What’s in the Bag: Real World Rights or New World Rights
Across the globe, the historical practice of trading goods has significantly adapted to the digitalization of common spaces. This has largely increased the efficacy of domestic and foreign trade by opening new forums for communication and increasing the productivity of business by reducing trade costs. Recently, however, upper-level courts have been faced with a series of cases considering the implications of the production and consumption of goods online. In 2021, Mason Rothschild created and sold one hundred digital “METABirkins.” According to Rothschild, these were images of the iconic Hermès “Birkin” covered in digital “fur” rather than leather, as a social commentary against animal cruelty in high fashion manufacturing. Hermès then sued Rothschild for “asserting trademark infringement, dilution, cybersquatting, and unfair competition.” Hermès Int’l v. Rothschild is the first case focused on the interaction between non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and trademark law. The court was introduced to a whole new digital dynamic of trademark infringement and ultimately found that the NFTs linked to digital images of the Hermès “Birkin” were infringing on Hermès’s trademark rights. The New York Law Journal explored this case and described NFTs as “data added to a file that creates a unique signature…very hard to recreate and can be sold in digital form.” The invention of digital spaces designed to facilitate the buying, selling, and trading of products has opened the doors of uncertainty with consideration for the legal intersection of NFTs and trademark law. The case has more significant implications for determining the line exists between artistic expression and trademark infringement for digital assets. Using the criteria for infringement established in Rogers v. Grimaldi, the question of trademark infringement will be highly fact-specific, centered on questions like the strength of the asserted marks, the intention behind the uses, and consumer impressions of the product.
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Preserving Religious Freedom or Upholding Constitutional Principles? Analyzing Kennedy v. Bremerton's Influence on U.S. Law
For centuries now, a separation between church and state has been argued. The place of religion within the U.S. school system has often been debated and precedent has remained unchanged for several decades. In 2022, however, a single U.S. Supreme Court case overturned nearly six decades worth of precedent which established a clear separation between religion and schools. In turn, states like Texas, Alabama, and Florida have taken the court’s rulings to extremes. Several states are now requiring that the Ten Commandments be posted in all public school classrooms. The state of Alabama has attempted to pass legislation that would require all public schools in the state to provide both the equipment and time to students who wish to pray aloud. Under past precedent, these actions would have been a violation of the Establishment Clause. With the abandonment of such precedent, the Establishment Clause’s role in the American school system has become very unclear. The complete upheaval of past precedent has caused a ripple effect in the American school system, further marginalizing students of minority religious groups around the county.
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Starry Skies and Legal Ties: Navigating the Complexities of Space Debris Liability
Among the twinkling stars in the night sky, an invisible threat looms closer to us than we might think. Encircling our planet is a swarm of unregulated debris that not only threatens the future of scientific advancement, but undermines the very laws meant to govern our cosmic neighborhood. Only 27,000 out of over 100 million pieces of space debris – most of which are small meteoroids or discarded remnants of human-made objects – are currently accounted for by the Department of Defense’s Space Surveillance Network sensors. So, what happens when a piece of debris traveling at an average speed of 15,700 miles per hour in low Earth orbit collides with a satellite or spacecraft, and perhaps more importantly, who is responsible for the damage?
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The Implications of Denying Healthcare to Inmates: Originalism and the Supreme Court
As the United States continues to grapple with the meaning and interpretation of its Constitution, issues relating to abortion, affirmative action, and, most recently, the issue of healthcare for incarcerated individuals have grown increasingly contentious. The same originalist approach that has been deployed to challenge the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling could also be used to curtail the healthcare rights of those who are incarcerated, thus directly contravening the provisions of the Eighth Amendment and disregarding the legal precedents established by the 1976 Supreme Court decision in Estelle v. Gamble. The constitutional right to healthcare for incarcerated individuals, as established through Estelle v. Gamble, maintained that failing to provide "adequate medical care" violated the Eighth Amendment's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment. The case involved a respondent state inmate who claimed he had been subjected to "cruel and unusual punishment" following inadequate back injury treatment. The district court dismissed the prisoner's pro se complaint, which had previously maintained that an "allegation of inadequate medical care was insufficient to be classified as a cause of action" under the Eighth Amendment. Nonetheless, the U.S. Court of Appeals of the 5th Circuit reversed and reinstated the complaint, ultimately granting the defendants' certiorari petition and establishing that denial of healthcare equated to "cruel and unusual punishment." Ultimately, the notion of "deliberate indifference" set a legal definition that prohibits ignoring the plight of prisoners who require healthcare, translating into a mandate meant to provide all persons in custody with access to medical care. Beyond healthcare, Estelle's significance lies in that the Court contended that prison conditions could amount to "cruel and unusual punishment," proposing a more focused approach to providing care for incarcerated individuals.
