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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Jrgetsin (talk | contribs) at 21:48, 7 August 2006 (→State constitutions: to do?). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

A small (§) victory.

Please note that for our articles on statutes, restatements, etc., the powers that be have seen fit to add the § symbol to the character box on the editing page (you can find it somewhere on the last line) so use it generously! -- BD2412 talk 00:40, 3 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Infobox help

Hi, I created a law infobox based on Roe v. Wade for a Indian court case (K. M. Nanavati vs. State of Maharashtra based on the judgement text). I have some doubts. What does citation mean here? The judgement mentioned a citation, which I have copied, but it also had something called Citator Info, which I can't make out. Can someone please give an opinion on whether the infobox is done right? Thanks. --Pamri • Talk 15:36, 17 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  • It appears correct in all regards to me - the citation is simply the reference to where the case can be found in the jurisdictions records of cases, and this is correct here. Cheers!  BD2412 talk 16:00, 17 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure the value of this, but this user Alloy33 (link to contrib page) has been spamming links to LawyerIntl.com. Anyone wanna take up reverting them? Mmmbeer 03:33, 18 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

New "Law" Categories

Above we have something going for templates. I just thought it might be useful to create a discussion for new/useful categories that we should make sure that we're aware of when creating new articles.

I think that sounds great. I think, in fact, it would be worth starting a page dedicated to categorization issues (such as Wikipedia:WikiProject Law/Categorization), like they have for the Medical Wikiprojects. It would be useful to map out the taxonomy of law and examine what categories might be missing. Anyone interested in getting something like that started? -- PullUpYourSocks 03:33, 25 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Sounds like a plan. In the meantime, I've added another:

I notice we do not have a category for District Attorneys. Nor are they listed anywhere in the categories for occupation. This is a rather large oversight methinks...  ALKIVAR™ 23:19, 26 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

More clean up stuff

At least I find myself thinking, "I need to remember to come back and clean up this article I stumbled across." So I created, Wikipedia:WikiProject_Law/Cleanups so that we can contribute to a single list of deficient articles. I think if we do this, rather than simply creating stubs from the "missing law articles" pages, we can get a better idea of articles that are also in need of some help.

I started this because I was looking at Forum shopping. I realized that while it has some information, it's pretty weak on any real substance. Feel free to contribute. Mmmbeer 21:14, 27 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Do we need to add a more explicit disclaimer?

At the bottom of the page there is a "disclaimer", but man, it hardly seem like enough, especially since you have to go from Wikipedia:General disclaimer to the Wikipedia:Legal disclaimer. Would it be such a bad idea to use the following at the top of all the "discussion" pages containing legal information: {{Legal_disclaimer}}


Maybe I'm missing an important template already. mmmbeerT / C / ? 13:45, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The biggest problem is Jimbo is 100% against any templates of this nature, in fact it actually WEAKENS their footing when it comes to lawsuits... Or so the wikimedia council says (removing common carrier status?). As IANAL you guys might want to run this past Jimbo before putting this into use.  ALKIVAR™ 01:04, 29 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Case law?

Hello, I've just joined the project. I have made a two articles on cases (Partridge v. Crittenden and R. v. Constanza) so far, and I don't know if they are consistent with all other ones. Is there a standard layout that they must have, or are they OK? Izehar 19:30, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Looking great to me. There is no official standard for law articles but I think you have the right idea. So long as it's readable to the lay-person you can't go too wrong. --PullUpYourSocks 03:56, 18 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

1911 topics

Lets have a run at Wikipedia:1911 Encyclopedia topics on Law. There's only a few dozen topics left, and many are likely redirects. BD2412 T 03:20, 18 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Church tax exemption

Not exactly and obviously law, but I don't know where else to take this. Remarkably, a recent addition at Ted_Haggard#Relationship_with_President_George_W._Bush is Wikipedia's first mention of the current controversy over the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) investigating All Saints Church's tax status over an anti-war speech. Does someone want to start an article on the broader matter? I don't watchlist this page, so if anyone wants me, please hit my user talk page. -- Jmabel | Talk 07:01, 24 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

{{LawUnref}}

Note - I have created a modification of the {{unreferenced}} template for law articles - {{LawUnref}}, which puts articles into Category:Law-related articles lacking sources. I have substituted this for the regular unref template on some law articles in Category:Articles lacking sources. Please use this as a resource to note law-related articles that require references. Cheers! BD2412 T 15:23, 7 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Legal rights of women---This article seriously needs a rewrite. It's an important subject, and Wiki should have an acceptable article on it as soon as possible. Alexander 007 05:07, 9 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

the article on Warez has a rather pathetic "Legality" section. The entire content is:

Legality

Copyright infringement is sometimes a civil wrong or a crime, depending on the country and jurisdiction. However, there are exceptions and loopholes in some countries.

