A law review or law journal is a scholarly journal or publication that focuses on legal issues. A law review is a type of legal periodical . Law reviews are a source of research, imbedded with analyzed and referenced legal topics; they also provide a scholarly analysis of emerging legal concepts from various topics. The primary function of a law review is to publish scholarship in the field of law. Law reviews publish lengthy, comprehensive treatments of subjects (referred to as "articles"), that are generally written by law professors , and to a lesser extent judges, or legal practitioners. The shorter pieces, attached to the articles, commonly called "notes" and "comments", often are written by law student members of the law review. Law review articles often express the thinking of specialists or experts with regard to problems, in a legal setting, with potential solutions to those problems. Historically, law review articles have been influential in the development of the law; they have been frequently cited as persuasive authority by courts. Some law schools publish specialized reviews, dealing with a particular area of the law, such as civil rights and civil liberties , international law , environmental law , and human rights. Some specialized reviews focus on statutory, regulatory, and public policy issues.
106-624: The Wisconsin Law Review is a bimonthly law review published by students at the University of Wisconsin Law School . One issue each year is generally dedicated to a symposium or special topic. The review was established in 1920 by students and faculty of the law school. The first issue was published in October 1920. In 1935, the journal became entirely student-edited. The first faculty editor-in-chief
212-735: A law clerk for Justice William J. Brennan Jr. of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1962 to 1963. He then served as an attorney-advisor to Commissioner Philip Elman of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC); he would later argue that the FTC ought to be abolished. Posner went on to work in the Office of the Solicitor General in the United States Department of Justice , under Solicitor General Thurgood Marshall . In 1968, Posner accepted
318-726: A punitive damages award of 37.2 times the compensatory damages guests won from a bedbug infested Motel 6 . In 2003, Posner found that co-workers who did not prevent a hypoglycemic diabetic's fatal attempt to drive himself home violated no duty to rescue . In Morin Building Products Co. v. Baystone Construction, Inc. (1983), Posner held that the Uniform Commercial Code presumes contracts impose an objective standard upon what would subjectively be illusory promises . In 1987, Posner dissented when Judge Frank H. Easterbrook , joined by Richard Dickson Cudahy , found that
424-578: A "legal newspaper", folded after just one year. Its spiritual successor, the current Albany Law Review was later published in 1936. The Columbia Jurist was created by students in 1885 but ceased publication in 1887. Despite its short lifespan, the Jurist is credited with inspiring creation of the Harvard Law Review , first published in 1887 . The current Columbia Law Review , was founded in 1901. The National Law Review also started during
530-627: A Note, Bluebook exercise, and Diversity Statement. The journal no longer takes first-year grades into consideration. Law review Law reviews are generated in almost all law bodies/institutions worldwide. In the United States and Canada, most law journals are housed at individual law schools and are edited by students, not professional scholars, which is unique of law schools. North American law schools usually have flagship law reviews and several secondary journals dedicated to specific topics. For example, Harvard Law School 's flagship journal
636-461: A category-leading specialized journal. Often the best indicator is the age of the journal; a newer journal will rarely have the same clout with employers that the older journal has, even when the older journal is specialized. In any case, membership on any such journal is a valuable credential when searching out employment after law school. The paths to membership vary from law school to law school, and also from journal to journal, but generally contain
742-412: A debate with the philosopher Peter Singer in 2001 at Slate magazine . He agrees that "gratuitous cruelty to and neglect of animals is wrong and that some costs should be incurred to reduce the suffering of animals raised for food or other human purposes or subjected to medical or other testing and experimentation," but rejects grounding this view in an ethic of strong animal rights, contending that such
848-519: A decision that held that late term abortion was constitutionally protected in some circumstances. In November 2015, Posner authored a decision in Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin v. Schimel striking down regulations on abortion clinics in Wisconsin. He rejected the state's argument that the laws were written to protect the health of women and not to make abortion more difficult to obtain. Accusing
954-499: A few of the same basic elements. Most law reviews select members after their first year of studies either through a writing competition (often referred to as "writing on" to the law review), their first-year grades (referred to as "grading on" to the law review) or some combination thereof. Most Canadian law reviews, however, do not take grades into considerations and cannot be submitted with the application. A number of schools will also grant membership to students who independently submit
1060-512: A fraction of the drug laws that we have. I think it's really absurd to be criminalizing possession or use or distribution of marijuana." At the Cybercrime 2020: The Future of Online Crime and Investigations conference held at Georgetown University Law Center on November 20, 2014, Posner, in addition to further reinforcing his views on privacy being over-rated, stated that "If the NSA wants to vacuum all
1166-415: A joint competition with the main law review. A law review's membership is normally divided into staff members and editors. On most law reviews, all 2Ls (second-year students) are staff members while some or all 3Ls (third-year students) serve as editors. 3Ls also typically fill the senior editorial staff positions, including senior articles editor, senior note & comment editor, senior managing editor, and
