Connecticut Law Review will host its first Proof Day for Volume 57 on August 24, 2024, at 8:30 AM in the Starr Reading Room. All members of CLR are required to attend unless previously excused.
Author: Mahler, Samuel
Connecticut Law Review Ranks Among Top 50 Flagship Law Journals in U.S.
Connecticut Law Review has been ranked as the 50th flagship law review in the United States, according to the 2024 Law Journal Meta-Rankings. Connecticut Law Review improved 8 spots from its ranking in 2023 in order to break into the top-50 flagship journals in the nation in 2024. Professor Bryce Clayton Newell publishes Meta-Rankings of approximately 200 different flagship law reviews across the country, determining their rank based on the Washington & Lee Law Journal ranking, Google Scholar Metrics ranking, U.S. News Peer Reputation score, and U.S. News average 10-year overall school ranking. For more information and to see the full ranking, visit the Law Journal Meta-Ranking, 2024 Edition.
The Current State of Guardianship Law Furthering a Need for Supported Decision-Making in Connecticut
Julia R. Vassallo
Despite living in a society that values autonomy and individual thought, people with disabilities in the United States are continually subjected to oppression and discrimination, often in the name of a “well-intentioned” paternalistic desire to protect such individuals. Legally recognized protective orders, including guardianships and conservatorships, are often used to restrict the autonomy of people with disabilities, including individuals with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities, individuals with mental health disorders, and aging individuals experiencing Alzheimer’s or other degenerative diseases that have the ability to impact an individual’s cognitive functioning. While guardianships and conservatorships may be appropriate in a number of circumstances, for the majority of the disability community, such mechanisms are overbroad, stripping people with disabilities of the ability to make decisions regarding their own legal, health, financial, and personal affairs. Continue reading
Ensuring Climate Litigants’ Standing: Insights from National and International Climate Litigation
Florence T.B. Simon
In March 2023, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its Sixth Assessment Report and confirmed unequivocally that human activities are the cause of climate change. Greenhouse gas emissions over the next few years are capable of causing irreversible and catastrophic damage to our planet. Catalyst litigation plays an important role in tackling climate change by prodding governments to assume a role in implementing adaptation and mitigation measures. Despite the extreme consequences that climate change will have on humanity, jurisdictional issues—such as standing—impose considerable hurdles for climate litigants. And these hurdles ultimately keep plaintiffs from obtaining a ruling, or even a discussion, on the merits of their case. Continue reading
Practiced Peril: The Flawed Role of Experience in Accidental Death Determinations
Casey M. Corvino
Words often carry an intuitive meaning that defies explicit definition. While this vagueness typically poses no issue in our daily lives, it presents distinct challenges within the legal realm where words and their definitions wield the power to influence the course of justice. One abstract concept is notoriously elusive: what is an accident? Despite the apparent simplicity of identifying what is commonly understood implicitly, there are inherent challenges in “giving substance to a concept which is largely intuitive.” Continue reading
Haaland v. Brackeen and Mancari: On History, Taking Children, and the Right-Wing Assault on Indigenous Sovereignty
Laura Briggs
In June 2023, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) of 1978 in Haaland v. Brackeen, making it harder for (some) Indigenous families and communities to lose their children. The decision left one key question unanswered, however: whether protections specifically for American Indian households served as an illegitimate “racial” preference. Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s opinion for the majority argued that the petitioners lacked standing to raise this issue. Thus, the Court left the door open to continuing challenges by those who have an interest in using ICWA’s cute children and clean-cut evangelical Christian parents to try to put an end to this and all related statutes that give so-called “preferential treatment” to American Indians—including in gaming compacts, employment, federal treaties, and essentially all of Indian law. Continue reading
Haaland v. Brackeen—A Window into Presenting Tribal Cases to the Court
Ian Heath Gershengorn
In this Essay, as I did at the Connecticut Law Review’s Symposium, I draw on my experience representing Tribes in Haaland v. Brackeen to discuss more broadly the effective presentation of tribal arguments to the Court. I touch briefly on four main topics. First, I discuss how we collaborated with amici to ensure that the Court would have the full context as it considered the issues in Brackeen. Second, I discuss how we thought about preparing for the argument and the particular importance of understanding the practical operation of the Indian Child Welfare Act. Third, I offer a few observations on the oral argument itself, focusing on how the structure of the argument influences the substance of the argument. And fourth, I step back and discuss why this is a particularly interesting and challenging time to argue Indian law cases before the Supreme Court. Continue reading
Interrogating Haaland v. Brackeen: Family Regulation, Constitutional Power, and Tribal Resilience: The Connecticut Law Review Symposium
Casey M. Corvino & Julia R. Vassallo
In October 2023, the Connecticut Law Review hosted the Symposium “Interrogating Haaland v. Brackeen: Family Regulation, Constitutional Power, and Tribal Resilience.” The symposium was centered on the state of federal Indian law in the wake of the Brackeen decision. This decision was a victory for Indigenous families and Native nations as it left the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) unscathed and affirmed the constitutional relationship between tribal nations and the United States. However, threats to tribal sovereignty continue as a handful of states and interest groups continue to seek ways to challenge tribal authority and federal laws that support it. Continue reading
The Mature Minor Doctrine and COVID Vaccination in Connecticut
Brianna Cyr
The mature minor doctrine is an exception to the common law rule of parental informed consent for a child’s medical decisions. The mature minor doctrine is applicable as either doctrine or statute in some states, but not all. Connecticut currently upholds the common law view for a minor child’s medical decision-making authority. Consequently, one prominent topic of discussion in recent years deals with the Covid-19 pandemic and the public policy discussions over nationwide vaccination efforts. Many minors, children legally under the age of eighteen, are looking to make their own medical decisions when dealing with vaccination for the Coronavirus. By expanding the parameters of the mature minor doctrine, and implementing it into Connecticut statute, mature minors can be given the autonomy to acquire, or resist, vaccination despite their parent’s wishes. Continue reading
Nondelegation and Native Nations
Seth Davis
There is no nondelegation doctrine for Native nations, nor should there be one even if the Supreme Court revives the nondelegation doctrine for federal agencies and private parties. The Court has never struck down a statute on the ground that it delegated legislative power to a Native nation. Instead, it has held that Congress may recognize the sovereignty of Native nations and that their independent authority sustains statutes that rely upon Native governments to implement policy goals that they share with the United States. Continue reading