General Course Descriptions for Terms: constitutional
725 - Introduction to Criminal Procedure
This course is designed to help you understand the key legal decision points in a criminal case, from the commission of a crime through the imposition of sentence, as well as the context in which these decisions are made. The discussion problems in each chapter and the class assignments are intended to help you develop a range of fundamental lawyering skills, including the ability to begin exercising legal discretion—a difficult skill, even for practiced attorneys. By the end of this course, you should be able to: • Identify the steps in a criminal prosecution, both prior to and following the commencement of a formal criminal action. • Recite the basic governing principles that guide police in searches, seizures, and interrogations, and that govern the disclosure of discovery documents by prosecutors. • Possess a basic understanding of the criminal and civil ramifications of criminal conviction. • Understand the role of the lawyer at each stage of a case, from pre-charge interrogation through sentencing. • Identify and know how to utilize multiple sources of legal guidance relevant to criminal cases, including Constitutional principles, administrative rules, ABA Standards, ethics rules, and local rules and policies. • Define and understand what discretion means and how it is exercised throughout the adjudication of a criminal case.
731 - Constitutional Law
An introduction to the constitutional law of the United States covering the basic structure of government in the United States, with emphasis on the federal government. Includes the role of the federal courts and the doctrine of judicial review; the rise of federal power, as reflected particularly in shifting definitions of "interstate commerce," the doctrine of separation of powers, with emphasis on current issues of legislative and executive branch authority; and judicial and other limitations on the exercise of authority by the states as well as selected rights protected in the Amendments to the Constitution.
740 - Constitutional Law II
Rights of citizens against state and federal governments; the nature of due process and the equal protection of the law; the protection of freedom from invidious discrimination; the Civil Rights Acts; freedoms of expression, association, and religion.
744 - Administrative Law
This course is an introduction to the federal administrative state. We will study both the powers that agencies possess and the constitutional, statutory, and other limitations on those powers. We will explore the relationship of agencies to Congress, the courts, the President, and the public; the procedures through which agencies operate; and the availability and scope of judicial review of agency action. Along the way, we will consider the rationales for delegating power to agencies, the implications of the ways agencies are structured, and the values that do or should guide agency conduct. The course thus has theoretical components, but it is also extremely practical, and I will emphasize both theory and practice during the course. The work of federal agencies affects nearly every area of modern life, from environmental protection to financial markets to national security—not to mention public health, medicine,voting, and mail.This course will prepare you to engage with that law, whether as a public servant, a lawyer representing a client, or a citizen interacting with your government. Understanding how regulation works will serve you well in your legal careers (and your lives), whatever you choose to do with your degree.
790 - Law of Democracy
This course will examine the laws that structure the U.S. democratic system. Topics will include voting rights, electoral districting, the regulation of political parties, and campaign finance. We will address the key constitutional principles and federal statutory provisions that govern these areas, with special emphasis on recent legal developments. In addition to covering doctrine, the course will consider the theoretical underpinnings of the electoral system, the role of courts in overseeing the system, and proposals for reform.
830 - Land Use Controls
Limitations imposed upon the use of privately owned land by the court-made law of nuisance, by private covenant, and by public action; master plan, official map, subdivision regulation, zoning, and urban redevelopment. This course will attempt to demystify the legal system by providing an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the operation and functioning of the legal system and its impact on planning. The course will provide a brief historical overview of the operation of law within a federalist form of government and provide students with an appreciation of the behaviors and structures of the different units of government available to bring about sound planning outcomes. The course will introduce students to the basic legal principles governing the areas of local government, real estate, contract, planning, zoning, environmental, administrative, and constitutional law. The course will explore the role of planners and lawyers within this system. While the course is primarily focused on the legal system in the United States, students will be exposed to foreign legal systems for comparative purposes.
854 - Clinical Program: Constitutional Litigation, Appeals & Sentencing Project (CLASP) (AKK Session)
901 - First Amendment
Explores American constitutional law governing speech, association, the press, and religion. It focuses on the leading First Amendment cases that have created the most expansive protection for expression anywhere in the world. Consider not only the reasons for protecting these rights, but also countervailing interests - such as public safety, national security, and equality - that may justify restrictions on expression. Consider arguments that the U.S. Supreme Court has gone too far in protecting some forms of speech and association, such as false statements, sexually explicit materials, hate speech, and corporate political spending.
