Hidden Nondefense: Partisanship in State Attorneys General Amicus Briefs and the Need for Transparency

In all fifty states, the State Attorney General (SAG)—as the state’s chief legal officer—is charged with defending state laws that are challenged in court. If an SAG declines to defend or challenges a state law on the ground that it is unconstitutional—an action scholars describe as “nondefense”— the SAG ordinarily will disclose this decision to the public. This Essay discusses a hidden form of nondefense that can occur when SAGs file amicus curiae briefs on behalf of their states in matters before the U.S. Supreme Court. Surprisingly, some SAGs have joined multistate amicus briefs that support invalidating other states’ laws without disclosing that similar state or local laws exist in the SAGs’ own jurisdictions. This Essay explores this problem through analysis of multistate amicus briefs filed in the 2017 Supreme Court term. It proposes requiring that SAGs disclose relevant laws from their state when they file amicus briefs on behalf of their state with the Supreme Court

Fertile Women May Now Apply: Fetal Protection Policies after Johnson Controls

In its recent interpretation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the U.S. Supreme Court leaves little room for permissible occupational sex discrimination. However, its decision has wider implications. Here, Professor Grumet takes a look at some of them from both a legal and a social perspective, including matters such as employees\u27 reproductive freedom and employers\u27 potential liability for a variety of possible injuries to employees\u27 offspring

Energy normalization of TV viewed optical correlation (automated correlation plane analyzer for an optical processor)

An automatic correlation plane processor that can rapidly acquire, identify, and locate the autocorrelation outputs of a bank of multiple optical matched filters is described. The read-only memory (ROM) stored digital silhouette of each image associated with each matched filter allows TV video to be used to collect image energy to provide accurate normalization of autocorrelations. The resulting normalized autocorrelations are independent of the illumination of the matched input. Deviation from unity of a normalized correlation can be used as a confidence measure of correct image identification. Analog preprocessing circuits permit digital conversion and random access memory (RAM) storage of those video signals with the correct amplitude, pulse width, rising slope, and falling slope. TV synchronized addressing of 3 RAMs permits on-line storage of: (1) the maximum unnormalized amplitude, (2) the image x location, and (3) the image y location of the output of each of up to 99 matched filters. A fourth RAM stores all normalized correlations. A normalization approach, normalization for cross correlations, a system's description with block diagrams, and system's applications are discussed

Imago, Imago, Imago

Response to Anchor Articl

Promoting Justice from the Inside: The Counseling Role of Local Government and School District Attorneys

https://digitalcommons.nyls.edu/impact_center/1003/thumbnail.jp

Interview with Jason Grumet by Brien Williams

Biographical NoteJason S. Grumet was born February 25, 1967, in Rochester, New York, to Gerald and Madeleine Grumet. After high school, he spent a year traveling North America through a program with the National Audubon Society Expedition Institute. He received an environmental studies degree from Brown University and then worked for the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. He attended Harvard Law School and ran an organization that worked for the Northeast State Air Pollution Control officials. At the time of this interview, he was president of the Bipartisan Policy Center. SummaryInterview includes discussion of: Mitchell and the Clean Air Act of 1990; Mitchell and the National Commission on Energy Policy; the Clinton Global Initiative; purpose of the National Commission on Energy Policy; bipartisanship; how Senators Mitchell, Daschle, Dole, and Baker interacted on the bipartisan health care commission; how the challenges with Clinton health care influenced the commission; reaction to the report from the commission; Chris Jennings and Mark McClellan; working with the law firms of former senators; lack of bipartisan energy on health care; the Obama administration’s role; how the projects are organized; Senator Mitchell and bipartisan leadership; and Mitchell’s legacy