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#17330852850701272-552: A means to prevent what he views as free riding on newspaper journalism. His co-blogger Gary Becker simultaneously posted a contrasting opinion that while the Internet might hurt newspapers, it will not harm the vitality of the press, but rather embolden it. As part of a three-judge panel on the 7th Circuit weighing a challenge to the Illinois Eavesdropping Act, which bars the secret recording of conversations without
1378-566: A number of his opinions. In June 2016, Posner was criticized by right-wing media organizations for a column he wrote for Slate in which he stated, "I see absolutely no value to a judge of spending decades, years, months, weeks, day, hours, minutes, or seconds studying the Constitution, the history of its enactment, its amendments, and its implementation." He has called his approach to judging pragmatic. "I pay very little attention to legal rules, statutes, constitutional provisions. ... A case
1484-431: A number of reasons why journal membership is desired by some students: At schools with more than one law review, membership on the main or flagship journal is normally considered more prestigious than membership on a specialty law journal. This is not the case at all schools, however. At many schools, the more prestigious journal is the specialty journal; a low-ranked general journal will rarely attract as much attention as
1590-500: A particular applicant. A student who has been selected for law review membership is said to have "made the law review". Secondary journals vary widely in their membership process. For example, at Yale Law School , the only one of its nine journals that has a competitive membership process is the flagship Yale Law Journal – all others are open to any Yale Law student who wishes to join. By contrast, other secondary journals may have their own separate membership competition or may hold
1696-547: A polymath would be a gross understatement. ... Judge Posner evidently writes the way other men breathe", though the economist describes the judge's grasp of economics as, "in some respects, ... precarious." In 1999, Posner was welcomed as a private mediator among the parties involved in the Microsoft antitrust case . A 2000 study published by Fred Shapiro in the University of Chicago's Journal of Legal Studies found that Posner
1802-456: A portion of prospective editors in order to increase the diversity of the journal’s membership. In 2018, a self-styled group of "faculty, alumni, and students opposed to racial preferences" sued New York University Law Review and Harvard Law Review over this practice. Both suits were dismissed in 2019 for lack of standing. In 2019, the top 16 law schools in the United States all reported female editors-in-chief of their law reviews. For
1908-546: A position teaching at Stanford Law School . In 1969, Posner moved to the faculty of the University of Chicago Law School , where he remains a senior lecturer. He was a founding editor of The Journal of Legal Studies in 1972. On October 27, 1981, Posner was nominated by President Ronald Reagan to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit vacated by Judge Philip Willis Tone . Posner
2014-453: A premise entails conclusions inconsistent with the reality of human society and psychology. He further states that people whose opinions were changed by consideration of the philosophical arguments presented in Singer's book Animal Liberation failed to see the "radicalism of the ethical vision that powers [their] view on animals, an ethical vision that finds greater value in a healthy pig than in
2120-430: A profoundly retarded child, that commands inflicting a lesser pain on a human being to avert a greater pain to a dog, and that, provided only that a chimpanzee has 1 percent of the mental ability of a normal human being, would require the sacrifice of the human being to save 101 chimpanzees." Posner emphasizes the importance of facts over arguments in creating social change. He states that his moral intuition says that "it
2226-855: A publication by the state Bar Association started in 1894. In 1917, editorship was taken over by the West Virginia College of Law and became the West Virginia Law Review in 1949. The first law review originating outside the Northeast was the Michigan Law Review , beginning in 1902. The Northwestern University Law Review —formerly the Illinois Law Review —followed shortly thereafter in 1906. Both Michigan and Northwestern were launched by faculty and only later turned over to student editors. Following these publications, there
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#17330852850702332-440: A publishable article. The write-on competition usually requires applicants to compose a written analysis of a specific legal topic, often a recent Supreme Court decision. The written submissions are often of a set length, and applicants are sometimes provided with some or all of the background research. Submissions normally are graded blindly, with submissions identified only by a number which the graders will not be able to connect to
2438-462: A short article-writing competition, as well as an examination on Bluebook legal citation rules. In the US, law reviews are normally edited and published by an organization of students at a law school or through a bar association , in close collaboration with faculty members. Law reviews can provide insight and ideas that contribute to the bedrock of jurisprudence. For example, Justice Stanley Mosk of
2544-597: A staple of first year torts courses taught in American law schools , where the case is used to address the question of when it is better to use negligence liability or strict liability . In 1999, Posner applied the lex loci delicti commissi rule on choice of law rather than the Restatement of Torts, Second when rejecting a claim by an Illinois dentist who slipped and fell in Acapulco , Mexico. In 2003, Posner affirmed
2650-415: A stockbroker could sue his former employer under SEC Rule 10b-5 after he quit shortly before the firm's lucrative unannounced merger. In 1990, Posner found that Delaware corporate law did not permit an airline's board from adopting a poison pill provision that encouraged its machinists to take strike action if its pilots' takeover attempt succeeded. In 1991, Posner held that good faith performance