Help put something worthwhile here. Any specific laws/cases RE: Warez/Software Piracy in particular would be extremely helpful. I'm trying to make a run at FAC again in the spring, its on PR now. Thanks!  ALKIVAR™ 22:39, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Articles for the Wikipedia 1.0 project

Hi, I'm a member of the Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team, which is looking to identify quality articles in Wikipedia for future publication on CD or paper. We recently began assessing using these criteria, and we are looking for A-Class and good B-Class articles, with no POV or copyright problems. Can you recommend any suitable articles on law? We are also looking for FAs. Please post your suggestions here. Cheers!--Shanel 00:50, 17 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

You're one of the most active WikiProjects out there... you surely don't want to fall behind in the full article list when compared to other WikiProjects, do you? ;). Besides, law is one of the fundamental areas of human knowledge, so we need to cover at least some as we push to 1.0... Titoxd(?!? - help us) 06:54, 11 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

District attorney

District attorney has been redirected to Prosecutor, losing its content: diff. Is this kosher?--Commander Keane 08:18, 18 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I've reverted. It's a perfectly legitimate article as the American form of a prosecutor, which is markedly different to that in a number of other countries. Ambi 08:27, 18 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

If there are any Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act experts out there...

I could really use the help with the legal analysis given that it's very possible the good ol' Shrub authorized the violation of the law[1] just recently. I think that I've taken it a long way[2], but it would be good to have another pair of eyes go over it.

Also, the case law relating to the topic is pretty thick. I know I'm certainly NOT an expert in this area. Given that this is a current issue, it might be a good article to get into shape, and get it there quickly. mmmbeerT / C / ? 02:36, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Consistent statute template

Check out the infoboxes used in Digital Millennium Copyright Act and USA PATRIOT Act. Why are two different templates used for two recent pieces of U.S. statutory law? Can we come up with an infobox (if none of the current templates are adequate) that can be consistently used in U.S. statutory articles? Am I simply missing something? I'm in a bit of a quandry as to which box to use in this article, and there are several others that I would like to add an infobox to. - Jersyko talk 16:35, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It appears that the author of Digital Millennium Copyright Act used Template:Infobox U.S. legislation, while the author of USA PATRIOT Act simply designed his/her own table format. The former is rather too garish for my taste, although obviously that is a subjective viewpoint. However, in terms of maintainability, it would probably be best to link as many articles as possible to the existing template, and then play with it to make it more attractive. --Russ Blau (talk) 17:19, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I got rid of the "yikes" green and went for a color that's a bit more consistent with American legislation: a light blue gray. Plus I dropped the really ugly borders. Now watch some revert the change because they liked the green. mmmbeerT / C / ? 17:53, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Much better, and no one liked the green :). - Jersyko talk 19:48, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I'll blame you the moment I get a message from someone saying, "Hey! Why did you change the template. It was l337 the way it was. I'm reverting!" mmmbeerT / C / ? 20:00, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

District Attorney (redux)

Rather than get into an edit war, I'd like some input from my fellow Wikipedians on this. There is an article titled Prosecutor which is a fairly comprehensive article. There were also articles at District Attorney, Commonwealth's Attorney, County Attorney, District attorney (city), and District attorney (county). Those were all redirected (mostly by me) to Prosecutor. My redirect from District Attorney only was reverted, then reverted again when I changed it back. I don't believe there should be a separate page for District Attorney apart from Prosecutor because it's completely redundant, they mean the same thing, except Prosecutor is more inclusive. If we keep District Attorney, we would need to keep ALL of the other pages that are redirected. District Attorney is simply the title given to the Prosecutor in several states. For example, I happen to be a prosecutor in New York. My title is Assistant District Attorney. If I happened to live in New Jersey, my title would be Assistant Prosecutor. If I lived in Florida, I'd be an Assistant State's Attorney. If a lived in Massachusetts, I'd be an Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney. Regardless, no matter what my title would be, I'd be a prosecutor. If someone is looking for an encyclopedia article on what a District Attorney is (or a Commonwealth's Attorney, or whatever), they should be redirected to Prosecutor, rather than have multiple pages with the exact same information. Any extra info at District Attorney can be easily merged into Prosecutor, expanding on this paragraph: "In the United States the director of any such offices may be known by any of several names depending on the legal jurisdiction (e.g. County Attorney, County Prosecutor, State Attorney, State Prosecutor, Commonwealth's Attorney (in Virginia, Kentucky, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts), District Attorney, City Attorney, City Prosecutor or U.S. Attorney) and may be either appointed or elected." Thoughts, comments? Thanks!! Tufflaw 05:16, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • I really don't know what to make of this, but I will note that Black's Law Dictionary has separate entries for "prosecutor" and "district attorney." The definitions of the two words, however, are essentially identical. This comment is relevant only to use of the terms in the United States, as far as I know. - Jersyko talk 05:22, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • That is the issue. A district attorney in the US is a different kettle of fish entirely from a prosecutor in the Commonwealth realms, and assumedly in other places as well. I see the problem with deciding what to name said article, but there was good US-specific content in those articles that didn't need to be lost. Ambi 07:51, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • Well, let's break down the article:

"A district attorney is, in some jurisdictions, the title of the local prosecutor, the American public official who represents the government in the prosecution of criminals. Because different levels of government in the U.S. operate independently of one another, there are many differences between persons who perform this function at the federal, state, and county levels. Similar functions are carried out in other jurisdictions by officers such as the Commonwealth's Attorney or County Attorney." - This can easily be merged into Prosecutor, to the extent that it's not already there.

