “enterprise,” but also the use predicate statutes to define “racketeering activity.” The ideas are not new, but their combination affects how prosecutors and law enforcement agents investigate, try, and sanction violations of the Act. RICO’s drafting also reflects organizational theory and economic analysis. The investigation and prosecution of a single crime committed by an individual on a single day and in a single place maybe done using one set of procedural and evidentiary rules. Nevertheless, the investigation and prosecution of patterns of diverse offenses committed by, through, and against licit and illicit enterprises require sophisticated procedures, evidentiary rules, and criminal sanctions. In addition, antisocial conduct is more than a challenge to the administration of criminal justice; it also requires the full panoply of civil sanctions, including public injunctions as well private enforcement of injunctive relief and treble damages. RICO has had a profound effect on the prosecution of organized crime, white-collar crime, and other forms of similar criminal behavior. William J. & Dorothy K. O’Neill Professor of Law, Notre Dame Law School; A.B. 1957, University of Notre Dame; J.D. 1960, Notre Dame Law School. Professor Blakey was the Chief Counsel of the Subcommittee on Criminal Laws and Procedures of the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary in 1969-70 when the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970, Pub. L. No. 91-542, 84 Stat. 922 (1970) was processed, Title IX of which is the Racketeer Influence and Corrupt Organization Act or RICO. For a general treatment of the statute from a variety of perceptive, see the collection of law review literature in G. Robert Blakey & Kevin Roddy, “Reflections on Reves v. Ernst & Young: Its Meaning an Impact on Substantive, Accessory, Aiding, Abetting and Conspiracy Liability under RICO,” 33 Amer. Crim. L. Rev. 1345, 1348 n. 3(1996).     

'Tangential Relation' criterion clears way for infringement of amended patent claim under doctrine of equivalents

Prosecution history estoppel generally bars patent infringementunder the doctrine of equivalents when a claim is narrowed byamendment during examination, but the ‘tangential relation’criterion preserves that doctrine when the claim is narrowedin a manner unrelated to the particular equivalent which, itis alleged, infringes the patent.     

THE EVOLUTION—OR END—OF MARRIAGE?: REFLECTIONS ON THE IMPASSE OVER SAME‐SEX MARRIAGE

The debate over legalizing same‐sex marriage implicates the question of whether doing so would signal the end—or destruction—of the institution of marriage. The appeal to preserving a millennia‐old tradition of marriage against change fails to reckon with the evolution that has already occurred. Invocations of gender complementarity between parents as essential to child well‐being also conflict with growing recognition in family law that children's best interests can be served by gay and lesbian parents. Canada's path toward same‐sex marriage suggests that impasse need not be inevitable. In the United States, this impasse stems in part from the problem that same‐sex marriage serves as an emblem of everything that threatens marriage.