The use of a simple 50%-50% box score of decisions for parents and districts, respectively, is a false measure of the impartiality of hearing officers under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). This analysis canvasses relevant structural factors that the stakeholders, the mass media, and the professional literature have failed to recognize both generally and systematically. T...

Medical law inevitably involves decision-making, but the types of decisions that need to be made vary in nature, from those that are purely technical to others that contain an inherent ethical content. In this paper we identify the different types of decisions that need to be made, and explore whether the law, the medical profession, or the individual doctor is best placed to make them. We also...

Dilemmas about when psychiatric advance directives (PADs) should be overridden are complicated by conflicting legal frameworks that may nonetheless operate concurrently-a legal scheme based on decision-making capacity (or competency) set against a legal scheme based on civil commitment, in which the latter may "trump" the former. A single statute in which the strengths of both schemes are "fuse...

Gay, lesbian, and bisexual (GLB) parents are increasingly common and visible, but they face a number of social and legal barriers in the United States. Using legal consciousness as a theoretical framework, we draw on data from 51 interviews with GLB parents in California and Nebraska to explore how laws impact experiences of parenthood. Specifically, we address how the legal context influences ...

Euthanasia and assisted suicide involve taking deliberate action to end or assist in ending the life of another person on compassionate grounds. There is considerable disagreement about the acceptability of these acts and about whether they are ethically distinct from decisions to forgo life-sustaining treatment. Euthanasia and assisted suicide are punishable offences under Canadian criminal la...

The problem of widespread homelessness among mentally ill persons is often attributed to changes in mental health law. In consequence, suggestions for addressing homelessness frequently involve legal interventions, including loosening of commitment standards. A review of the limited data on the relation of legal standards to homelessness suggests that the problem is not primarily a result of st...

In recent times, there has been an exponential growth in digitization of legal documents such as case records, contracts, terms of services, regulations, privacy documents and compliance guidelines. Courts have been digitizing their archived cases and also making it available for e-discovery. On the other hand, businesses are now maintaining large data sets of legal contracts that they have sig...

In a recent publication, the lack of consensus among U.S. laws regarding the age at which minors may consent to confidential treatment for abuse of illegal substances was highlighted. This article reports the results of an investigation of the information used by legislators to determine the age at which minors may consent to treatment. Evidence indicates that in four states lawmakers considere...

Part I of this Article provides an overview of path dependence theory. It outlines the theory and briefly describes three separate strands of the theory: increasing returns path dependence, evolutionary path dependence, and sequencing path dependence, which are rooted in the economics, biological, and rational choice theory literatures, respectively. Although each of these strands has specific ...

The goals of resuscitation are to preserve life, restore health, relieve suffering, limit disability, and respect the individual’s decisions, rights, and privacy. Decisions about cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) efforts are often made in seconds by rescuers who may not know the victim of cardiac arrest or whether an advance directive exists. As a result, administration of CPR may be contrary...