2756-477: A wide variety of current events including the 2000 presidential election recount controversy, Bill Clinton 's affair with Monica Lewinsky and his resulting impeachment procedure, and the 2003 invasion of Iraq . His analysis of the Lewinsky scandal cut across most party and ideological divisions. Posner's greatest influence is through his writings on law and economics; The New York Times called him "one of
2862-405: Is 85, a full standard deviation below the white average, and the average Hispanic IQ has been estimated recently at 89. Black children in particular often come from disordered households, which has a negative effect on ability to learn and perhaps indeed on IQ. ... Increasingly, black and Hispanic students find themselves in schools with few white or Asian students. The challenge to American education
2968-613: Is a factual question of the defendant's state of mind that must be proven at trial. In 1984, Posner wrote for the en banc circuit when it held that a consent decree regulating law enforcement Red Squads did not apply to FBI terrorism investigations, over the dissent of Judge Richard Dickson Cudahy . In January 2001, Posner loosened that consent decree to allow the Chicago Police Department to conduct counterterrorism operations. In United States v. Marshall (1990), Posner dissented when Frank H. Easterbrook , writing for
3074-709: Is an attempt to create a legal publication, that is produced from all groups related to law, including lawyers, academics, students, members of the judiciary, procurators and anyone else in related fields with an interest in China. Examples include the NALSAR Student Law Review and the National Law School of India Review . The Mexican Law Review , the law review of the National Autonomous University of Mexico , Mexico's preeminent university,
3180-654: Is an example of a professionally edited law review in Ireland, while some leading student law reviews include the Trinity College Law Review and the UCD Law Review . Bocconi Legal Papers is a student-edited law journal in Italy. It is a project sponsored by Bocconi School of Law and is published by a group of students belonging to the same institution, under the supervision of several faculty advisors. They adopted
3286-438: Is arbitrary and in contrast with major traditional and contemporary philosophies (including the theology of Thomas Aquinas for one and utilitarianism for another). In addition, he points out that this basis for rights has problematic implications—including that it might soon make some computers more worthy of rights than some humans, a conclusion he calls absurd. Posner goes on to reason that granting human-like rights to animals
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3392-618: Is edited by professors and is therefore a closer cousin to peer-reviewed social science journals than to typical student-run law journals. RUPTURA, is the law review of the Law School Association of the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador . This law review is edited by students who maintain an annual publication standard. RUPTURA is considered the oldest magazine in the region. Online legal research providers such as Westlaw and LexisNexis give users access to
3498-538: Is faulty to impose uniform educational standards on all schools. His view in this regard is undergirded by his view that different races differ in intelligence. (However, Posner says that he thinks it is "highly unlikely" that these differences are rooted in genetics, rather than environment.) In a blog post, Posner wrote, "I suggest that the only worthwhile reforms of teacher compensation are raising teacher wages uniformly, providing recognition and modest bonuses for outstanding teachers, and increasing hiring standards." In
3604-574: Is fraught with implications which could radically disrupt or devalue the rights of human beings. He alludes to Hitler's zoophilia as evidence that respect for animals and humaneness toward human beings are not necessarily associated. Arguing that the analogy of animal rights to the civil rights movement lacks imagination and is not very apt, Posner posits that animal welfare might be better protected by other legal models, one example of which would be stronger laws making animals property, since, he asserts, people tend to protect what they own. Posner engaged in
3710-520: Is just a dispute. The first thing you do is ask yourself—forget about the law—what is a sensible resolution of this dispute? The next thing ... is to see if a recent Supreme Court precedent or some other legal obstacle stood in the way of ruling in favor of that sensible resolution. And the answer is that's actually rarely the case. When you have a Supreme Court case or something similar, they're often extremely easy to get around." Posner has written several opinions sympathetic to abortion rights , including
3816-588: Is the Harvard Law Review , and it has 16 other secondary journals such as the Harvard Journal of Law & Technology and the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review . Membership and editorial positions on law journals, especially flagship law reviews, is competitive and traditionally confers honor and prestige. Selection for law review membership is usually based on a combination of students' grades, their performance on
3922-411: Is the author of nearly 40 books on jurisprudence , economics, and several other topics, including Economic Analysis of Law , The Economics of Justice , The Problems of Jurisprudence , Sex and Reason , Law, Pragmatism and Democracy , and The Crisis of Capitalist Democracy . Posner has generally been identified as being politically conservative; in recent years, however, he has distanced himself from
4028-496: Is the most-cited legal scholar of all time by a considerable margin, as Posner's work has generated 7,981 cites compared to the runner-up Ronald Dworkin 's 4,488 cites. In 2021, using a modified methodology (including the HeinOnline database and searches for citations to books), Shapiro found that Posner was the most-cited United States legal scholar, generating 48,852 cites to runner-up Cass Sunstein 's 35,584. In his decision in
