Call For Papers: Affordable Care Act

Call for Papers:

Public Affairs Quarterly is seeking abstracts for a special issue which will cover the various issues surrounding the upcoming Supreme Court decision on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (ACA); the decision is expected later this month. We are seeking papers that are philosophical in nature, but, in keeping with the purpose of the journal, we are primarily interested in papers that engage in a meaningful way with the Court’s decision. The aim of the special issue is to move beyond the generic debate over universal health care and to engage critically with the various legal and normative issues at stake in the Affordable Care Act, specifically, the potential legal fallout from the decision, and legislative/political paths forward.

The Court has granted review of the following issues with respect to the ACA:

• Is it appropriate to decide the case before any individual has been forced to pay the penalty which is at issue; i.e. does the Anti-Injunction Act apply?
• Can the expansion in Medicaid proposed by the ACA be justified?
• Can the individual mandate be constitutionally justified?
• If the individual mandate is deemed unconstitutional, what ramifications ought this to have for the rest of the provisions in the ACA; i.e. is the individual mandate severable?

We hope that authors will engage meaningfully with one or more of these issues as well as the normative and legal consequences that follow.

Abstracts should be between 500 and 750 words in length and should be submitted within one month of the decision. If selected, authors will then have an additional six months to submit final manuscripts for the issue. The special issue will be edited by Nathan Stout (Tulane University) with oversight from PAQ’s Editor-in-Chief, Fritz Allhoff (Western Michigan University). We welcome submissions not just from philosophers, but also from our colleagues in the legal and medical communities.

Abstracts should be sent in .doc or .docx format to Nathan Stout at:  paqjournal@gmail.com.  All manuscripts are to be submitted in accordance with the style guidelines of the journal which may be found at the following address: http://www.press.uillinois.edu/journals/paq.html

Contact Information:

Nathan Stout
paqjournal@gmail.com

Fifth Annual Conference: America, EU Confront Constitutionalism in Crisis

Date(s) of Conference:

October 28-29, 2011

Location:

Bucerius Law School
Hamburg, Germany

Description:

Constitutions imply a long-term perspective: they seek to establish effective political institutions and to limit the vagaries of politics over the long haul. The American Founders made their ambition explicit in the Constitution’s Preamble, which promises to “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” A similar impulse, though, also propelled the endeavor to establish a European Constitution a decade ago. After decades of groping towards an “ever-closer union” and the piecemeal construction of an unwieldy intergovernmental apparatus, the time had come to let the peoples of Europe know where the enterprise was headed and to establish a firmer, more democratic and functional framework of government.

For all their great and manifold differences, the American and the European projects both now confront fundamental challenges that appear to raise serious doubts about the continued relevance and viability of constitutionalism and constitutional order, as those terms have traditionally been understood. Some of those challenges are particular to the EU and the United States; others have manifested themselves on both sides of the Atlantic.

The Transatlantic Law Forum (TLF), a joint initiative of the American Enterprise Institute (Washington, D.C.) and the Council on Public Policy (Bayreuth, Germany), will discuss these issues ranging from bank bailouts to the constitutional implications of the crisis of the welfare state, from the role of constitutional courts and the question of whether constitutional democracies can still be governed. The event is co-sponsored by the Federalist Society.

Contact Information:

Elizabeth DeMeo
The American Enterprise Institute
1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W.
Washington, DC 20036
202-862-4876
elizabeth.demeo@aei.org

http://legalscholarshipblog.com/2011/08/31/fifth-annual-conference-america-eu-confront-constitutionalism-in-crisis-hamburg-germany/#more-5765

Call for Papers: The State of State Courts

Call for Papers:

The Albany Law Review is presently accepting article submissions for its State Constitutional Commentary, on topics related to the upcoming Symposium entitled “The State of State Courts.” The issue will feature a Perspectives section which includes analysis, op-ed, and essay pieces related to Judicial Retention. The deadline for submission is December 15, 2011.