"The proper title for a federal prosecutor is United States Attorney. Such officers are appointed by the President of the United States, serve under the Attorney General, and prosecute cases in the district courts of the federal government." - This shouldn't even be in the District Attorney article, and should instead be in Prosecutor.

"Most states also have an Attorney General who oversees prosecutions throughout the state. A district attorney of a state is often called a state's attorney. However, the district attorney of a county (often called the county attorney) usually serves as the chief prosecutor for the county, holding the highest office in the county's legal department, and supervising a staff of assistant district attorneys." This is just all wrong. Attorney General is federal, first of all, and is never called a District Attorney. Also, it's incorrect to say that "A district attorney of a state is often called a state's attorney", because they're two different titles for the same job, both under the umbrella of prosecutor.

"Depending on the system in place in the particular state or county, district attorneys may be appointed by the chief executive of the region, elected by the people, or hired directly by the supervisor of the particular office in which they work." Merge to Prosecutor.

"The equivalent position within England and many Commonwealth countries is the Director of Public Prosecutions." Merge to Prosecutor. Tufflaw 08:21, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree entirely, Tufflaw. There's no logic whatsoever to having a specific page about District Attorney, unless the article is to discuss matters such as the history of the office (as opposed to the history of public prosecutors), notable office holders, etc. If (and I for one am not convinced), a prosecutor in Commonwealth realms is an entirely different kettle of fish, this point can be put in the article.
Finally, the last sentence, on the equivalent position within England is (in England and Wales at least) incorrect. The equivalent position is Crown Prosecutor, who are people who work for, and under the direction of, the Director of Public Prosecutions, and (to quote the legislation), under the 'superintendance' of the UK Attorney-General. Merge the articles and Redirect. Necessaryx 11:42, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've restored County attorney as a seperate article, and added some info - I interviewed with that office for Miami-Dade County, and learned that, in addition to prosecutions, they are responsible for handling the County's civil law matters, contracts, election challenges, all kinds of non-prosecutorial stuff. BD2412 T 19:28, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
In Illinois, the State's Attorney performs essentially the same functions BD describes for Florida. To quote from the Cook County State's Attorney website: "The State's Attorney pursues these goals by enforcing the criminal laws, promoting civil protection for the disabled, the elderly, consumers and the environment, and acting as general counsel for a county government that is larger than 44 state governments." Although being a prosecutor is a full time job for most of the 500+ attorneys in that office, many others have nothing to do with criminal law. -- DS1953 talk 17:36, 11 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Help please

If anyone out there has access to a copy of Dicey and Morris or any other reputable text on Conflict of Laws, could you please verify my definition of a state and say how many states there are in the U.K. Many thanks in anticipation that someone can provide the necessary source to verify my entry which has been disputed. David91 12:22, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Good thing I read this while at the library, and only feet away from the proper stacks no less. On p.28 of 1993 edition of Dicey it says:
"The word State has various meanings. Whatever may be its meanig in public international law or constitutional law, in this book it means the whole of a territory subject to one sovereign power." He then shows as an example that the UK is a state but England is not. "A State may or may not coincide with a country in the sense of the conflict of laws. Unitary States ... wher the law is the same throughout the State, are "countries" in this sense. But composite States like the United Kingdom...are not." There you go. Hope that helps. --PullUpYourSocks 23:26, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for checking but that only partially addresses the issue. The law as I have always understood it is that, for the purposes of Conflict, the word "state" is used to to refer to a "law area", i.e. a defined territory subject more or less to a single legal system. Thus, for example, Scotland or Arizona are not a de jure states that can sign treaties in the international arena, but they are states in the Conflict sense because if you wanted to determine a person's status, you would refer to the lex domicilii, i.e. the law of the state in which that person has the factum of permanent residence + animus semper mandendi (English law terminology). Hence, the U.K. and the U.S. are composite states in the Public International Law sense because they have the sovereign authority to enter into treaties, etc. But how many Conflict states are they composed of? In the case of the U.K (or, upon reflection, the British Isles since I tend to use the terms interchangeably for these purposes), I think the answer is five or six depending on how you count the Channel Islands (at least that is how it used to be before I got old and forgetful), i.e. England and Wales, Scotland, Northern Island, the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey. Thus, you would have a British nationality and a domicile in any one of the five or six "states". But things change, I forget specifics and the answer does not seem to be easily verified on the net, hence this question. David91 01:38, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Articles in need of some serious work

Found these linked over at Articles requested for more than a year:

Others listed that need work:

as I do not know what they pertain to perhaps they merely need redirects? Thanks in advance for your help, this will get stuff requested for more than a year off the request list!.  ALKIVAR™ 14:51, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Feedback and copyediting wanted