4134-423: Is to provide a useful education to the large number of Americans who are unlikely to benefit from a college education or from high school courses aimed at preparing students for college." In September 2014, Posner authored the opinions in the consolidated cases of Wolf v. Walker and Baskin v. Bogan challenging Wisconsin and Indiana's state level same-sex marriage bans. The opinion of the three-judge panel on
4240-403: Is wrong to give as much weight to a dog's pain as to an infant's pain," and that "[this] is a moral intuition deeper than any reason that could be given for it and impervious to any reason that you or anyone could give against it." Instead, Posner claims that "[expanding and invigorating] the laws that protect animals will require not philosophical arguments for reducing human beings to the level of
4346-531: The University of Pennsylvania Law Review , it is the oldest surviving law review in the US. By the 1870s, these early commercial legal periodicals established the format for a more "modern style of legal writing" and led to today's student-edited law reviews. The first student-edited law periodical in the US was the Albany Law School Journal , founded in 1875. This journal, described as something like
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4452-515: The Austrian Empire . After high school, Posner studied English literature at Yale University , graduating in 1959 with a B.A. , summa cum laude , and membership in Phi Beta Kappa . He then attended Harvard Law School , where he was president of the Harvard Law Review . He graduated in 1962 ranked first in his class with an LL.B. , magna cum laude . After law school, Posner was
4558-842: The Review of the Academic Center Afonso Pena from the Federal University of Minas Gerais (published since 1996), and the Alethes Periodic from Federal University of Juiz de Fora . To pursue academic recognition by the Brazilian Ministry of Education, review bodies must include post-graduated and ranked academics, which prevents student law reviews to even be recognized or compared to other similar legal periodicals. In China, there are law reviews run by academics, as well as law reviews run by students. The China Law Journal
4664-642: The Supreme Court of California admitted that he got the idea for market share liability from the Fordham Law Review comment cited extensively in the court's landmark decision in Sindell v. Abbott Laboratories (1980). A 2012 study found that the Supreme Court has increased its use of citing law journals and reviews over the last 61 years in majority, concurring or dissenting opinions, especially for important or difficult cases, despite claims by some judges to
4770-411: The en banc circuit, held that the punishment for possession of LSD is determined by the weight of the carrier it is found within. The circuit's judgment was affirmed, under the name Chapman v. United States (1991), by the Supreme Court of the United States . In 1995, Posner, joined by Judge Walter J. Cummings Jr. , affirmed an injunction blocking Illinois from closing schools on Good Friday as
4876-410: The rule of law is an accidental and dispensable element of legal ideology," his argument that buying and selling children on the free market would lead to better outcomes than the present situation, government-regulated adoption , and his support for the legalization of marijuana and LSD . Posner on Posner Series Judge Posner was the focus of a "series" of posts (many Q&A interviews with
4982-434: The 1880's, but was not student or academically produced, but published by Pennsylvania reporter and legal book publisher Kay & Brother and included editorially reviewed contributions by practicing attorneys focusing on the interpreting court decisions on a nationwide basis versus regionally and was not an academic law review. It continues today as on-line only daily legal news service with analysis contributed by lawyers and
5088-428: The 1997 case State Oil Co. v. Khan , Posner wrote that a ruling 1968 antitrust precedent set by the Supreme Court was "moth-eaten", "wobbly", and "unsound". Nevertheless, he abided by the previous decision in his ruling. The Supreme Court granted certiorari and overturned the 1968 ruling unanimously; Sandra Day O'Connor wrote the opinion and spoke positively of both Posner's criticism and his decision to abide by
5194-538: The 2014 cases that the same-sex marriage bans were both "a tradition of hate" and "savage discrimination". Posner wrote the opinion for the unanimous panel, finding the laws unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause . The Supreme Court then denied a writ of certiorari and left Posner's ruling to stand. When reviewing Alan Dershowitz 's book, Why Terrorism Works: Understanding the Threat, Responding to
5300-515: The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Indiana and Wisconsin 's bans on same-sex marriage were unconstitutional, affirming a lower court ruling. During oral arguments, Wisconsin's attorney general cited tradition as a reason for maintaining the ban, prompting Posner to note that: "It was tradition to not allow blacks and whites to marry—a tradition that got swept away." Though Posner argued in his 1992 book Sex and Reason that prohibitions against gay marriage were rationally justified, he held in
5406-559: The African context," including "legal and institutional regional and sub-regional developments, post conflict resolution, constitutionalism, commercial law and environmental law". In spite of some few exceptions, in Argentina almost all law reviews are run by publishing houses or law professors. In both cases, the involvement of students in the day to day creation of these reviews is fully narrowed. Among these few exceptions, it should be mentioned
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#17330852850705512-577: The Challenge , Posner wrote in the September 2002 The New Republic , "If torture is the only means of obtaining the information necessary to prevent the detonation of a nuclear bomb in Times Square , torture should be used – and will be used – to obtain the information.... No one who doubts that this is the case should be in a position of responsibility." In 2007, Posner wrote