Contact Information:

Nikki Nielson
Executive Editor for State Constitutional Commentary
nnielson@albanylaw.edu

http://www.albanylawreview.org/sub.php?id=4

Call for Papers: Smartphones and the Fourth Amendment: The Future of Privacy in Our Hands

Call for Papers:

The University of the District of Columbia, David A. Clarke School of Law seeks submissions for its 2012 Annual Law Review Symposium. This year’s theme is “Smartphones and the Fourth Amendment: The Future of Privacy in Our Hands” The conference date is to be determined, but will be in the Spring of 2012.

This Symposium seeks to explore the constitutional implications of smartphone technology, focused on the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.   The smartphone as currently developed implicates existing Fourth Amendment doctrine involving data privacy, email privacy, phone privacy, photo privacy, workplace, privacy, GPS tracking technology, cloud technology, social media, the Third Party doctrine, and generalized expectations of privacy.  Participants in the Symposium will address how existing Fourth Amendment protections can be applied to this new technology.  Panels will address discrete issues arising from current law enforcement practice of warrantless GPS tracking, subpoenas to third party providers such as cell phone companies, work email privacy after the Supreme Court’s decision in Quon, cloning of cell phone hardrives during traffic stops, and the expectation of privacy on information stored on cloud computing systems and smartphone systems.  In addition, the Symposium seeks to synthesize a working metaphor to analyze Fourth Amendment issues for future information technology developments.

This symposium will attempt to address these and other questions from the prospective of advocates, practitioners, and scholars. The symposium will be an opportunity for participants and audience members to freely exchange ideas about the current state of the Fourth Amendment reasonable expectation of privacy and the smartphone.  By expanding the boundaries of our exploration, we hope to develop a deeper understanding how the Supreme Court should rule of various aspects of the operation of the smartphone through the Fourth Amendment lens of the reasonable expectation of privacy.

To submit a paper proposal, please submit an abstract by 5 p.m. on September 30, 2011 to Symposium Editor Tracy Jackson at udclawreviewsymposium@gmail.com.  In the subject line of your submission you must type: Abstract law review submission. Your submission must contain your full contact information, including, an email, phone number, and mailing address where you can be reached. Abstracts should be no longer than one page. All papers need to follow a strictly academic format, but all papers should address the symposium theme.  We will notify presenters of selected papers in mid-October. All working drafts of papers will be due no later than February 13, 2012. All selected abstracts will be posted on the UDC Law Review Symposium website to be shared with other participants and attendees.

To be eligible for publication in the UDC Law Review, submissions must not be published elsewhere. Typically, the UDC Law Review publishes pieces ranging from 25-45 pages in length, using 12-point times new roman font and one-inch margins.

Contact Information:

Tracy Jackson
Law Review Symposium Editor
udclawreviewsymposium@gmail.com

Constitution at the Crossroads: Progress Imperiled?

Date(s) of Conference:

June 16-18, 2011

Location:

Washington, D.C.

Description:

The ACS National Convention brings together more than a thousand of the nation’s top lawyers, judges, law students, policymakers, scholars and activists to learn, debate and strategize. The 2011 National Convention will provide participants with the opportunity to engage with exciting speakers, participate in rigorous debate and discussion of critical legal and public policy issues, visit with their members of Congress, network with lawyers and companies from around the country, and contribute to the development of a progressive vision of the Constitution, the law and public policy.

Contact Information:

info@ACSLaw.org

http://www.acslaw.org/pages/convention11

Sixteenth Annual LatCrit Conference

Date(s) of Conference:

October 7-9, 2011

Location:

San Diego, CA

Description:

The global crisis we are living through may well be a transformative moment in world history, whose ultimate resolution will reshape politics and economics both locally and globally for at least a generation. The Great Recession and the global financial crisis have put into question the “free market” road to material salvation. The ever-expanding global permanent state of exception has put in jeopardy the rule of law, constitutional governance, and democracy. While over three trillion dollars change hands every day on foreign exchange markets, nearly three billion people struggle to survive on less than two dollars a day. As the net yearly financial transfers from developing to developed economies approach one trillion dollars, prospects of future generations are mortgaged to bail out global finance capital. Constitutionally protected freedoms are trampled in the name of security. Struggles for self-determination are crushed by imperial militarism. Social compacts are rewritten by ascendant xenophobia. The distributions of gain and pain of these crises threaten to reinforce structures of subordination along enduring divides of race, class, gender, sexuality, and nationality. How will the project of global justice survive this conjuncture? How will the ideals of equality, freedom, and self-determination survive a time when predatory global finance, militarism, and racism are ascendant? What global progressive alliances are possible to resist global cartels of reaction and repression? LatCrit XVI will be an opportunity to explore theories, histories, and futures of global justice. Of particular importance will be the relationship between universality and difference, and comparative conceptions of equality and justice.

