The Story of ‘Hoffman Plastic Compounds v. NLRB’: Labor Rights Without Remedies for Undocumented Immigrants

In Hoffman Plastic Compounds v. NLRB, 535 U.S. 137 (2002), the United States Supreme Court held that undocumented workers are not entitled to remedies for violations of their rights to unionize under the National Labor Relations Act. The majority of the Court viewed enforcement of immigration policy prohibiting employment of undocumented workers as more important than protecting the labor rights of both undocumented workers and their U.S. citizen co-workers who join their efforts to improve working conditions. The chapter explores the origins of the case in a minimum-wage factory in Los Angeles, the surprising turn of events when the illegally fired worker blurted out on the witness stand that he was not a U.S. citizen, how the lawyer for the employer portrayed his client as being unaware of the worker\u27s undocumented status when the employee he had stated on the job application that he was not authorized to work in the U.S., and the closely-divided decisions at every level of judicial review in which judges disagreed strenuously how to reconcile immigration and labor policy. The chapter also explores the impact of the case on a wide variety of state and federal employment cases in which employers have argued that undocumented workers are unprotected by law

Dissipation of the sectored heliospheric magnetic field near the heliopause: a mechanism for the generation of anomalous cosmic rays

The recent observations of the anomalous cosmic ray (ACR) energy spectrum as Voyagers 1 and 2 crossed the heliospheric termination shock have called into question the conventional shock source of these energetic particles. We suggest that the sectored heliospheric magnetic field, which results from the flapping of the heliospheric current sheet, piles up as it approaches the heliopause, narrowing the current sheets that separate the sectors and triggering the onset of collisionless magnetic reconnection. Particle-in-cell simulations reveal that most of the magnetic energy is released and most of this energy goes into energetic ions with significant but smaller amounts of energy going into electrons. The energy gain of the most energetic ions results from their reflection from the ends of contracting magnetic islands, a first order Fermi process. The energy gain of the ions in contracting islands increases their parallel (to the magnetic field ${\bf B}$) pressure $p_\parallel$ until the marginal firehose condition is reached, causing magnetic reconnection and associated particle acceleration to shut down. The model calls into question the strong scattering assumption used to derive the Parker transport equation and therefore the absence of first order Fermi acceleration in incompressible flows. A simple 1-D model for particle energy gain and loss is presented in which the feedback of the energetic particles on the reconnection drive is included. The ACR differential energy spectrum takes the form of a power law with a spectral index slightly above 1.5. The model has the potential to explain several key Voyager observations, including the similarities in the spectra of different ion species.Comment: Submitted to ApJ; shortened abstract; degraded figure qualit

Electronic phase separation due to magnetic polaron formation in the semimetallic ferromagnet EuB6_6 - A weakly-nonlinear-transport study

We report measurements of weakly nonlinear electronic transport, as measured by third-harmonic voltage generation $V_{3\omega}$, in the low-carrier density semimetallic ferromagnet EuB$_6$, which exhibits an unusual magnetic ordering with two consecutive transitions at $T_{c_1} = 15.6$\,K and $T_{c_2} = 12.5$\,K. Upon cooling in zero magnetic field through the ferromagnetic transition, the dramatic drop in the linear resistivity at the upper transition $T_{c_1}$ coincides with the onset of nonlinearity, and upon further cooling is followed by a pronounced peak in $V_{3 \omega}$ at the lower transition $T_{c_2}$. Likewise, in the paramagnetic regime, a drop of the material's magnetoresistance $R(H)$ precedes a magnetic-field-induced peak in nonlinear transport. A striking observation is a linear temperature dependence of $V_{3\omega}^{\rm peak}(H)$. We suggest a picture where at the upper transition $T_{c_1}$ the coalescing MP form a conducting path giving rise to a strong decrease in the resistance. The MP formation sets in at around $T^\ast \sim 35$\,K below which these entities are isolated and strongly fluctuating, while growing in number. The MP then start to form links at $T_{c_1}$, where percolative electronic transport is observed. The MP merge and start forming a continuum at the threshold $T_{c_2}$. In the paramagnetic temperature regime $T_{c_1} < T < T^\ast$, MP percolation is induced by a magnetic field, and the threshold accompanied by charge carrier delocalization occurs at a single critical magnetization.Comment: to appear in J. Kor. Phys. Soc (ICM2012 conference contribution