5618-733: The Commonwealth more generally are the Law Quarterly Review (first published 1885), the Modern Law Review (first published 1937), the Cambridge Law Journal (first published 1973), The Oxford Journal of Legal Studies (first published 1981) and Legal Studies (first published 1981). In Africa, the Journal of African Law has published articles focusing on "legal pluralism and customary law'" to "issues of international law in
5724-528: The Faculty of Law at the University of Oslo and one student from the Faculty of Law at the University of Bergen. Its articles are mainly related to the curriculum at these universities. Within the United Kingdom, as in much of the Commonwealth outside North America (a notable exception being Australia), all of the leading law reviews are edited and run by academics. The leading law reviews in the United Kingdom and
5830-686: The International Chamber of Commerce - Italy. Its editorial board is composed of more than 150 members, including students, scholars, and professionals from all over the world. It is a double-blind peer reviewed law journal, run by University of Bologna, School of Law students, which follows The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation. The Trento Student Law Review is a student-run law review based in Trento, Italy. Established in 2017, it published its first issue, titled "Number Zero", in January 2018. In
5936-524: The Judge) done by University of Washington Law Professor Ronald K. L. Collins . The twelve posts—collectively titled "Posner on Posner"—began on November 24, 2014, and ended on January 5, 2015, and appeared on the Concurring Opinions blog. In Posner's youth and in the 1960s as law clerk to William J. Brennan, he was generally counted as a liberal . However, in reaction to some of the perceived excesses of
6042-651: The Netherlands ( Ars Aequi [ nl ] ), Groningen Journal of International Law ) and the Czech Republic ( Common Law Review ). In Belgium, the oldest and most prominent student-edited law review is Jura Falconis . It was founded by a group of students from the Law Faculty of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven who, in 1964, conceived the idea of producing their own law journal grafted on
6148-765: The Netherlands, Ars Aequi [ nl ] is one of the few general legal journals. It has been published since 1951. It is edited by students from all faculties of law of Dutch universities, who review and edit submitted articles ( peer review is not common in Dutch law journals). The quality of its publications is considered top-ranked in the Dutch legal discipline. Ars Aequi publishes articles written by established scholars, researchers and students. The editorial board does however not set different quality standards for student articles. Ars Aequi [ nl ] has published its Black Issue in 1970, criticizing legal aid. It resulted in reforms of accessible legal aid in
6254-535: The Netherlands. In Iceland, Úlfljótur Law Review , has been in publication since 1947. In 2007 it celebrated its 60th anniversary. Since its creation in 1947 it has been edited and run by students at the Department of Law, University of Iceland. Úlfljótur Law Review is the most senior of all academic journals still in publication at the university and held in great respect by Icelandic jurists and legal scholars. In Finland, Helsinki Law Review , edited by students at
6360-563: The Republican Party started becoming goofy." Among Posner's judicial influences are the American jurists Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. and Learned Hand ; he has written that "Holmes is the greatest jurist ... because the sum of his ideas, metaphors, decisions, dissents and other contributions exceeds the sum of contributions of any other jurist of modern times", and he has applied the Hand formula in
6466-559: The School in US News of the last 10 years, and Google Scholar metrics for all Law reviews in the United States. There has been a weak correlation between law school ranking and law review citation metrics. In the United States, law reviews are typically edited by students who are selected to join after successfully completing a "write on competition" at the end of their first year of law school. Grades and class standing are often considered during
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#17330852850706572-420: The Seventh Circuit over treatment of pro se litigants. Posner is a pragmatist in philosophy and an economist in legal methodology . He has written many articles and books on a wide range of topics including law and economics, law and literature, the federal judiciary, moral theory , intellectual property , antitrust law , public intellectuals, and legal history . He is also well known for writing on
6678-408: The United States. Posner is "one of the founding fathers of Bluebook abolitionism, having advocated it for almost twenty-five years, ever since his 1986 University of Chicago Law Review article on the subject." In a 2011 Yale Law Journal article, he wrote: The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation exemplifies hypertrophy in the anthropological sense. It is a monstrous growth, remote from
6784-484: The University of Helsinki, has been active since 2007. Earlier, the University of Turku published Turku Law Journal from 1999 to 2003. Sweden's first law review is Juridisk Publikation . The first number of Juridisk Publikation was published in April 2009. It originated as a review by students from Stockholm University. It is now delivered to Swedish law students from all universities, as well as to most legal libraries in
6890-523: The appendix is about 2–3 pages long, and he says the entire manual is about 1% as long as the Bluebook. Posner opposes the U.S. " War on Drugs " and called it " quixotic ". In a 2003 CNBC interview he discussed the difficulty of enforcing criminal marijuana laws, and asserted that it is hard to justify the criminalization of marijuana when compared to other substances. In a talk at Elmhurst College in 2012, Posner said that "I don't think that we should have