I'm not sure where to write this, but I hope this is the right place. I started an article on Tony Kiritsis and noone seems to have read it yet. It may need some copyediting and maybe someone with better juridical knowledge could add something about how this case was important. It helped change US laws on insanity defense (it seems like there was something briefly refered to as "The Kiritsis Law"). This was also one of the first cases that were broadcast on live TV. I have mentioned that some tv stations quit broadcasting it out of fear that Kiritsis would pull the trigger (this was 10 years before people saw Budd Dwyer's brain all over the room on live tv). Please edit whatever you like, and I'd appreciate feedback here or on my talk page or on the article's talk page. (Entheta 22:24, 7 January 2006 (UTC))[reply]

Helping Law Students

You might be interested in the Cyberlaw project where a group of Harvard Law School students are taking a class, where part of their exposure is to Wikipedia. I volunteered to help out. I am not a lawyer, but rather a computer programmer, and other related worker bee. I am somewhat of a Wiki newbie, with fluctuating time availability, getting more experienced in Wikipedia, with a background in a diversity of Cyber topics.

The students are intensively studying some topics that I think the Wiki community could also benefit from knowing better, especially in some contentious areas where the more inexperienced think consensus trumps the law, and many leaders seem to be doing a less than adequate job of communicating why fair use can be used some places and not others.

One of the class assignments was to figure out how Wikipedia could do a better job coping with a variety of contemporary issues. Seems to me the students reccommendations ought to have better exposure to the Wikipedian community for general discussion of their merits.

The next Wikimania will be held at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society where these students are located and I wonder if there is good enough cooperation between the different interests intersecting here. User:AlMac|(talk) 13:13, 11 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Opinions sought on abortion/reproductive rights category merge proposal

I'd like some additional opinions at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2006 January 14 on my proposal to merge Category:United States abortion case law into Category:United States reproductive rights case law (the proposal was initially just for a rename, but I went ahead and created the latter category to house the cases I named in the proposal). BD2412 T 23:58, 19 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

AFD

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Unlawful arrest could do with some informed input. --Doc ask? 19:37, 24 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Notability

I was reading wikipedia's policy on notability and noticed that there are sets of articles for deterimining notability in specific areas, such as Wikipedia:Notability (music). Anyone interested in perhaps starting Wikipedia:Notability (law)? I think this would be most relevant for issues regarding case summaries. For example, are all Supreme Court decisions automatically notable? How obscure can the cases be? What about the trivial cases that seem to have a life only in law school (e.g. Hawkins v. McGee and countless others)? I'm sure this will become an issue one of these days as the law materials grow. -PullUpYourSocks 05:45, 26 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • My hunch is that since WP isn't paper, cases worth writing a summary about are probably notable-even if it is only important to a law student or someone having watched the Paper Chase. SCOTUS cases are also probably per se notable, and I don't think that we should discourage people from creating case brief (stubs). Anyway, I think you're right, we should probably have some policy, but I don't know if it'll be invokable as often as Wikipedia:Notability (music). mmmbeerT / C / ? 12:22, 26 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • Having thought it over a bit more, maybe a whole article on policy might not be necessary. I'm not certain one way or the other, actually. However, in any event, some guidelines on the notability of briefs would be useful. -PullUpYourSocks 13:38, 26 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
As a matter of convenience more than anything else, I have grouped brief case summaries under a topic heading rather than create stubs (see, for example Public order crime case law in the United States or Recklessness (criminal). Alternatively, I have created discussion pages such as Automatism (case law). I am not sure that it is user friendly to have free-standing pages for each case. Unless editors are aware of the resource, the information may not be linked into topic articles and the reader experience is to be constantly referred to other pages for short summaries rather than having the material in-line with commentary when relevant. However, rather than make policy on the hoof, some form of informal guidance would be useful. David91 01:44, 2 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I've thought about this a bit - I think any case that has appeared in casebooks by two different publishers is notable. I don't think all SCOTUS cases are notable, but every one that turns up in a casebook probably is. BD2412 T 02:34, 2 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm -- I think an argument could be made than any SCOTUS case that has not been overturned is notable in that it is currently the law of the land. And of course many overturned cases are notable for their historic value (ie: Plessy v. Ferguson). Tufflaw 20:25, 2 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Tufflaw. And, as he says, many overturned cases are notable for historic value (there are so many....Lochner, Bowers v. Hardwick etc.)jgwlaw 02:10, 17 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Case infobox

Does an infobox exist for articles about non-U.S. Supreme Court cases (i.e., federal circuit cases, state appellate court cases)? - Jersyko talk 01:08, 2 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I used an infobox I found on Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad for a New York State Court of Appeals article I created at People v. Goetz. Tufflaw 20:27, 2 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Here's the source of the infoboxes, with a collection of seals: User:Postdlf/court_case_infobox Tufflaw 19:10, 6 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A storm in a Wiki cup