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The Supreme Court’s Verdict of Allen v. Milligan: A Pivotal Moment in the Battle for Voting Rights and Representation
Marking a turning point in legal history, the ruling in the recent Supreme Court case Allen v. Milligan has been hailed as both “historic and significant” by Deuel Ross, the plaintiff’s attorney. On June 8, 2023, this case, which revolved around an Alabama congressional redistricting map drawn by a Republican-dominated legislature, was brought out of the lower district court. In a state where one in four voters are Black, yet only one Black representative held a position out of the seven representatives, the fairness of the district lines was under question. An analysis of the population distribution within the lines found that Black voters were dominant in one sole district, whereas the rest of the Black population was meticulously spread out in other districts. The areas with the most Black residents had more voting power than the single district, which prevented Alabama from having more than one Black representative. In Allen v. Milligan, in a 5-4 ruling, both conservative and liberal judges upheld Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA) in an attempt to alleviate the effects of racial discrimination. The Court found that, given Alabama’s racially polarizing voting, the map had to be redrawn. Although served with a glimpse of hope, the Court declined the request from Black Alabama voters and organizations for the lines to be redrawn with the intention of having proportional Black representation. Thus, while the discriminatory effects were addressed, they were not alleviated. By using an outdated method to determine the districting of lines while viewing the Constitution as a “color-blind” document, the Court failed to fully address a critical and ongoing issue that the VRA has originally intended to solve.
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Navigating Uncharted Waters: Redefining Liability in the Age of Climate Migration
As climate-induced migration intensifies, individuals and communities are relocating around the world due to the increasingly dangerous effects of climate change. Those affected by this phenomenon, often referred to as “climate migrants” or “climate refugees,” frequently find themselves without formal legal recognition. This oversight deprives them of the protections that these frameworks allege to offer, leaving many vulnerable amid this global dilemma. While climate migrants navigate a treacherous path, it becomes evident that society’s legal safeguards fall short. The inability to formally recognize climate refugees and the absence of effective resettlement mechanisms highlight these deficiencies, as do gaps in equitable climate justice compensation and the enforcement of international cooperation. To address these issues, there is a pressing need for new legislation tailored to the intricacies of climate-induced migration—laws that prioritize clear resettlement strategies, fair compensation measures, and enhanced global collaboration, all reinforced by stringent enforcement. Beyond merely protecting climate migrants, these reforms are essential to bolster the resilience and well-being of the global community facing an unparalleled environmental crisis.
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Dangers of Unregulated Charities: Revising Nonprofit Corporate Governance
he address of the fake charity “American Cancer Society of Michigan” led to a rented mailbox on Staten Island in New York City—hundreds of miles away from Michigan. Beginning in 2014, this rented mailbox became the “home” to seventy-six fake charities, all approved by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), under which the regulatory system for U.S. charities falls. Despite warnings from the real American Cancer Society about these sound-alike groups, the IRS approved them anyway. Ian Hosang, who created the seventy-six fake charities, is accused by New York prosecutors of operating a charity fraud that stole over $150,000 through soliciting donations for supposed cancer charities. Many of these fake charities started with the words “American Cancer Society,” “American Cancer Foundation,” and “United Way,” despite Hosang’s lack of affiliation with the actual American Cancer Society and United Way.
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Disparate Impact: The Natural Disaster Aid Inequities Storm On
As the Atlantic Hurricane season continues through the summer to the end of November, communities in the Southern United States are readying themselves for what the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has suggested will turn out to be a “near-normal” season. While stocking up on emergency items and tracking the paths of the hurricanes coming their way, some households are also bracing themselves for a more complicated storm of events that may follow hurricane season – the steps towards gaining financial recovery and aid. These very steps and their uneven responses between bodies of applicants reflect and magnify the inadequate measures taken by government agencies involved with natural disaster response, such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), to alleviate crisis, thus highlighting their culpability for disparate impact.
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Playing Legal Ping-Pong: Schrems I, II, and Perhaps III
In both the United States and European Union, protection of personal data is an essential right. Transatlantic data exchanges are projected to form the foundation of over $1 trillion in yearly trade and investment for multinational companies. Despite its lucrative potential and the United States’ reliance on transatlantic transfers of personal data for national security, the legality of such transfers has yet to be clearly outlined. Since the Court of European Justice’s ruling in Data Protection Commissioner v. Facebook Ireland Limited and Maximillian Schrems (colloquially known as Schrems II), the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield has been deemed invalid and companies with U.S. and EU presences have been left without necessary compliance regulations that allow them to legally transfer data internationally. When the Court invalidated the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield, it failed to replace it with a clear alternative. This has created challenges for international businesses and governments as none of the parties know to whom to defer for regulatory compliance inquiries. While on July 10, 2023, the EU Commission and the Biden Administration agreed upon an EU-U.S. Data Protection Framework, it is unlikely that this agreement will be legally binding. Should the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) overturn this framework, all policy proposals must start over. The debacle not only highlights differences in data protection standards and surveillance practices between the two regions but also the inadequate commonplace of international organizations deciding on ‘legal’ frameworks without judicial approval.
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