6996-604: The application process. Law professor Erwin N. Griswold noted the concern some have about the unusual nature of a publication being run by students and celebrated the impact that it has had in law and legal education. In 1995, Richard Posner argued law reviews had a higher standard of fact-checking to faculty-run journals or published books, and described them as indispensable resources for law clerks, judges, practitioners and professors. He also argued that faculty-run journals are generally better at aspects including article selection and editing interdisciplinary papers. In Canada,
7102-648: The case of Revista Lecciones y Ensayos , a law review ran by students at the School of Law of the University of Buenos Aires . In Australia, as of 2017, the leading student-edited peer-reviewed academic law reviews are the Melbourne University Law Review , Melbourne Journal of International Law , University of New South Wales Law Journal , and Monash University Law Review . The Melbourne University Law Review generally outperforms Sydney Law Review on reputation, impact, citation in journal and cases and combined rankings. These publications are among
7208-492: The complete text of most law reviews published beginning from the late 1980s. Another such service, Heinonline , provides actual scans of the pages of law reviews going back to the 1850s. Membership on the law review staff is highly sought after by some law students, as it often has a significant impact on their subsequent careers as attorneys. Many U.S. federal judges and partners at the most prestigious law firms were members or editors of their school's law review. There are
7314-554: The consent of all the parties to the conversation, Posner was to deliver another memorable quote. At issue was the constitutionality of the Illinois wiretapping law, which makes it illegal to record someone without consent even when filming public acts like arrests in public. Posner interrupted the ACLU after just 14 words, stating, "Yeah, I know. But I'm not interested, really, in what you want to do with these recordings of peoples' encounters with
7420-459: The contrary. In addition to rankings that measure impact factor , a number of methods can be used to assess the notability of a law review. A professor at the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication averages the annual rankings of: the Washington and Lee University Law School rankings, the average US News Peer Reputation score from the last 10 years, the average ranking of
7526-569: The country. Juridisk Publikation is edited by top students from the law schools in Lund, Stockholm Uppsala, Gothenborg and Umeå. The publication is anonymously peer reviewed by a board of leading Swedish legal practitioners and academics. In Norway, the first student edited law review Jussens Venner was founded in 1952 by students Carsten Smith and Torkel Opsahl (both of whom later became distinguished academics). Occasionally it features peer-reviewed articles, but its editors are composed of one student from
7632-526: The essential end goal of any antitrust policy. Posner's and Bork's theories on antitrust evolved into the prevailing view in academia and at the Justice Department in the George H. W. Bush administration; they have remained the consensus view in both the Justice Department and among legal academics of antitrust. The Bluebook is the style guide that prescribes the most widely used legal citation system in
7738-458: The exception rather than the norm. In Continental Europe law reviews are almost uniformly edited by academics. However, a small number of student-edited law reviews have recently sprung into existence in Germany ( Ad Legendum , Bucerius Law Journal , Freilaw Freiburg Law Students Journal , Goettingen Journal of International Law , Hanse Law Review , Heidelberg Law Review , Marburg Law Review ),
7844-536: The famous American law reviews. Since then, Jura Falconis has grown into a very solid and most unusual value in the Belgian legal literature. The articles in the leading law reviews in France are written by academics and lawyers, the principal editors are Dalloz , LexisNexis, Lamy Liaisons [ fr ] (part of the international Wolters Kluwer group) and Francis Lefebvre [ fr ] . Irish Law Times
7950-420: The first time in history, women led all of the law journals of the most prestigious U.S. law schools. Richard Posner Richard Allen Posner ( / ˈ p oʊ z n ər / ; born January 11, 1939) is an American legal scholar and retired federal judge who served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit from 1981 to 2017. A senior lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School , Posner
8056-402: The format of a working paper series, as a way to complement – rather than compete with – peer-reviewed publications and offer scholars an additional round of feedback. The University of Bologna Law Review is a student-run law journal published by the Department of Legal Studies of the University of Bologna , and officially sponsored by Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP and
8162-931: The fully student-run law reviews (without a Faculty editor-in-chief) include, in order of the frequency they are cited by the Supreme Court of Canada: the McGill Law Journal , the Osgoode Hall Law Journal , the Queen's Law Journal , the Alberta Law Review , University of British Columbia Law Review , the University of Ottawa Law Review , the Saskatchewan Law Review , and the University of Toronto Faculty of Law Review . The country also has several specialized publications run entirely by students. Outside North America, student-run law reviews are
8268-418: The functional need for legal citation forms, that serves obscure needs of the legal culture and its student subculture. He describes those needs as unrelated to practical legal activity but instead as social and political. In the same article, Posner gives an excerpt of the entire citation style guide included (as an appendix) in the short manual he gives his own law clerks (whom he describes as "very smart");
8374-447: The late 1960s, Posner developed a strongly conservative bent. He encountered Chicago School economists Aaron Director and George Stigler while a professor at Stanford . Posner summarized his views on law and economics in his 1973 book The Economic Analysis of Law . Today, although generally viewed as to the right in academia, Posner's pragmatism , his qualified moral relativism and moral skepticism , and his affection for