I stumbled across a catastrophic page on victimless crime. When I tested the waters, I discovered it policed by two Libertarians who would tolerate no view but their own, so I went round them by writing a separate set of pages on criminology and law, and then moved their page to victimless crime (political philosophy) where their version of the law could be dignified as political argument. This has not been well received. You may all be amused by the talk page Talk:Victimless crime (political philosophy) David91 11:01, 2 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Everyday, I find pages that fail to state principles well or accurately. My reactions to particular stimuli vary from amusement to horror, but the response to each stimulus is always to correct it. I suppose that this is either a generational or cultural response. I am old and relatively intolerant of error. And, as the world has discovered through Simon Cowell on American Idol, we English are not deferential. If something is wrong, we say so in plain language. So what is the consequence of passivity in Wiki. By not addressing error when you find it, you are allowing that error to remain on a public site where it may mislead or confuse lay readers. As individuals who have identified yourselves with a particular interest in the law, I wonder why you are not more proactive to defend the accuracy of Wiki when statements of "law" are made. No-one has intervened at victimless crime. Did you have no curiosity to look at the page? Did you not find many inaccurate statements of law? Well, for whatever reason, the individual members of law group seem content for the page to remain as it is so why should I care on that score. But ask yourselves whether this is indicative of a more general "don't know, don't care" attitude which, if allowed to continue, would undermine the credibility of the Wiki. David91 03:54, 10 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have been busy correcting misstatements of law in other articles. There are many. Far too many, and often written by non-lawyers in a political context. jgwlaw 02:12, 17 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Berufsverbot

I discovered that, although German Wikipedia has a reasonable article on Berufsverbot, English Wikipedia had none. I know little about it (which is why I looked it up) and I understand little German. Anyone with a basic knowledge of German law or good high school German would be welcome to help with this. I find little online in English, though there seems to be plenty in German. --Tony Sidaway 16:26, 20 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It is all standard stuff. For individuals, it includes professional malpractice justifiying suspension of licence, directors disqualification, and, in the event that a crime has been committed, laws preventing the criminal from holding certain types of employment depending on the nature of the crime, e.g. sex offences and teaching, etc. At a broader social level, it involves any form of policy restriction on a group engaging in an occupation, e.g. children may not be employed in certain types of industries or working environments, etc. Neither UK nor U.S. has a general term to cover all instances but we parallel almost all the German situations under separate legal classifications. The only tricky element is the history in that there were political applications but, for the most part, these no longer apply. I do not think it would be particularly useful to produce an English version given that we do not treat this as a composite topic. David91 16:57, 20 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

WikiLaw

First of all, well done on this very good initiative, and you do excellent work. Secondly, me being a bit of a nosey guy has found a new law wiki, called WikiLaw, still in the first few days of its life. I just happen to be a member, and have been tasked with advertising the new site. Im sure its all a coincidence though! Anyway, the site can be accessed here, and I and all the other members would appreciate any help that you might be able to give. It is based around the central themes of law and law enforcement, generally in the UK, so may interest all of those who wish for English, Scottish and Welsh law to have a greater share of internet law resources. Best of wishes with the WikiProject, Daniel --86.137.228.203 18:51, 1 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

An anon user with no contributions but who is a nosey guy who believes that there is something called Welsh law, wants this group's help because "you do excellent work". This should be interwsting to watch. David91 02:46, 2 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Notable effort?

I am fascinated by the efforts of http://lawdragon.com/ to produce a ranking system for U.S. judges and lawyers. Do we want to start a sweepstake to see if we can spot who will come bottom of the new league table? David91 16:34, 4 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Policy issue

I am slowly updating "my" pages with the most recent case authorities. In necessity, for example, there is a mass of interesting criminal and civil law emerging on medical necessity. I debated long and hard about how much to include in the criminal necessity page (ending up forking the English law out because the "generic" page was getting too big). But this raises a major policy issue. I assume that all you specialists from different jurisdictions are also adding new material all the time to keep the information here accurate. So when a given page grows too big, what is our policy? Incidentally, I think I may have to create a separate page for medical necessity but that is a separate editorial matter. David91 05:56, 24 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Freedom of movement

I'd like to throw together a collaboration for the improvement of Freedom of movement, a very important topic that is currently treated in a very cursory and stubby way. This topic should instead be reaching featured article status. Cheers! BD2412 T 18:33, 25 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that freedom of movement as it stands is a faint shadow of what it should be, but the corollary is that you are biting off a major topic of immense breadth. I am currently struggling to bring my pages up-to-date with the latest developments before pressing on with my list of things to do (which still includes monism et al as promised). I will keep a distant eye on this and hope that the new blood signing up to the project will step up to the plate and hit this one out of the park. But, if all else fails, I will help out. David91 18:52, 25 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

First Amendment article

American WP:LAW participants—I'd love to get your thoughts on this matter: Talk:First Amendment to the United States Constitution#"The Meaning of the First Amendment" section. Thanks. - Jersyko·talk 21:02, 29 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Common law

I noticed the removal of:

I ask the membership here, which I assume to be largely from common law jurisdictions, whether the law of evidence is predominantly common law in their jurisdictions. Although the law of corporations has tended to be codified, what is the situation as to other business entities? Is the balance of the law under this heading now shifting away from its common law roots? David91 18:02, 8 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

