“Community Theaters Kill ‘Mockingbird’ Productions After Lawsuit Threat”

Atticus Grinch: “From Massachusetts to Utah, small community theater productions of To Kill a Mockingbird are being shut down under threat of a lawsuit by the producer of the new Broadway production.

“It doesn’t matter that the new version, penned by Aaron Sorkin, is completely different from the Christopher Sergel play that’s been performed by high school students and community theater actors for decades. Nor does it matter that the community theaters paid a licensing fee of at least $100 per performance to the Dramatic Publishing Company, which owns the rights to the earlier version of the play.

“What matters, lawyers for Broadway producer Scott Rudin say, is that according to the contract between Dramatic and the Harper Lee estate, most amateur performances can’t proceed now that a new version of the story is on Broadway.” [Matthew S. Schwartz, NPR]

Filed under: copyright

Constitutional law roundup

You don’t need to be a religious believer to think the Supreme Court should uphold the continued display of the Bladensburg war memorial cross [George Will/syndicated, Eugene “Jesse” Nash IV and Victoria Gomes-Boronat, Capital News Service] Cato filed a brief in the case [Ilya Shapiro, Trevor Burrus, Patrick Moran, and Michael Finch on The American Legion v. American Humanist Association]
“The Second Amendment In The New Supreme Court” [Federalist Society conference with Renee Lerner, Stephen Halbrook, Mark W. Smith, and others; Halbrook on the Court’s decision to hear New York State Rifle and Pistol Association Inc. v. City of New York, earlier on which] Map of state changes liberalizing concealed carry law since 1986 [Eugene Volokh]
In the spirit of balance, here’s a more cheerful and positive view of an Article V convention than the one I take [Paul Starobin, American Affairs Journal]
“Bruno Leoni and the Search for Certainty in Law” [Alberto Mingardi, Law and Liberty]
Oregon carbon emission credit system falls more heavily on out-of-state than on in-state suppliers, and the Dormant Commerce Clause has something to say about that [Ilya Shapiro on Cato cert amicus brief in American Fuel & Petroleum Manufacturers v. O’Keeffe]
Would a wealth tax be constitutional? [Richard Epstein, Hoover]

Filed under: Article V, constitutional law, guns, Oregon, religious liberty, taxes

Unions exploit California environmental law for leverage

The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and other California laws are notorious for delaying and driving up the cost of building projects. Aside from their uses for neighbors pursuing Not In My Back Yard (NIMBY) goals, the environmental laws are also employed for leverage by labor unions who threaten to invoke them “to stop new construction unless they get a cut of the action. One developer is fighting back.” [Scott Shackford, earlier on CEQA]

Filed under: California, environment, labor unions, legal extortion

California AG: it’s illegal to possess secret list of convicted cops

By filing routine public records requests, reporters obtained a hitherto unreleased list of thousands of California law enforcement officers convicted of crimes over the past decade. “But when [California Attorney General Xavier] Becerra’s office learned about the disclosure, it threatened the reporters with legal action unless they destroyed the records, insisting they are confidential under state law and were released inadvertently. The two journalism organizations have rejected Becerra’s demands.” The list includes “cops who stole money from their departments and even one who robbed a bank wearing a fake beard. Some sexually assaulted suspects. Others took bribes, filed false reports and committed perjury.” [Robert Lewis and Jason Paladino, East Bay Times]

Filed under: attorneys general, California, police

February 27 roundup

In move to protect itself against patent trolls, Apple plans to close retail stores in the troll-favored Eastern District of Texas [Joe Rossignol, MacRumors; Sarah Perez, TechCrunch]
Don’t: “Civil Rights Lawyer Faked Cancer to Delay Cases, Illinois Bar Authorities Say” [Scott Flaherty, American Lawyer]
Don’t: “* lies about joint stipulation for extension * FABRICATES OPPOSITION BRIEF * constructs false chain of emails, forwards to partner. Dude, just doing the work would have been WAY less effort.” [Keith Lee thread on Twitter, with punch line being what the New York courts did by way of discipline; Jason Grant, New York Law Journal]
I’m quoted disagreeing (cordially) with Sen. Mike Lee on whether criticism of judicial nominees at hearings based on their religious views oversteps Constitution’s Religious Test Clause [Mark Tapscott, Epoch Times; my 2017 post at Secular Right]
Colorado may become 13th state to enact National Popular Vote interstate compact, an attempted workaround of the Electoral College. This critique of the idea is from 2008 [John Samples, Cato; Emily Tillett, CBS]
New York law imposes strict liability on simple possession of a gravity knife, leaves enforcement to official whim, and lacks a mens rea (guilty mind) requirement. The Constitution demands better [Ilya Shapiro on Cato Institute cert amicus brief in Copeland v. Vance, earlier and more on such laws]

Filed under: Apple, don't, patent trolls, religious liberty, Texas

Justice Sotomayor on administrative law’s “stacked deck”

Last week the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Return Mail Inc. v. USPS, posing the patent law issue (to quote SCOTUSBlog) of “Whether the government is a ‘person’ who may petition to institute review proceedings under the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act.” On pp. 30-31 of the transcript, Justice Sonia Sotomayor referred favorably to the Cato Institute’s brief on the unique dangers that can arise when federal agencies litigate before tribunals operated by federal agencies.

And that wasn’t even the best part! This was, from her comments immediately afterward, on the failure of the law to specify whether the word “person” includes the government:

It does seem like the deck is stacked against a private citizen who is dragged into these proceedings. They’ve got an executive agency acting as judge with an executive director who can pick the judges, who can substitute judges, can reexamine what those judges say, and change the ruling, and you’ve got another government agency being the prosecutor at the same time.

