Should Courts Stop Using "Substantive" Canons of Construction?
A proposal from Justice Kagan.
Statutory Interpretation
Justices Spar Over How to Interpret the Armed Career Criminal Act
In Wooden v. United States, the justices were unanimous in the judgment, but expressed disagreement over the role of statutory history and the rule of lenity.
D.C. Circuit Concludes Trailers Are Not "Motor Vehicles"
A partially divided panel concludes the Environmental Protection Agency may not regulate trailers as “motor vehicles.”
The Parable of the Soldier at the Bank
on the proper role of legal corpus linguistics, by C'Zar Bernstein
Immigrant Seeking to Challenge Removal Prevails with Unusual Supreme Court Line-up
The Supreme Court's 6-3 decision in Niz-Chavez v. Garland is not what you might have expected, but it may be a sign of things to come.
Judge Amy Coney Barrett's Assorted Canards of Contemporary Legal Analysis: Redux
The Case Western Reserve Law Review has published Judge Barrett's 2019 Sumner Canary Memorial Lecture
Bostock v. Clayton County and the Debate over the Meaning of "Ordinary Meaning"
Both sides in the landmark employment discrimination decision agree that laws should generally be interpreted based on the "ordinary meaning" of their words. But they differ on what that entails.
Textualism and Purposivism in Today's Supreme Court Decision on Discrimination Against Gays, Lesbians, and Transsexuals
The decision in Bostock v. Clayton County is well-justified from the standpoint of textualism (a theory associated with conservatives), but less clearly so from the standpoint of purposivism (often associated with liberals).
The Ballad of FDA v. Brown & Williamson
How the FDA lost, and gained, jurisdiction over cigarettes -- to a Newfoundland fishing-boat tune
Antitrust standing and Kavanaugh-versus-Gorsuch textualism
The Supreme Court's dueling opinions in Apple, Inc. v. Pepper raise interesting questions about textualist statutory interpretation.
Dog Nips Cow, Cow Tramples Man
If a statute imposes strict liability for dog bites, does that extend to a herding dog nipping at a cow that then trampled the plaintiff?