Cultivated Compendium is my personal website with the occasional link to my reporting and to important, cutting-edge or interesting legal news.
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January 10th, 2014
Leo Strine, current chancellor of the Delaware Court of Chancery, has been nominated to lead the Delaware Supreme Court, Delaware Law Weekly's Jeff Mordock writes in a more indepth report on this week's development: "'Strine heads the most important business court in the world,' said Thomas J. Reed, a professor at Widener University School of Law, after the chancellor had submitted his application. 'He's been there... Continue Reading
January 10th, 2014
Whether history and what the Founding Fathers thought about things controls how we interpret the American Constitution is going to get another ride in the U.S. Supreme Court in the upcoming term. USA Today reports on the historical issues implicated in the case in which the justices will decide the constitutionality of the president making appointments during Congressional recesses: "For two centuries, presidents have found ways to get... Continue Reading
January 9th, 2014
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has adopted a new code of judicial conduct, including a rule against nepotism in judicial hiring decisions, The Legal Intelligencer's P.J. D'Annunzio reports. Abraham C. Reich of Fox Rothschild, co-chair of the PBA Task Force on the Code of Judicial Conduct, told The Legal "that the nepotism provision represented a cultural shift in the judiciary. 'I thought that was a very bold move by the court... Continue Reading
January 8th, 2014
The epicenter of corporate law has a new leader. The Wall Street Journal reports that Leo Strine, the colorful and outspoken head of the Court of Chancery, is going to be nominated to lead the Delaware Supreme Court.
January 8th, 2014
Wall Street banks are being investigated by federal authorities on whether they "deliberately mispricing a type of mortgage bond that was central to the economic turmoil," The Wall Street Journal reports. Its the first "known wide-ranging examination of mortgage-bond sales by banks in the years that followed," The Journal reports. The investigation could upset the financial recovery those institutions have made, but it also... Continue Reading
January 7th, 2014
The Washington Post reports on new data that shows that health spending, as a share of the economy, has shrunk. The Post further reports: '"There are two explanations,' says David Cutler, a Harvard economist who served as a health care adviser in President Obama's 2008 campaign. 'One is the recession was a big and drunken episode that has a very long hangover. The alternative view is that something big has actually changed... Continue Reading
January 7th, 2014
Law professor Noah Feldman argues in a piece for Bloomberg that the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to strike down the federal Defense Against Marriage Act without declaring same-sex marriage a fundamental constitutional right has left the issue "a total friggin' mess." The result is the limbo in Utah in which a federal judge has declared that state's ban unconstitutional and same-sex nuptials have been proceeding until the... Continue Reading
January 7th, 2014
Four couples are challenging Arizona's ban on same-sex marriage in a putatative class action, Courthouse News Service reports. For example, "plaintiffs Holly Mitchell and Suzanne Cummins say that though they were able to become certified foster care parents, only Cummins was allowed to adopt their two children because 'Arizona law strongly prefers heterosexual couples in permanent adoption proceedings and permits only a husband... Continue Reading
January 6th, 2014
Philadelphia attorney Daniel-Paul Alva, winner of the bid to start a new Office of Conflict Counsel in Philadelphia, said in an interview today that he is looking forward to proving “detractors” wrong.
The city announced its intention Tuesday, December 31, to contract with Alva & Associates to start a for-profit law firm from scratch to represent criminal defendants and family court defendants when the Defender Association... Continue Reading
January 6th, 2014
The U.S. Senate has not ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, including a vote in December 2012 that failed by five votes, The Interdependent reports. The convention was modeled after the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act. The Senate likely will consider the convention again this year, The Interdependent further reports.
"Both U.S. Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power and Secretary [of State John]... Continue Reading
January 6th, 2014
Just Security's Steve Vladeck's writes that last week's decision finding a Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel memo is exempt from the Freedom of Information Act "may have the effect, unintended or otherwise, of insulating virtually all nonpublic OLC memos and opinions from FOIA requests–regardless of their subject-matter or sensitivity." (The opinion regards the FBI's use of exigent National... Continue Reading
January 6th, 2014
ProPublica reports on a little-covered problem: some people harmed by medical malpractice can't find any attorneys to take their cases.
This is a phenomenon that many plaintiffs lawyers told me about when I was regularly reporting on medical-malpractice litigation for The Legal Intelligencer. Med mal cases are very expensive to work up because they require expert witnesses and scientific-oriented discovery, and many firms will not take... Continue Reading
January 6th, 2014
The U.S. Supreme Court halted same-sex marriages in Utah this morning while an appeal of a ruling that the state's ban on same-sex nuptials violates constitutional rights proceeds in the Tenth Circuit, NPR reports. A stay during an appeal was denied by lower courts. The justices' order was without comment or dissent. Continue Reading
January 6th, 2014
Craig Zucker founded Buckyballs, a desk toy of small magnets that can be stacked into infinite shapes. But "perhaps more than 1,000" kids have swallowed the magnets and needed to undergo surgery, The Washington Post reports. Now the Consumer Product Safety Commission is seeking to hold Zucker personally liable for the $57 million recall because he dissolved his business, The Post further reports: "The commission supported that... Continue Reading
January 6th, 2014
The New York Times' Adam Liptak writes on the difficulties in protecting the constitutional right to have counsel paid for in criminal cases when you can't afford your own lawyer. For example, in Washington, a federal judge has found two cities violated the constitutional right to counsel by having lawyers handle 500 cases at a time. The judge has imposed a federal monitor to improve the situation. In Texas, a pilot program is starting... Continue Reading
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