904 - Sel Prob Con Law: Constitutional Rights and Criminal Justice
This course provides an overview and critical examination of constitutional law as it relates to criminal justice issues. This course will examine the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments with specific focus on policing, mass incarceration, and prisoners’ rights.
915 - SP Crim. J. Admin: Criminal Injustice in America
Examine historical and structural injustices that drive racially discriminatory practices and outcomes in the criminal legal system. Explore the system’s racially discriminatory approach to surveillance, street detention, arrest, charging, pretrial detention, trial, sentencing, and probation. Consider how constitutional “rights” expand the discretion of state actors to exert unaccountable power. Critically examine narratives within the criminal legal system and law school curriculum that legitimize a mass incarceration crisis that targets communities of color and undermines public safety. This course meets with Prof. Meyn's undergraduate Legal Studies course of the same name. With respect to Law students in the course, he anticipates assigning 3-4 writing assignments. These assignments will require law students to conduct independent research. For example, the first few weeks of the course examines conceptions of public safety between the 1600s and the present. Prof. Meyn plans to ask law students to study historical newspapers and other relevant historical texts to further illuminate or contest the texts and ideas discussed in class about what public safety has meant at different times in this country’s history. Where undergraduates take three exams that test their understanding of the presented material, JD students will be expected to understand the material presented, and thus expected through writing assignments to deepen our understanding of course concepts through the presentation of findings from their own research into historical documents and scholarly texts.
940 - Food Law
What is "natural?" What is “healthy?” Is Wisconsin's "Cheeseburger Law" unconstitutional? Can food executives be imprisoned for the negligence of their companies? How do consumers fight food fraud? What about the rise of plant-based foods? What two cases decided last term at the U.S. Supreme Court may change the contours of food law? By the end of this course, students should understand: 1. How the law embodies our many expectations of food; 2. The history of food regulation in the United States and the relationship between the states and federal government in food oversight; 3. The role of litigation in protecting food safety, advancing good nutrition, and preventing food fraud; 4. The importance of core constitutional principles (First Amendment, Fourth Amendment, Commerce Clause, and Supremacy Clause) in food law; 5. How the law may be used to advance a national food policy, including eliminating hunger; 6. The role of the criminal law in advancing food safety.
950 - European Union Law
Course Description: The subject of this six-week, one-credit course taught by Professors from Justus-Liebig University in Giessen, Germany, will be an "Introduction to the Law of the European Union." This will be a general introduction to the legal system of the European Union covering both its constitutional and institutional architecture and focusing on a selection of issues including (1) the EU institutional setting, (2) sources of EU law (treaties, secondary legislation, law-making procedures, direct effect, supremacy), (3) remedies in EU law (enforcement proceedings, preliminary references, direct actions, liability), (4) general principles of EU law (human rights, citizenship, rule of law, discrimination, proportionality), (5) the internal market (free movement of goods, persons, services and capital), and (6) a brief overview of other policies of the EU. The focus will be on understanding the underlying principles of European legal integration and becoming familiar with European Union legal sources. Note: The course will meet starting on September 15th and meet each Friday thereafter until October 20th; the final exam will be a take-home exam on Saturday, October 21st.
988 - SP Environ Law: Natural Resources Law
This course covers the law and policy of the disposition and use of natural resources in the United States. We will emphasize federally owned and managed resources, especially the nearly one-third of this country’s land area that is owned by the federal government, although you will also learn a little about the management of state and private lands as well. Main topics include the history of public land law; the constitutional basis for federal control of natural resources, and legal doctrines and principles that cut across the whole field. We will study two important statutes that, while often included in environmental law curricula, are equally pivotal to natural land use and management in the United States: the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act. We will then turn to studies of particular types of resources, including fisheries, wilderness and recreational areas, water, rangelands, federally owned minerals, and forests. Although the general public often perceives natural resources law as part of “environmental law,” natural resources law, as presented in law school courses and casebooks, covers the government’s role as owner and regulator of publicly owned resources, such as land and use of navigable waters. In contrast, environmental law tends to focus on the regulation of private conduct to minimize and provide remedies for various forms of pollution of natural resources. Natural resources law follows a property law model, whereas environmental law’s common law heritage is traceable first and foremost to tort law. While having taken environmental law will, like a number of other courses (structural constitutional law; federal courts; legislation), prove helpful for your studies of this course, it is not a requirement, and I will not assume knowledge of environmental law.