In those situations, shouldn’t you have a clear and express rule?

Filed under: administrative law, Cato Institute, patent litigation, Sonia Sotomayor

Maryland: “Bail reform hasn’t led to fewer held in jail, court records show”

A Capital News Service series published at Maryland Matters confirms that in Maryland, at least, bail reform has had trouble meeting its intended goals. In particular, while the number held for inability to meet bail has dropped sharply since the adoption of reforms in February 2017, Baltimore in particular has seen an offsetting jump in the rate at which judges hold defendants without making bail available. Statewide, “the number of people held with bail decreased from 29.8 percent to 18.4 percent over the past 18 months, while the number of people held without bail has increased from 13.6 percent to 22.6 percent.” [Alicia Cherem and Carly Taylor with sidebar by Kaitlyn Hopkins and James Crabtree-Hannigan] I reported on the same trend in 2017 and again last year.

A second entry in the series examines the adoption of pretrial risk assessment algorithms which can make up for some of the lost functions of cash bail, a county-by-county process still under way across the state [Angela Roberts and Nora Eckert] A third looks at the “trial penalty”: numbers show that “defendants who reject plea bargains and are convicted when they choose to go to trial for many types of crimes face longer sentences – sometimes substantially longer – than defendants who make a deal.” [Shruti Bhatt, Angela Roberts and Nora Eckert]

It’s worth remembering that state ventures in bail reform can lead to quite different outcomes depending on the strategy tried. New Jersey, which has won praise for its careful development of pretrial services, “is approaching two years operating a bail system where people don’t have to pay money to be free from jail. The crime wave some warned about hasn’t happened.” [Scott Shackford, Reason; Marc Levin, Real Clear Policy]

Filed under: bail bonds, Baltimore, Maryland, New Jersey

Free speech roundup

We’ll pass the bill first, and let the courts tell us later whether it violates the First Amendment. That’s not how it’s supposed to work [my Free State Notes on a Maryland “cyberbullying” bill]
Local laws requiring government contractors to disclose/disclaim ties to the anti-Israel BDS movement have rightly come under criticism. Will that spill over to a constitutionally dubious new Los Angeles ordinance requiring contractors to disclose ties with an advocacy group devoted to a different issue, the NRA? [Eugene Volokh]
“Lust on Trial,” new book by Amy Werbel on celebrated vice crusader Anthony Comstock [Kurt Conklin with Alex Joseph, Hue (Fashion Institute of Technology, NYC); podcasts at FIRE with Nico Perrino and ABA Journal with Lee Rawles]
“The Rushdie affair became a template for global intellectual terrorism” from Paris and Copenhagen to Garland, Tex.; in a different way, it also foreshadowed the far pettier heresy hunts and sanctity trials of callout culture [Jonathan Rauch]
$250 million libel suits as a fantasy way to own the libs? In real life meanwhile big-ticket libel suits are used to silence conservatives [Competitive Enterprise Institute press release (leading media orgs including RCFP, SPJ, ASNE support rehearing of D.C. court ruling favorable toward Michael Mann defamation action), NR editors, Jack Fowler] “The media’s Covington coverage was appalling, but Nick Sandman’s libel lawsuit is not the answer” [Robby Soave, Irina Manta] Another part of the forest: Justice Clarence Thomas criticizes New York Times v. Sullivan [Will Baude, Cass Sunstein, Ramesh Ponnuru]
“A new documentary showcased by PBS presents Montana as a success story of campaign finance reform and Wisconsin’s John Doe investigations as a failure.” But “Dark Money” has some omissions [Cato Daily Podcast with Caleb Brown and Steve Klein of the Pillar of Law Institute]

Filed under: bullying, free speech, guns, libel slander and defamation, Los Angeles, Maryland, Montana, Wisconsin

Some costs of teacher tenure

Citing a study by Stanford University researcher Eric Hanushek, Howard notes that bad teachers have a much greater negative effect on student performance than good teachers have a positive effect. Based on student-performance data, Hanushek’s study concluded that dismissing the worst 8 percent of American public school teachers would put American students on par with those of Finland, which has the highest-scoring students in the world. Yet it’s nearly impossible to fire tenured teachers. In Los Angeles, an effort to fire just seven notoriously bad instructors cost the city $3.5 million, and only got rid of four of the teachers.

— Jonathan Leaf, City Journal, reviewing Philip K. Howard’s new book Try Common Sense: Replacing the Failed Ideologies of Right and Left.

Filed under: Los Angeles, schools, teacher tenure

Hello again, reparations

Ten years ago I wrote this piece for City Journal pronouncing slavery reparations dead as a national cause. Now, as Astead W. Herndon reports in the New York Times, presidential candidates are getting behind the word: Sens. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) affirmed her support, and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) “also said she supported reparations for black Americans impacted by slavery — a policy that experts say could cost several trillion dollars, and one that Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and many top Democrats have not supported.” Did I speak too soon?

One complication is that while candidates have begun using the word, it’s often to describe policies that wouldn’t fit the definition accepted up to now. For example, as I noted in the City Journal piece, beginning in the 1960s many programs were enacted aiding poor persons of all races, often conceptualized and argued for as an alternative to more explicit race-based reparations. Some of the candidates who now describe themselves as being for reparations are vague about whether they intend to go beyond support for new programs that are formally race-neutral. [Jeff Stein, Washington Post]

Filed under: Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, reparations