8480-425: The law school, students may receive academic credit for their work on the law review, although some journals are entirely extracurricular. English and US law education in the early 19th century was dominated by the study of "discursive" treatises which examined older English case law. These treatises were written by eminent scholars of the era but had diminishing relevance to a newly founded nation. The treatise format
8586-586: The majority opinion upholding Indiana's photo identification law in the Crawford v. Marion County Election Board case. He wrote that "absence of prosecutions" for voter fraud is explained in part by "the extreme difficulty of apprehending a voter impersonator," and that such impersonators are "almost impossible to catch without a voter ID requirement". The law was subsequently upheld at the United States Supreme Court . In 2013, Posner disavowed support for
8692-410: The moral irrelevance of species membership). He recognizes the philosophical force of arguments for strong animal rights, but maintains that human intuition about the paramount value of human life makes it impossible to accommodate an ethic of strong animal rights. Posner, a self-avowed moral anti-realist, does not present his critique of strong animal rights as a deductive proof. Instead, he highlights
8798-462: The most important antitrust scholars of the past half-century." In December 2004, Posner started a joint blog with Nobel Prize -winning economist Gary Becker , titled simply "The Becker-Posner Blog". Both men contributed to the blog until shortly before Becker's death in May 2014, after which Posner announced that the blog was being discontinued. He also had a blog at The Atlantic , where he discussed
8904-456: The most prestigious of all, editor-in-chief of the law review. (Upon graduation, the editor-in-chief of the law review can often expect to be highly recruited by the most prestigious law firms.) As members, students are normally expected to edit and cite-check the articles that are being published by the law review, ensuring that references support what the author claims they support and that footnotes are in proper Bluebook format, depending on
9010-630: The most-cited law reviews by the High Court of Australia and among the most cited non-US reviews by US journals. The top international law journal in Australia is the Melbourne Journal of International Law , also a student-edited peer-reviewed academic law review. In Brazil, law reviews are usually run by academics as well, but there are efforts by students to change this; for example: University of Brasilia Law Students Review (re-established in 2007),
9116-485: The optimal patent protection for an inventor. When patent protection is too strongly in favor of the inventor, market efficiency is decreased. He illustrates his argument by comparing the pharmaceutical industry (where the cost of invention is high) with the software industry (where the cost of invention is relatively low). However, Posner suggested that strengthening copyright law, including a possible bar on linking to or paraphrasing copyrighted materials, may be necessary as
9222-449: The other animals but facts, facts that will stimulate a greater empathetic response to animal suffering and facts that will alleviate concern about the human costs of further measures to reduce animal suffering." Along with Robert Bork , Posner helped shape the antitrust policy changes of the 1970s through his idea that 1960s antitrust laws were in fact making prices higher for the consumer rather than lower, while he viewed lower prices as
9328-614: The police. ..." Posner continued: "Once all this stuff can be recorded, there's going to be a lot more of this snooping around by reporters and bloggers. ... I'm always suspicious when the civil liberties people start telling the police how to do their business." The 7th Circuit upheld the challenge, 2–1, striking down the Eavesdropping Act, but Posner wrote a dissenting opinion. In a dissent from an earlier ruling by his protégé Frank Easterbrook , Posner wrote that Easterbrook's decision that female guards could watch male prisoners while in
9434-566: The positions of the Republican Party, authoring more liberal rulings involving same-sex marriage and abortion . In A Failure of Capitalism , he writes that the 2007–2008 financial crisis caused him to question the rational-choice , laissez-faire economic model that lies at the heart of his law and economics theory. Posner was born on January 11, 1939, in New York City . His father's family were of Romanian Jewish descent, and his mother's family were Ashkenazi Jews from Galicia in
9540-453: The practical importance of intuition and emotion over abstract argument. In a 2000 Yale Law Journal book review on the title "Rattling the Cage" by Steven M. Wise , Posner again criticized the legal notion of animal rights. In the review, Posner argues that Wise's approach, using the cognitive ability of animals compared to that of very young normal human beings as a basis for rights-worthiness,
9646-502: The publication's journalists. The success of the Harvard Law Review provided a model that was followed by later journals: faculty-written articles solicited and published by student editors. Yale Law Journal , first published in 1891, used this format to great success. Other contemporary journals were launched by faculty with varying degrees of student input including Dickinson Law Review in 1897. The West Virginia Bar ,
9752-448: The publication's preference. On some law reviews, students may be expected to write a note or comment of publishable quality (although it need not actually be published), although other law reviews often pull from a broader pool for submissions. The editorial staff is normally responsible for reviewing and selecting articles for publication, managing the editing process, and assisting members in writing their notes and comments. Depending on
9858-682: The ruling due to concerns about voter suppression caused by the law. He stated that judges "weren’t given the information that would enable that balance to be struck" between preventing fraud and protecting voters’ rights. In 2014, Posner wrote a 30-page dissent opposing the upholding of a Wisconsin voter ID law. Posner is one of the most prolific legal writers, through both the number and topical breadth of his opinions, to say nothing of his scholarly and popular writings. Unlike many other judges, he writes all his own opinions. Nobel Laureate economist Robert Solow says that Posner "is an apparently inexhaustible writer on ... nearly everything. To call him
