Moritz Legal Information Blog

Cornell's freely available Legal Information Institute (Est. 1992) recently added a new version of the Code of Federal Regulations. Features include cross-reference links to LII's U.S. Code as well as links to the latest regulation updates in the Federal Register's e-CFR . See the announcement from LII.

If you purchased an iPod from Apple between September 12, 2006 and March 31, 2009, you may soon be receiving notification of your involvement in a class-action lawsuit .  The three individuals who initially filed suit claim that Apple unfairly prevented iPods from playing songs purchased anywhere but iTunes.  In November of last year, the suit was given class action status.  Class members began receiving notifcations this week. CNN

Moritz professor Michelle Alexander was on the Colbert Report  yesterday, talking about race and the war on drugs.

Yesterday, the Children's Law Center released two publications on the young offenders in Ohio who are transferred to the adult system.  The report, Falling through the Cracks: A New Look at Ohio Youth in the Adult Criminal Justice System , is accompanied by In Their Own Words , highlighting the personal experiences of young people and their families. Local coverage here .

Last month, we linked to an article showing the enormous sums of money contributed by the top ten Super PAC donors . UCLA law professor Eric Zolt and others are leading an effort to remove at least some of the money from politics by establishing a website called Repledge . Currently in beta form, Repledge "attempts to connect individual contributors who agree to transform their political contributions into charitable donations if a supporter of the opposing political candidate matches the contribution." The political donations are essentially canceled-out and the money diverted to charity. According to Repledge, this increases the "social utility" of the donation. Repledge provides a brief video demo on its main page . The Federal Election Commission is currently considering Repledge's request for an advisory opinion on whether the site complies with federal election law. See additional coverage from The Washington Post , The Volokh Conspiracy , and the Center

Back in February , we wrote about the new dog law here in Ohio, ending the designation of pit bulls as inherently vicious.  But the status of pit bulls is still changing in other states, too.  Last week, the Maryland Court of Appeals adopted "a strict liability standard in respect to the owning, harboring, or control of pit bulls and cross-bred pit bulls in lieu of the traditional common law liability principles that were previously applicable to attacks by such dogs."  The Court cited the "aggressive and vicious nature" of pit bulls, and the ruling has incited controversy in the state as owners, shelter workers, dog-bite victims, the Maryland SPCA, and others debate the ruling. The Baltimore Sun (opinion round-up) CBS Baltimore Chicago Tribune Reuters

New York Times Supreme Court correspondent Adam Liptak reported earlier this week on the absence since 1993 of a certain 4-letter word from the Court's opinions. After the Cohen v. California case in 1971, the word apparently appeared in nine subsequent decisions over the next two decades or so, usually quoting a criminal defendant. In discussing the Cohen case, Liptak quotes Moritz professor Chris Fairman, "the nation's leading authority on the legal status of the word." See Fairman's 2007 law review article on the topic, titled . . . The Oyez Project provides the oral argument audio of the Cohen case. As told in Liptak's article, listen for defendant's counsel Melville Nimmer uttering the word just over the 2:00 mark.