Federalism and Horizontality in International Human Rights

The advent of the international human rights system is one of the many changes to international law since the time Missouri v. Holland was decided. As other contributions to this symposium note, one of the challenging federalism questions raised by Holland in this new era is the effect of international human rights treaties and emerging customary international human rights law on U.S. states. And just as the creation of the international human rights regime has affected domestic analysis of federalism, the international human rights system has itself adjusted to the processes of federalism. The human rights regime is largely structured as a vertical process. States sign on to international human rights obligations, which are then integrated into domestic law. If a national government fails to implement its obligations internally, international courts and other institutions are designed to serve as supranational enforcement mechanisms. The system has not always worked as planned. For its part, the United States has chosen to remain outside the human rights treaty regimes, or, where it has signed onto a treaty, has applied reservations, understandings and declarations to its commitments, which serve to limit the domestic effect of the treaty obligation. In part as a reaction to the failures of vertical enforcement, and in part as a reaction to U.S. human rights exceptionalism, the international human rights system has developed strong features of horizontality. This has been particularly true of efforts by states, NGOs and other actors to bring about changes to human rights behavior in the United States. Federalism itself, which only a few decades ago was viewed as a constraint to changing human rights behavior in the United States, has increasingly been exploited by advocates to promote international human rights standards and norms. This essay explores the potential pitfalls of this expansion of horizontality and embrace of federalism for the broader project of international human rights

Internationalism of Justice Harry Blackmun, The

This comment is intended to provide a roadmap for closer examination of the Blackmun Papers and to evaluate the sources of internationalism in Justice Blackmun\u27s opinions. An understanding of those sources can in turn inform typologies of internationalism among other Justices, past, present, and future. It seems particularly salient to be discussing the internationalist aspects of Justice Blackmun\u27s legacy today, at a time when the Court is deeply divided on questions of executive power over foreign affairs, the relevance of foreign and international political practices and judicial opinions to constitutional interpretation, and the extent to which decisions of international tribunals are binding on U.S. courts. Justice Blackmun\u27s appeal to the broad interests of the international community and to the universality of human rights echoes throughout these contemporary debates

Foreword

Columbia, Missouri is a fitting venue at which to continue the conversation about Missouri v. Holland and explore the intersection of law-making at the international, national and sub-national levels. This symposium revisits the debate over national and local control over foreign affairs and brings together the constitutional doctrinal discussion and accounts of the globalization of regulation that consider the complexity of influences operating within and between multiple systems of law. Both the factual background of Holland (primarily a case about environmental regulation) and the doctrinal context in which it arose (a Supreme Court poised to move toward constitutional endorsement of greater concentration of power in the hands of the national, rather than state, government) presaged things to come. Returning to Missouri - the case and the place - is a perfect point of departure for examining what international law and federalism have become since Missouri v. Holland was decided in 1920

American Legal Education, Skills Training, and Transnational Legal Practice: Combining Dao and Shu for the Global Practitioner

Transnational law subjects have become an integral part of U.S. law school curricula, and international students are vital members of our law school communities. However, to adequately prepare lawyers more effectively for global legal practice, law schools must integrate skills training into the teaching of transnational law. This essay discussing one comparative approach follows a recent symposia addressing current issues facing global legal education, and China’s reform programs for legal education

New insights into the genetic etiology of Alzheimer's disease and related dementias

Characterization of the genetic landscape of Alzheimer's disease (AD) and related dementias (ADD) provides a unique opportunity for a better understanding of the associated pathophysiological processes. We performed a two-stage genome-wide association study totaling 111,326 clinically diagnosed/'proxy' AD cases and 677,663 controls. We found 75 risk loci, of which 42 were new at the time of analysis. Pathway enrichment analyses confirmed the involvement of amyloid/tau pathways and highlighted microglia implication. Gene prioritization in the new loci identified 31 genes that were suggestive of new genetically associated processes, including the tumor necrosis factor alpha pathway through the linear ubiquitin chain assembly complex. We also built a new genetic risk score associated with the risk of future AD/dementia or progression from mild cognitive impairment to AD/dementia. The improvement in prediction led to a 1.6- to 1.9-fold increase in AD risk from the lowest to the highest decile, in addition to effects of age and the APOE ε4 allele

Common variants in Alzheimer’s disease and risk stratification by polygenic risk scores

Funder: Funder: Fundación bancaria ‘La Caixa’ Number: LCF/PR/PR16/51110003 Funder: Grifols SA Number: LCF/PR/PR16/51110003 Funder: European Union/EFPIA Innovative Medicines Initiative Joint Number: 115975 Funder: JPco-fuND FP-829-029 Number: 733051061Genetic discoveries of Alzheimer's disease are the drivers of our understanding, and together with polygenetic risk stratification can contribute towards planning of feasible and efficient preventive and curative clinical trials. We first perform a large genetic association study by merging all available case-control datasets and by-proxy study results (discovery n = 409,435 and validation size n = 58,190). Here, we add six variants associated with Alzheimer's disease risk (near APP, CHRNE, PRKD3/NDUFAF7, PLCG2 and two exonic variants in the SHARPIN gene). Assessment of the polygenic risk score and stratifying by APOE reveal a 4 to 5.5 years difference in median age at onset of Alzheimer's disease patients in APOE ɛ4 carriers. Because of this study, the underlying mechanisms of APP can be studied to refine the amyloid cascade and the polygenic risk score provides a tool to select individuals at high risk of Alzheimer's disease