Volume 36
Issue
4

Remedying Conflict of Interest Issues in Public Health Bodies

by Conor Bigley
Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) account for a majority of worldwide annual deaths. Common NCDs like heart disease, cancer, chronic respiratory dis- ease, and diabetes cause decreased quality of life and premature deaths. The CDC states that 696,547 Americans died from heart disease in 2021, making it the leading cause of death in a year marked by […]

The Inadequacy of Objectivity for a Feminist Movement: How the Pro-Choice Movement Failed Women of Color and Its Own Agenda

by Sophia Arbess
Objectivity, as a virtue and methodology, has been touted as the gold-standard for sound reasoning and argumentation, particularly in the legal domain. Because objectivity, as Catharine MacKinnon describes, can be interpreted as a neutralized description of the male point of view, this valuation has created a false binary which positions male subjectivity as authoritative, and […]

Time to End the Chaos: A Call for Regulatory Reform on the Online Food Labeling System

by Yue Bai
It is a sunny day. You wake up and pick up your phone, planning to do some grocery shopping in preparation for the holiday season. You open Instacart, a mobile app that offers same-day grocery delivery to your door. You click on Chips Ahoy! Cookies. Just as you would in-store, you look for the nutrition […]

Under Pressure: The Effects of Dobbs on Lawyers Advising Abortion Providers

by Abigail L. Cahn-Gambino
Every single day I have a conversation with a patient in which I say, ‘Abortion would be a really safe and valid option for you and I’m so sorry that I can’t do it here.’” This is what a Texas physician said, grappling with the implications of the Dobbs decision. In states like Texas, doctors […]

The Intersection of Civil Rights, Religious Liberty, and Infectious Disease

by Ezra Clark
In June 1981, the CDC published the first two articles on a surge of rare ill- nesses amongst gay men, which would later be identified as opportunistic infections linked to the human immunodeficiency virus, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDs) virus. Nearly forty years later, COVID-19 would surge across the globe, triggering a never before seen public […]

Fairness and Due Process in Class Settlements: Analyzing Amchem and Stephenson

by Chase W. Gordon
In 1997, the Supreme Court released a landmark decision in aggregate litigation, Amchem Products, Inc. v. Windsor. Amchem clarified that Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23 applies to settlement classes or classes certified in the courts for the sole purpose of legitimizing a private settlement agreement. In doing so, the Court declared that the terms […]

Environmental (Non)disclosure and the SEC’s Proposed Solution

by Emma R. Howard
Investment funds purporting to focus on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors have experienced substantial growth in recent years. This Note will focus exclusively on the ‘E’ of ESG, particularly climate-related information and disclosures. The financial sector is increasingly recognizing the importance of climate change within corporate risk management, disclosure, and investment decisions. However, the […]

Lawyers’ Obligation to Decline Representation for Morally Reprehensible Clients in Animal Law

by Hana Khan-Tareen
The legal system often requires lawyers to deal with people exhibiting morally questionable conduct. Whether it be intentionally lying when entering a contract, stealing someone else’s property, or testing animals in laboratories, lawyers may find themselves representing people who have exhibited behavior that at least some of society believes is immoral. For the purposes of […]

Ethical lawyering, attorney-client privilege, and dual–purpose communications in light of In re Grand Jury

by David Kim
Attorney–client privilege protects communications between attorneys and cli- ents made to obtain or provide legal advice. When a client engages in full and frank communication with their attorney, the attorney is better situated to provide “sound legal advice or advocacy,” which ultimately “serves public ends.” However, not all attorney–client communications are purely legal in nature. […]

Non-Disclosure Provisions in Medical Malpractice Settlements: The Silent Killer of Accountability and Patient Safety

by N. Joshua Morris
Two of the primary goals of medical malpractice litigation are to promote patient safety and deter misconduct by medical professionals. These two goals are of paramount importance as patients are largely without a significant level of control over their outcome(s) once treatment begins. However, today, both of these goals are under fire in a variety […]

The Independent Attorney General: An Analysis of Why the Office Should be Insulated from Presidential Political Imperatives

by Andrew Nisco
The Office of the Attorney General, created during the First Congress, has become one of the most recognizable administrative offices within the executive branch. A president’s pick to head the Department of Justice is one of the most consequential and scrutinized. However, the Department of Justice (DOJ), as we have come to know it, did […]

The Office of Congressional Discipline: Reforming Congressional Misconduct Investigations by Bringing Investigations In-House

by Michael Parola
Congressional misconduct covers a wide variety of activities with varying degrees of legality. On one end is the minor and perfectly legal misconduct of violating the dress code of the chamber. On the other extreme lies insider trading, sexual harassment of staff, and accepting bribes. Currently, Congress rarely han- dles its own affairs when falling […]

The Vaccine Monologues: Federal Vaccine Policy and SIRVA’s Place in the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program

by Alexa S. Perlmutter
It’s common parlance in these pandemic times: “I just got a covid shot, and my arm is a little sore!” Indeed, the Centers for Disease Control (“CDC”) lists mild pain and soreness for several days at the injection site as a common side effect af- ter receiving the Covid-19 vaccine or a booster shot. However, […]

Practicing Ethically in Virtual Environments and the Rise of Remote Proceedings in a Post COVID-19 Era

by Margaret Romanin
Nearly every aspect of society was affected by the Coronavirus Pandemic (“COVID-19”). Along with the millions of lives lost and affected by the virus, most businesses and industries were forever altered; the legal community was no exception. This Note focuses on the recent move towards virtual legal proceed- ings and electronic communications between lawyers and […]

ERISA as a Solution to Insurer Abrogation of Responsibility in the Face of the Opioid Crisis

by Zachary Semple
Even as insurance companies saw record profits during the COVID-19 pan- demic, they steadfastly refused to adequately respond to the other health crisis facing America: the opioid overdose epidemic. The opioid overdose epidemic began in the 1990s with the overprescribing of prescription opioids for the treatment of pain. Since then, the epidemic has advanced through […]

Balancing Liberal Ideals with the Use of a Cultural Defense

by Emma Skowron
Scholars have long debated if and how liberalism can be balanced with multi- culturalism; the use of a cultural defense in the courtroom illustrates the major issues of this conflict. In People v. Moua, a defendant’s rape charges were successfully reduced based on the use of a cultural defense in which the attorney argued that […]

Plain Language in the Written Law

by Leen van Besien
As a law student, I was once asked to draft a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with a confidentiality clause. I was tasked with clearly indicating what in- formation would fall under the definition of “confidential” so that each party would know exactly what they were prohibited from sharing. My professor pointed me towards a sample […]

The Dobbs Leak as an Illustration of the Impasse Between Legal Ethics and Reality

by Elizabeth Yoder
The creation and interpretation of legal ethics tends to exist in a vacuum. It is difficult to predict all the ways legal ethics will be interpreted and enforced. Because the interpretation and enforcement of legal ethical codes can be unpredictable, legal ethical codes cannot adequately anticipate every situation that may arise. There is no way […]

The Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics 2024 Symposium