Something for Nothing: Untangling a Knot of Section 230 Solutions

Social media platforms have become the dominant public forum of the modern age but there is a big problem: they are privately owned and can moderate content however they like. This right is protected both by the First Amendment and Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the latter of which creates immunity from suit for platforms that exercise their right to moderate content by removing—or not removing—objectionable content. Politicians on both sides of the aisle have complained that platforms are abusing this immunity and, while they have put forward a wide variety of legislative solutions, none of them have come close to being passed. In response, this Note examines the pros and cons of these solutions and relies on First Amendment limits to put forward a legislative solution of its own.

Textualism, Dynamism, and the Meaning of "Sex"

A recent Article by Professors William N. Eskridge, Brian G. Slocum, and Stefan Th. Gries critically examines textualism, both in general and as applied in Bostock v. Clayton County. This Essay makes three points in reply. First, the authors criticize strawman versions of textualism that no mainstream legal interpreter claims to hold. Second, the authors’ examples of “societal dynamism” do not put any pressure on textualism properly understood. And third, the authors’ corpus-linguistics analysis of the word “sex” is, from a textualist perspective, irrelevant to the issue in Bostock.

Standardizing State Vote-by-Mail Deadlines in Federal Elections

The litigation over the vote-by-mail process during the 2020 general election revealed that absentee ballot voting disputes should not be left entirely to the courts. Rather, this Note argues that Congress should utilize its constitutional Elections Clause power to standardize federal vote-by-mail processes, and proposes specific elements that Congress should include in such legislation.

A Tale of Two Interoperabilities; Or, How Google v. Oracle Could Become Social Media Legislation

The Supreme Court’s recent decision in Google v. Oracle shares a perhaps unexpected connection with recent legislative proposals to enhance social media competition. At first glance they are seemingly unrelated: the former deals with copyright protection in certain portions of software code, while the latter relates to interconnection between dominant online platforms and their competitors. Yet they are closely intertwined, such that a competitive platform environment cannot be fully achieved without addressing lingering questions in Google. As a result, lawmakers ought to be motivated to address software copyrights and related matters as part of their efforts to improve competition among social media and other online platforms.

The Unconstitutionality of State Bans on Marriage Between First Cousins

A majority of jurisdictions in the United States severely limit or prohibit the right of first cousins to marry, cohabit, or have intercourse. Yet, unlike regulation of other relationships within close degrees of consanguinity, for instance between parents and children or siblings, these statutes are relatively recent additions to the marriage regulation landscape. These bans are unsupported by the commonly-cited concerns of harmful genetic or societal consequences. First cousin-marriages are, instead, popular and permitted in much of the world—as they once were in the United States. This Article demonstrates that the prohibitions against first-cousin marriages directly contravene right-to-marry jurisprudence and are unjustified state interferences born of discriminatory bias.

Congress and Universal Injunctions

As the judicial and scholarly debate rages over the power of federal courts to issue universal or non-particularized injunctions, this paper explores the role of Congress in ending this controversy. It considers the details, wisdom, and efficacy of five legislative proposals to eliminate or limit universal/non-particularized injunctions; it concludes that one approach resolves the problem—a flat and unequivocal prohibition on injunctions that protect anyone other than the plaintiffs.

W(h)ither Judgment

Textualists complain that loose rules of statutory interpretation inject uncertainty and inconsistency into judicial resolutions of statutory ambiguity. But by employing an incomplete theory of meaning, pure textualists fail to shore up their decisions. And by disparaging the judgement necessary to navigate complex questions of meaning, they erode trust in the judicial process—the very foundation of the rule of law.

COVID-19 and Digital Contact Tracing: Regulating the Future of Public Health Surveillance

Digital surveillance tools are at the forefront of potential public health response strategies for the COVID-19 pandemic. The United States is in desperate need of a national-level contact tracing and exposure notification strategy to supplement traditional public health response efforts. This article addresses data privacy and security concerns, as well as epidemiological considerations, when developing digital contact tracing and exposure notification tools. It is both feasible and prudent that the United States establish a federal network for public health surveillance aided by digital tools, especially considering that waves of COVID-19 are expected to continue well into 2021 and while the threat of other emerging infectious diseases persists.

Child Vehicular Heatstroke Deaths: How the Criminal Legal System Punishes Grieving Parents Over a Neurobiological Response

Twenty states have passed criminal statutes aimed at reducing heat stroke deaths resulting from a child being left in a vehicle. This Note examines those statutes and the legal theories of punishment they rely upon. The Note proposes that state legislatures repeal these statutes and instead increase funding for programs aimed at expanding awareness and technological advances focused on preventing these tragedies.