In the United States, the Federal Rules of Evidence have been codified since 1975 or so; the common law controlled before 1975. I'm not certain about the law relating to business organizations or corporations per se, but I think the adoption of the Uniform Commercial Code by essentially every American state is indicative of the trend in that area, as well. - Jersyko·talk 18:25, 8 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The law of partnerships and corporations is largely statutory. See, e.g., the Model Business Corporations Act, Uniform Limited Partnership Act, Uniform Limited Liability Partnership Act, Revised Uniform Partnership Act. Civil procedure, of course, is even more extensively codified (FRCP, FRAP, etc.). The judicially-created parts of civil procedure (abstention, Erie, etc.) have roots so far from Blackstone and company that they're hardly common-law in the same sense that torts, contracts, and property are. Amcfreely 21:42, 8 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Federal civ pro (which seems to be all law schools care for anymore) is largely statutory, but many states still have common law elements. Somewhat the same with evidence, with the caveat that common law privileges still apply in federal courts. Of course, the trend towards making everything statutory generally means codifying the common law anyway (and then tweaking it in the legislature instead of the courts). The law of business orgs is now very far removed from the common law (which only ever recognized general partnerships and corporations anyway). BD2412 T 23:56, 8 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Many thank for your views. So is the consensus that neither of these are common law? And while we are on this topic: "Property law, including Real property, Wills and Trusts". In English law, property law was codified under the Law of Property Act 1925, wills has been almost entirely statutory from the mid-Victorian era and trusts has always been equitable, so should we also remove this from "common law"? David91 03:05, 9 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, I wouldn't say that evidence should be removed from the common law - it may be more codified than, say, torts, but is still informed by common law. With respect to property law, in the U.S. that's still very much a common law area. BD2412 T 03:17, 9 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. There are at least *some* jurisdictions where evidence, property, and T&E are still mostly governed by the common law. There are basically no jurisdictions where the law of corporations is still common law.Amcfreely 06:05, 9 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Do we have a consensus that we should remove civil procedure, partnerships, and corporations, but keep evidence? Amcfreely 14:24, 13 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Court case infobox

Has anyone here seen {{Infobox Court Case}}? I discovered it when it was recently added to Universal City Studios, Inc. v. Nintendo Co., Ltd., but it seems that almost every article using it is Australian. Is User:Postdlf/court case infobox the standard U.S. court case infobox for this Wikiproject? If so, it would be helpful if it could be converted to a template. Pagrashtak 05:37, 18 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Userbox

I just designed and added a Userbox template for this project. I hope it helps us show our work and rally others to help us. Mhs5392 21:04, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Merge of Trust (law) USA and Trust (law) non-USA

Hi there, I have proposed a merge of Trust (law) USA and Trust (law) non-USA, for reasons listed on the talk page. So far it has recieved little response, but what response there was generally was in agreement with the merge. Could any members of this Wikiproject take a moment to contribute to the debate, and if (as I imagine it will) the proposal is accepted, help out with the merge? Both pages will likely need rewrites in places, and some sections may need to be condensed/removed. Your help is appreciated. Nuge talk 16:02, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]


What about a general "Trust Law" page that links to Trust law (USA), Trust law (Germany), Trust law (XYZ), etc.? Or, perhaps, "Trust Law" (generally), "Trust Law" (common law countries, with differences in USA, England, Australia, etc.), "Trust Law" (civil law countries, differences in France, Germany, etc.), etc? Would this be better? (I posed this on the Trust (law) non-USA talk page) Chart123

Citing law

I've wondered how laws are organized, what each part of a legal document is called, and so on. Sometimes I need to cite something I've found in a law but I don't know what to call the parts -- for instance, paragraph 1a or section 1, subsection a, etc. A page explaining this and if it's different across documents, and so on, would be helpful, I think. : ) cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 20:50, 25 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Law stubs

I've been trying to clear up the law stubs by putting stubs into sub-categories. There's quite a lot of stubs in {{law-stub}} that could be in {{crime-stub}}. There are even some stubs in both of these categories. Am I right in assuming that?

  • {{crime-stub}} is a sub-category of {{law-stub}}, so anything related solely to criminal law (as opposed to an article involving both civil and criminal law) should be in {{crime-stub}} and not in {{law-stub}}, and

-- Caveat lector 20:52, 2 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

State constitutions

I notice that our articles on the various state constitutions are in poor shape, and we have very few full texts over at wikisource:category:Constitutions of the United States. NoSeptember talk 13:12, 12 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

TfD nomination of Template:Legal disclaimer

Template:Legal disclaimer has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for Deletion page. Thank you. Joe 02:50, 30 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Request for Assistance

