Administrative Searches and Seizures: What Happened to Camara and See?

In recent years the Government\u27s efforts in promoting health, safety and welfare have necessitated an increased number of administrative inspections of commercial and noncommercial premises. Although such inspections were previously held to be excluded from the fourth amendment\u27s ban on unreasonable searches and seizures, the Supreme Court held in Camara v. Municipal Court and See v. Seattle that administrative inspections must comply with the warrant provision of the fourth amendment. Since those decisions, the Court has emphasized the exceptions to, rather than the strictures of, the warrant requirement. This article analyzes developments in the law concerning administrative searches and seizures and offers some observations on future trends

The Use of Genetic Information for Nonmedical Purposes

When one thinks about the use of genetic information by third parties for nonmedical purposes, one of the first things that comes to mind is the question of how the third party can gain access to the information. There are three main ways. First, and most importantly, the third party may obtain records developed in the clinical setting. In other words, if someone wants a job or insurance, that person may be required to sign a release authorizing the third party to access those records. Second, the genetic records might be obtained through a genetic data bank. Third, the third party may actually perform genetic testing itself or ask questions that elicit genetic information indirectly through family histories. I will address the following eight nonmedical uses of genetic information: (1) identification, (2) employment, (3) insurance, (4) commercial transactions, (5) domestic relations, (6) education, (7) criminal justice, and (8) tort litigation

Private Actions for Public Nuisance: The Standing Problem

From its original function of providing a remedy for the invasion of land rights, the law of nuisance has expanded to encompass a multitude of interferences with the health, safety, and welfare of the public and individuals. Where a nuisance is injurious to the public, the government has a right to sue for its abatement. An individual, however, has traditionally lacked standing to sue for damages or to enjoin a public nuisance where his injury is not distinct in degree and/or in kind from the injury to the public as a whole. While judicial inroads into this restrictive standing requirement have always been possible, courts have consistently been reluctant to relax the standing requisites for individuals attempting to sue on the theory of public nuisance. Only recently have some courts given indications that orthodox common law standing restrictions may slowly be giving way to the public\u27s interest in a healthful environment. This article discusses these new cases and the statutory provisions of several states that have modified the common law rules