Contributions to a Regenerated Social Science: A Review

By 1965, behavioral social science had become a widely accepted approach to the scientific study of man and his politics. Any uncertainty as to what constituted a proper social science seemed to be raised most deeply by writers acquainted with the nature of physical science which most social science methodology seemed desparately to emulate. Recent comments by Nobel physicist Hideki Yukawa seem to indicate that little has changed in the physicist's scientific method in the last ten years and it would appear to be time to review those theories which prompted some radical reconsideration of the nature of both natural and social science over the last decade. The ideas which seem to lead to such a reconsideration include Werner Heisenberg's principle of uncertainty — that the observer's attempt to pin-point one phenomenon in nature disrupts or interferes with closely related phenomena; and Niels Bohr's principle of complimentarity where two seemingly different or contradictory theories when taken together offer a more complete understanding of a given phenomenon in the physical world. Michael Polanyi's notions of "tacit knowledge"and "indwelling" indicate that "we know more than we can tell" and that our view of isolated and detailed aspects of reality are rooted in a "prior knowledge"or even "involvement" in a larger whole. The capability of seeing or sharing in such larger wholes has been considered by humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow as a measure of the scientist's maturity. A social scientist is open to more when he is a healthy person. Empathy, participation and man's purposefulness are the three human characteristics considered in this paper all of which seem to appear as the crux of a science of man by which all science must reinterpret its own methodology. To so interpret such characteristics rather than tailoring them to fit existing physical and behavioral scientific method and theory is to put certain ethical and political responsibilities of the social scientist at the very center of the nature, method and theory of our understanding of man and the science of man. The theories of Heisenberg, Bohr, Polanyi and Maslow support such a radical reinterpretation and the conclusion of the paper is that such a reinterpretation does not so much redefine social science in the light of natural science, but puts a reconsideration of the nature of man and science at center stage, so that a total regeneration of all science may be possible

Kondo insulator SmB6 under strain: surface dominated conduction near room temperature

SmB6 is a strongly correlated mixed-valence Kondo insulator with a newly discovered surface state, proposed to be of non-trivial topological origin. However, the surface state dominates electrical conduction only below T* ~ 4 K limiting its scientific investigation and device application. Here, we report the enhancement of T * in SmB6 under the application of tensile strain. With 0.7% tensile strain we report surface dominated conduction at up to a temperature of 240 K, persisting even after the strain has been removed. This can be explained in the framework of strain-tuned temporal and spatial fluctuations of f-electron configurations, which might be generally applied to other mixed-valence materials. We note that this amount of strain can be indued in epitaxial SmB6 films via substrate in potential device applications.Comment: to appear in Nature Material

Radio Frequency Tunable Oscillator Device Based on SmB6 Microcrystal

Radio frequency tunable oscillators are vital electronic components for signal generation, characterization, and processing. They are often constructed with a resonant circuit and a 'negative' resistor, such as a Gunn-diode, involving complex structure and large footprints. Here we report that a piece of SmB6, 100 micron in size, works as a current-controlled oscillator in the 30 MHz frequency range. SmB6 is a strongly correlated Kondo insulator that was recently found to have a robust surface state likely to be protected by the topology of its electronics structure. We exploit its non-linear dynamics, and demonstrate large AC voltage outputs with frequencies from 20 Hz to 30 MHz by adjusting a small DC bias current. The behaviors of these oscillators agree well with a theoretical model describing the thermal and electronic dynamics of coupled surface and bulk states. With reduced crystal size we anticipate the device to work at higher frequencies, even in the THz regime. This type of oscillator might be realized in other materials with a metallic surface and a semiconducting bulk.Comment: v3 to appear in Physical Review Letter