Cornell Law Review

Note

Patenting Pot: The Hazy Uncertainty Surrounding Cannabis Patents

Andrew Kingsbury, Arizona State University, B.S., Health Sciences, 2018; Cornell Law School, J.D., 2021

This Note explains the problems that surround cannabis patents. Part I provides an overview of patent law and discusses cannabis’s regulatory history. Part II expands on the topics discussed in Part I and explains how the lack of prior art within the cannabis space promulgates uncertainty for cannabis inventors. Part III argues for stronger claim requirements in cannabis patents and advocates for greater flexibility when factfinders evaluate cannabis patents. Further, Part III suggests alternative approaches to claim construction for challenged cannabis patents.

Aug 2021

Note

Are There Rights in Guantánamo Bay: The Great Writ Rings Hollow

Kayla Anderson, J.D. Candidate, Cornell Law School, 2021; Notes Editor, Cornell Law Review, Volume 106; B.A. Arizona State University, 2017

This Note argues that the district court should decide that the entirety of the Fifth Amendment applies to Guantánamo Bay detainees given previous jurisprudence, the nature of the War on Terror, and the protection of detainee rights. However, this Note also details that the possible ramifications of such a broad decision render it unlikely that…

Aug 2021

Protecting Pregnancy

Jennifer Bennett Shinall, Professor of Law, Vanderbilt Law School

Laws to assist pregnant women in the workplace are gaining legislative momentum, both at the state and federal levels. Last year alone, four such laws went into effect at the state level, and federal legislation advanced farther than ever before in the House of Representatives. Four types of legislative protections for pregnant workers currently exist—pregnancy…

Aug 2021

Article

Employment Practices Liability Insurance and Ex Post Moral Hazard

Erin E. Meyers, J.D./Ph.D., Program in Law and Economics, Vanderbilt Law School

Joni Hersch, Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Law and Economics, Vanderbilt Law School

Many businesses purchase Employment Practices Liability Insurance (EPLI), a form of insurance that protects them from claims of discrimination, harassment, retaliation, and wrongful termination. But critics of EPLI argue that allowing insurance coverage for employment liability detracts from employment law’s goal of deterrence and from notions of justice. We assess the validity of these criticisms…

Aug 2021

Article

Women on the Frontlines

Michele Goodwin, Chancellor’s Professor of Law & Founding Director, Center for Biotechnology & Global Health Policy at the University of California, Irvine

This Article takes aim at the troubling and persistent dis-empowerment and invisibility of women generally, and particularly marginalized women of color even one hundred years after the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment. It observes how the persistence of sexism, toxically combined with racism, impedes full political, economic, and social personhood of women and girls in…

Aug 2021

Article

Civil Liberties in a Pandemic: The Lessons of History

Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean and Jesse H. Choper Distinguished Professor of Law, University of California, Berkeley School of Law

Michele Goodwin, Chancellor’s Professor at the University of California, Irvine; founding director of the Center for Biotechnology and Global Health Policy

Throughout American history, whenever there has been a crisis the response has been a deprivation of rights. Today, the United States is in the midst of the worst health crisis in over a century. As of this writing, over 500,000 people have died.11. Johns Hopkins U. & Med. Coronavirus Resource Ctr., https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/ [https://perma.cc/XK5J-Y6KS] (last visited…

Aug 2021