Could you have a look at Unliquidated damages. My limited legal knowledge makes me think that it is describing tort rather than contract law and needs rewriting. RicDod 19:45, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the heads up. I edited down the article, as most of it was poorly phrased. I left it with only one sentence describing the concept as well as I was able, but I've never run across the term before so perhaps it could be expanded further by someone who is more familiar with it. - Jersyko·talk 20:07, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Generally, liquidated damages is an issue of contract law - several states allow prejudgment interest for "liquidated" damages (i.e., damages the amount of which are known before the completion of the litigation,) but not for "unliquidated damages." So if, for example, I sue you for not delivering a part for my wheat threshing machine, and I say I want my $500 deposit back plus the damages due to lost wheat sales, the $500 is liquidated and entitled to interest from the moment of breach, but the lost sales are unliquidated and only entitled to interest from the moment of judgment.
Now all I have to do is find a verifiable source that says that, and we're golden.TheronJ 21:07, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Um, can we just merge and redirect this into liquidated damages (which needs content anyway)? After all, a liquidated damages clause is specifically used to recover a set amount when you would otherwise have unliquidated damages... BD2412 T 21:43, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
That would be my recommendationTheronJ 00:02, 10 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks to you all for looking at this. RicDod 21:04, 10 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • Good move merging both into liquidated damages, which is almost invariably the phrase used to raise either side of the issue. The article still needs greater accuracy of statement and helpful citations. I can help with U.S. contract law, especially since I've drafted and litigated contracts in Massachusetts (State laws rule contracts even in federal courts). I'm pretty busy, though. I should put this on the To Do list, right? --Jrgetsin 21:47, 7 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Portal:Law for Wikipedia:Featured portal candidates?

What do y'all say we try to get our Portal up to the standards to be featured? I think it meets most of the criteria now, and would welcome any suggestions for improvement. Cheers! BD2412 T 02:50, 17 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]


Nebbia v. New York

Just a heads-up - I am going to be working on Nebbia v. New York over the next couple of days, so don't get rid of it just yet. RidG Talk 23:53, 17 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think it looks fine! I suggest that we remove the tag on the front page, since this article now looks complete.jgwlaw 20:29, 9 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I removed the tag since there has been no further discussion or suggestions.jgwlaw 02:04, 17 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Mutiny

I’d like to ask for help with the article on mutiny. (Arrrr. There, I said it.) Apart from a general lack of content, I think the British section is problematic. It currently mostly consists of barely edited Britannica text from their article on military law (a topic that, in my opinion, is rather wide, but treated rather narrowly there), and much of the rest is an attempt at summarising that article. Because views and laws on mutiny might have changed a bit since then, that needs amending. Because the topic is a fairly important one in general, I think too little attention has been paid to its maintenance especially in that respect recently.

Disclosure: I have removed the Britannica text twice (leaving the summary in its place) but this has been reverted each time by User:Fastifex. I have not been able to achieve an agreement with that user about this matter and would welcome others’ views. I cannot debate the matter at large in any depth because I am neither a lawyer of any kind nor an specialist in military law.

However, the purpose of this message is to ask for verification, correction and expansion of the article. Thank you in advance. —xyzzyn 16:37, 24 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

expert needed

Could someone knowledgeable in copyright law please have a look at the legal section of fanfiction? It has so many {{citation needed}} tags that it actually disrupts atteampts at reading the material. Circeus 00:18, 28 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, for starters I've broken it out into its own article (legal issues in fan fiction), and cleaned up a few assertions... bd2412 T 00:52, 28 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]



Ken Lay

There are some legal issues discussed in the Kenneth Lay article, a current event due to his sudden death. Can someone look into these? I notice the Abatement in pleading article referenced is a UK-centric article, while Lay is in the US legal system. NoSeptember 23:30, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Incorporation into 14th Amendment

I noticed that the article "jury trials" did not clarify that the 7th Amendment did not generally apply to the states. I wonder if this is a needed discussion, in other relevant articles. Input is welcome. Thanks!jgwlaw 05:10, 9 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Class Action

This article had (and still has) serious problems. I added some information on various countries' treatment of collective actions, but this needs much better references than I could find. In addition, the article needs a clean-up and references, in general.jgwlaw 23:28, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Latin pronunciation

I have started a discussion at Category talk:Latin legal phrases on including Latin pronunciation in articles on Latin legal terms; please continuee the discussion there. Thanks.—msh210℠ 04:54, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

request

The article Bridget Marks was apparently created by a banned user and has been edited repeatedly by puppet accounts of the banned user Amorrow. Could someone try to verify the article and check for NPOV? Thanks. --JWSchmidt 20:40, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I deleted the article since it was started by a sockpuppet of a banned user. Not sure that an article is really appropriate. FloNight talk 02:11, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Law school proposal

Moved from the front page:

I propose a wiki law school project, where law students can post their case briefs. This could supply WikiProject Law with some substantial case summaries and explanations. I am willing to post all my briefs to get the project started. But, I will need help setting up the project. Contact me if you want to help. Jlofgren

I had the same idea a while back, but discovered through trial and error that most of my briefs are useless as articles - found it better to start from scratch... however, it would be excellent to get a list of cases which should have articles based on their use in casebooks! bd2412 T 02:07, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Just remind me what a case brief is. Francis Davey 11:54, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
LOL, Francis. Surely you haven't forgotten those wonderful law school briefs!jawesq 04:24, 27 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi all --

