I'm currently writing an article for the Journal of International Criminal Justice on the legality of signature drone strikes under international humanitarian law and international human rights law. I will link to the article when it's done (two weeks or so), but I couldn't resist posting the following quotes -- the first from the New York Times, describing the Obama...
On September 19, the Supreme Court of Nevada ordered a new evidentiary hearing for Mexican national Carlos Gutierrez on his ability to overcome the State's procedural bars to further consideration of his death sentence. I've posted a copy of the court's order here. Gutierrez was one of 51 Mexican nationals whose convictions and sentences were the subject of the ICJ's Avena decision....
[Beth Stephens is Professor of Law at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey-Camden.] Monday’s oral argument in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum, Inc. focused on the search for a coherent limit to the reach of the Alien Tort Statute. The need for some limit is uncontroversial: even the most ardent advocates of human rights accountability agree that not all cases...
The Japanese Prime Minister made clear in remarks yesterday that he has no intention of proposing international arbitration to settle or mediate the ongoing Senkaku/Diaoyu Island dispute with China. Indeed, China's government-controlled English language paper, noted the inconsistency of Japan's position given its willingness to send its similar dispute with South Korea to the ICJ. (A point I noted here). Noda...
As I suggested earlier, the President has ample legal authority to strike back at those responsible for the deaths of U.S. Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and three other Americans in Libya. The NYT reports that the Pentagon is preparing to exercise this legal authority: The American military’s top-secret Joint Special Operations Command is preparing detailed information that could be used...
[Chimène I. Keitner, is a Visiting Professor of Law at the USC Gould School of Law and Professor of Law, University of California Hastings College of the Law.] Personal jurisdiction ain’t what it used to be. As Justice Ginsburg noted (Tr. at 54), in the age of Goodyear Tire, multinational corporations can’t necessarily be sued everywhere for everything. But Shell’s message...
[William S. Dodge is Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Research at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. From August 2011 to July 2012, he served as Counselor on International Law to the Legal Adviser at the U.S. Department of State, where he worked on the amicus briefs of the United States in Kiobel v. Royal...
[Curtis Bradley is the William Van Alstyne Professor of Law at Duke University.] The Alien Tort Statute (ATS) is one-sentence long, was enacted more than 200 years ago, has essentially no drafting history, and was relatively unknown before the Second Circuit’s seminal Filartiga decision in 1980. As a result, although it is obvious that the ATS was meant to provide the...
My initial impression of the Kiobel oral argument is that the Supreme Court is going to do its best to do an historical analysis of the ATS and use that history to find ways to limit its scope. It could do so by holding that the ATS does not apply extraterritorially, or that it does not apply unless there is...
John Witt's magisterial new book, Lincoln's Code: The Laws of War in American History, appeared a few weeks ago, and Gary Bass has an enthusiastic review of it in yesterday's New York Times Sunday Book Review. I am only about half-way through it, but Bass' enthusiasm is entirely justified - it is a fabulous book and one that I think...
Upcoming Events The Levin Center of Stanford University is hosting the International Public Interest Lawyering Symposium: Advancing Gender Equality through Human Rights, October 11-13, 2012. To register, click here. The American Bar Association (in cooperation with ASIL) will host the 2012 Fall Meeting from October 16-20, 2012 in Miami Beach, Florida. More information found here. The American Society of International Law has its third-annual Midyear...