9964-470: The ruling until the Court decided to change it. In U.S. Fidelity & Guaranty Co. v. Jadranska Slobodna Plovidba , 683 F.2d 1022 (7th Cir. 1982), Posner revived Learned Hand's economic efficiency theory of negligence law . In Indiana Harbor Belt Railroad Co. v. American Cyanamid Co. (1990), Posner lowered the standard of legal liability a railroad faced for a hazardous waste spill. The case became
10070-500: The same post, he wrote, "I am not clear what we should think the problem of American education (below the college level) is. Most children of middle-class ... Americans are white or Asian and attend good public or private schools, usually predominantly white. The average white IQ is of course 100 and the Asian (like the Jewish) almost one standard deviation higher, that is, 115. The average black IQ
10176-431: The shower or bathroom must stem from a belief that prisoners are "members of a different species, indeed as a type of vermin , devoid of human dignity and entitled to no respect. ... I do not myself consider the 1.5 million inmates of American prisons and jails in that light." Posner's views of public education policy are informed by his view that groups of students differ in intellectual ability, and therefore, that it
10282-405: The state of indirectly trying to ban abortions in the state Posner wrote, "They [Wisconsin] may do this in the name of protecting the health of women who have abortions, yet as in this case the specific measures they support may do little or nothing for health, but rather strew impediments to abortion." Posner rejects an ethic of strong animal rights on pragmatic grounds (where such an ethic posits
10388-503: The then-current Great Recession . Posner was mentioned in 2005 as a potential nominee to replace Sandra Day O'Connor because of his prominence as a scholar and an appellate judge. Robert S. Boynton wrote in The Washington Post that he believed Posner would never sit on the Supreme Court because despite his "obvious brilliance," he would be criticized for his occasionally "outrageous conclusions," such as his contention "that
10494-425: The thought of Friedrich Nietzsche set him apart from most American conservatives. As a judge, with the exception of his rulings with respect to the sentencing guidelines and the recording of police actions, Posner's judicial votes have always placed him on the moderate-to-liberal wing of the Republican Party, where he has become more isolated over time. In July 2012, Posner stated, "I've become less conservative since
10600-414: The thought that a company would be permitted to manufacture an electronic product that the government would not be able to search" he said. Posner has expressed concerns, on the blog he contributed to with Gary Becker, that both patent and copyright protection, though particularly the former, may be excessive. He argues that the cost of inventing must be compared to the cost of copying in order to determine
10706-563: The trillions of bits of information that are crawling through the electronic worldwide networks, I think that's fine. ... Much of what passes for the name of privacy is really just trying to conceal the disreputable parts of your conduct," Posner added. "Privacy is mainly about trying to improve your social and business opportunities by concealing the sorts of bad activities that would cause other people not to want to deal with you." Posner also criticized mobile OS companies for enabling end-to-end encryption in their newest software. "I'm shocked at
10812-418: Was "legendary" law professor William Herbert ("Herbie") Page, who taught at the school from 1917 until his death in 1952. The first student editor-in-chief was Leon Foley . In 1940, Harriet Zetterberg became the journal's first female editor-in-chief. Students are awarded staff membership based solely on their performance in a write-on competition at the end of their first year of law school, which consists of
10918-877: Was a lull in new journals broken in 1908 by publication of the Maine Law Review which unfortunately ceased publication when the school closed in 1920. The California Law Review , beginning in 1912, was the nation's first law review published west of Illinois. The Georgetown Law Journal was launched that same year. Additional US law reviews During the 1990s, the American Bar Association began coordinating its own practitioner journals with law schools, courting student editorial bodies for publications including Administrative Law Review , The International Lawyer , Public Contract Law Journal , and The Urban Lawyer . Some law reviews also consider race, gender, and other demographic characteristics of all or
11024-466: Was also unsuited to communicate the rapid decisions of a young court system to an expanding population of lawyers. By the 1850s a number of legal periodicals had arisen in the US which "typically highlighted recent court decisions, local news, and editorial comments". One of these periodicals, the American Law Register , was founded in 1852 and has been published continually since. Now known as
11130-505: Was confirmed by the United States Senate on November 24, 1981, and received his commission on December 1, 1981. He served as Chief Judge of that court from 1993 to 2000 but remained a part-time professor at the University of Chicago . Judge Posner retired from the federal bench on September 2, 2017. Posner stated that he had originally planned to retire at the age of 80, but instead retired at 78 due to disputes with other judges on
11236-653: Was identified in The Journal of Legal Studies as the most-cited legal scholar of the 20th century. As of 2021, he is also the most-cited United States legal scholar of all time. He is widely considered to be one of the most influential legal scholars in the United States. Posner is known for his scholarly range and for writing on topics outside of law. In his various writings and books, he has addressed animal rights , feminism , drug prohibition , same-sex marriage , Keynesian economics , law and literature , and academic moral philosophy , among other subjects. Posner
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