We've got a bunch of lingering legal terms over at Wikipedia:Articles_requested_for_more_than_a_year. Can someone take a look and delete any and all that in your estimation don't qualify as full articles (i.e. will never amount to more than a simple definition) ? Thanks! Bookgrrl 23:27, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Copying them here to save time. bd2412 T 04:10, 27 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Adjuster - Administer - Bill of costs - Court calendar - Faciendum - Family division - Family purpose doctrine - Fault auto insurance system - Fem covert - Final decree - Final settlement - No action motion - Private carrier - Real party in interest - Redetermination - Registry of deeds - Remittitur - Res publica christiana - Retaining lien - Richthofen Trial - Secured transaction - Security agreement - Share capital - Special administrator - Specific finding - Stationhouse bail - Statutory offer of settlement - Summary adjudication of issues - Uniform reciprocal enforcement of support act -

For a start, I've redirected Family division to High Court of Justice page - is this the right wiki thing to do? --BramleyBarn 16:03, 30 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
No - "family division" could apply to a whole lot of courts in a whole lot of countries. I've undone the redirect - this really should be a disambiguation page. Rebecca 03:22, 31 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, ideally it should be it's own article - a "family division" is commonly the division of a court system that is concerned with adjudicating matters of family law, e.g. divorce, custody, adoption, etc. bd2412 T 03:31, 31 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Also, I've struck administer, as that is a verb, and would be a dicdef if an article were made. bd2412 T 03:32, 31 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
If it gets its own article as per your definition then there would have to be a redirect to the High Court article, because in England and Wales, the Family Division is a division of the High Court, not of the court system as a whole (family cases may be heard in county courts and magistrates courts for example). Francis Davey 14:52, 31 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Not a problem - we create a main article at family division with an "otheruse" tag at the top leading to family division (diasmbiguation), with branches to whatever other articles require them. Did not know that about the division of the High Court - interesting stuff. bd2412 T 15:13, 31 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There was already a Feme covert article (which seems to be the more common spelling), and I greatly expanded this (but I'm not a lawyer). AnonMoos 17:14, 31 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Legality of Compulsory sterilization and relation to human rights

The Compulsory sterilization article suggests that compulsory sterilization is a violation of human rights and Eugenics says that "forced sterilization of those with birth defects" is a human rights violation. I have tried to find a good reference for the idea that forced sterilization as a human rights violation. I found that The United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women produced a "Platform for action" that discusses forced sterilization as violence against women in the context of violation of their human rights. I have no understanding of the legal standing of this "Platform for action". Can we (Wikipedia) safely say something like, "The United Nations has codified forced sterilization as a violation of human rights"? --JWSchmidt 00:17, 26 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Damages

Hi - I have just joined the project, and am having a stab at the Damages page- which was seriously in need. The whole question of Damages is clearly a central plank of law and can be linked in extensively, and any ideas or contributions here would be great, in particular how it best fits in. Its current position as a small subset of civil procedure I don't think is the best. --BramleyBarn 13:31, 28 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Masturbation and the law

There's a factual accuracy tag at Masturbation#Law, can somebody look into it? Circeus 00:12, 29 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Deed of trust

Trust instrument states that deed of trust and trust deed both refer to a trust instrument. However, in many US jurisdictions, a deed of trust is the preferred way of recording a security interest in real property, and has little to do with the common law of trusts except the terminology (at least in practice). In WA, and probably elsewhere, a deed of trust is legally distinct from a mortgage (which is statutorily possible but not used for decades). I think there ought to be a page for deed of trust to describe its use, foreclosure process, differences from a mortgage, etc. My dilemma: I'm too new to know what to name the page. I'm assuming that in the UK, deed of trust refers to the trust instrument, as stated on the page? Also, the disambiguation page for deed of trust mentions a song of the same name. So do I create a page "deed of trust (mortgage substitute)"? Any thoughts?--Zilonis 03:23, 29 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

  • There are three jurisdictions in the United Kingdom. One at least -- Scotland is so different in its land law I dare not say anything about it. I practice in England and Wales and here a deed of trust would refer to a deed creating a trust. You don't need a deed to create a trust, but you might well use one. I've no idea how the terminology became applied to a mortgage substitute. Francis Davey 09:18, 29 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Maybe you could name the page "Mortgages and Deeds of Trust" or "Security Interests in Real Property" or something. Legally speaking, an instrument is any document that by itself effects a change of ownership. Like a deed or mortgage. In a deed of trust, the borrower conveys title to the lender which can be redeemed by repayment. In a mortgage, the borrower conveys a conditional title to the lender which can be perfected in the event on nonpayment. Got that? The deed of trust came into being in the 1500's I think, something to do with the Statute of Uses. You know, I've already noticed that Equity and Trusts are topics needing attention. I'm qualified (Massachusetts lawyer) but kinda busy. I'll add them to the To Do list, anyway, once I'm a card carrying member of the Law Project. --Jrgetsin 21:35, 7 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
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