Contact Information:

Professor Tayyab Mahmud
Seattle University School of Law
Email: mahmud@seattleu.edu

http://web2.uconn.edu/latcrit/acxvi.php

Race and Criminal Justice in the West

Date(s) 0f Conference:

September 23-24, 2011

Location:

Gonzaga University School of Law
Spokane, WA

Description:

This conference seeks to examine the topic of race and the criminal justice system in the Western states. Racial minorities continue to be overrepresented in our criminal justice system; yet too often concerns about the high arrest and incarceration rates are dismissed as simply the result of a high rate of criminality. This conference will explore the role of bias, both conscious and unconscious, to ask whether race still matters in our criminal justice system.

Call  for Papers:

While the emphasis will be on the West, we welcome papers and presentations focusing on other areas of the country, particularly ones that engage in comparative analyses. Examples of the topics we expect to explore include:

• historical treatment of racial minorities with crime in the West
  empirical research examining the role of racial bias in the criminal justice system
• changing demographics and immigration reform
  unique experiences of African-Americans, Asian-Americans, Latinas/os, and Native Americans with the criminal justice system
• role and impact of police actions, prosecutorial discretion, and judicial decisions
• comparative analyses of the criminal justice in the West with other areas of the country
• solutions for addressing the problem of racial bias

Final drafts of papers will be due October 24, 2011.

Contact Information:

http://www.law.gonzaga.edu/Centers-Programs/Files/task_force_on_race/2011_race_task_force_conf_annct.pdf

4th Asian Constitutional Law Forum

Date(s) of Conference:

December 16-17, 2011

Location:

University of Hong Kong

Description:

The Asian Constitutional Law Forum provides an opportunity for constitutional law scholars in the region to establish academic exchanges and share their research.

Call for Papers:

We invite proposals for papers that are related to this year’s conference theme of “Major Constitutional Developments in Asia in the First Decade of the 21^st Century”.   Abstracts are due by May 15, 2011.

Contact Information:

Sharon Fast
sfast@hku.hk

http://www.hku.hk/ccpl/

Beyond Borders — Extraterritoriality in American Law

Date(s) of Conference:

November 12, 2010

Location:

Southwestern Law School
3050 Wilshire Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90010

Description:

A flurry of recent activity and scholarship has involved disputes over the geographic reach of domestic law. Do U.S. laws stop at the border? If not, when do they — or when should they — govern the conduct of people abroad? From the controversial extraterritorial application of U.S. commercial and environmental laws, to the contentious uses of universal jurisdiction in the human rights context, to debates over the extent to which the U.S. Constitution applies outside U.S. territory — extraterritorial transnational litigation has gripped the headlines and remains at the center of heated controversies.

This topic is a timely one. A number of scholars have recently written influential law review articles and books on these topics, and the U.S. Supreme Court decided a landmark case last term. For the near future, the topic of territoriality and extraterritoriality promises to be a focal point of discussion and debate for constitutional, transnational, and international law scholars. Beyond Borders — Extraterritoriality in American Law brings together leading scholars to discuss the history, doctrine, and current issues related to this widely discussed matter from a variety of viewpoints.

Contact Information:

lawreview@swlaw.edu

http://www.swlaw.edu/academics/cocurricular/lawreview/extraterritoriality/#registration

State Constitutionalism in the 21st Century

Date(s) of Conference:

September 22, 2010

Location:

Lewis Katz Building
University Park, PA

Description:

Join more than a dozen of the nation’s most prominent constitutional law scholars including Robert F. Williams, Distinguished Professor of Law and Associate Director, Center for State Constitutional Studies Rutgers, and Hon. Jack L. Landau, Justice-elect of the Oregon Supreme Court, as they come together to explore the next generation of issues in state constitutions.

Contact Information:

http://law.psu.edu/events/state_constitutionalism/program