US Federal Law Research Articles

Using PulpMotion videos as instructional anchors for pre-service teachers learning about early childhood special education

Providing pre-service early childhood general educators with a strong knowledge base of key aspects of early childhood special education is essential in the United States as US federal law mandates it. Specifically, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) stipulates that children with special needs must to be placed in the least restrictive environment, and thus this legislation increases the number of young children with special needs in general education settings (Cook, Klein, Tessier, 2008; Crockett & Kauffman, 2013; Siegel, 2007). For many pre-service early childhood educators, learning about concepts in early childhood special education can be challenging given that pre-service general educators can often feel uncomfortable with potentially working with children with special needs, a population that they may feel they have little understanding of how to effectively teach (Henning & Mitchell, 2002). However, teacher education approaches that allow the exploration of various perspectives about inclusive practices while also developing critically reflective thinking skills can promote a sound understanding of inclusive teaching practices (Silverman, 2007). This study introduced an anchored instructional experience using a software program called PulpMotion to create video media to bridge meaningful understandings of general educators with potentially challenging knowledge of early childhood special education. Pre-service early childhood educator s presented with the PulpMotion created anchored instructional video experiences were shown to have a marked increase of on-line discussion board postings and reviews of non-required reading of early childhood special education.International Research in Early Childhood Education, vol. 5, no. 1, p. 56-63

Early marks: American trademarks before US trademark law

Historians identify the process of registration as key to the ‘modern mark’. Hence the introduction of trademark registration with the US federal law of 1870 appears as a pivotal event, endorsing Chandlerean accounts of the modern mark as a product of the ‘Second Industrial Revolution’. Such accounts overlook the earlier registration laws in places where economic conditions challenge claims for an industrial origin to registration. This article looks at California’s registration law, which antedated the US federal law by seven years, asking whether it is merely an exception to prove the Chandlerean rule, or an example that asks us to question Chandlerean assumptions.

Effect of the CRF1-receptor antagonist pexacerfont on stress-induced eating and food craving.

In rodents, antagonism of receptors for corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF) blocks stress-induced reinstatement of drug or palatable food seeking. To test anticraving properties of the CRF1 antagonist pexacerfont in humans. We studied stress-induced eating in people scoring high on dietary restraint (food preoccupation and chronic unsuccessful dieting) with body-mass index (BMI) >22. In a double-blind, between-groups trial, 31 "restrained" eaters were stabilized on either pexacerfont (300mg/day for 7days, then 100mg/day for 21days) or placebo. On day 15, they underwent a math-test stressor; during three subsequent visits, they heard personalized craving-induction scripts. In each session, stress-induced food consumption and craving were assessed in a bogus taste test and on visual analog scales. We used digital video to monitor daily ingestion of study capsules and nightly rating of food problems/preoccupation on the Yale Food Addiction Scale (YFAS). The study was stopped early due to an administrative interpretation of US federal law, unrelated to safety or outcome. The bogus taste tests suggested some protective effect of pexacerfont against eating after a laboratory stressor (r effect=0.30, 95% CL=-0.12, 0.63, Bayes factor 11.30). Similarly, nightly YFAS ratings were lower with pexacerfont than placebo (r effect=0.39, CI 0.03, 0.66), but this effect should be interpreted with caution because it was present from the first night of pill ingestion, despite pexacerfont's slow pharmacokinetics. The findings may support further investigation of the anticraving properties of CRF1 antagonists, especially for food.

“The Right to Privacy” by S. Warren and L. Brandeis – The Story of a Scientific Article in the United States

The author of this paper will examine the history and influence of “The Right to Privacy,” a scientific article written at the end of the nineteenth century by S. Warren and L. Brandeis on the development of the right to privacy in the United States. The paper will also present the main thesis of the article, which illustrates how the right to privacy was understood at the time. Furthermore, the author will also explore the impact of the article on jurisprudence and case law in the United States, and identify the most important solutions of US federal statutory law. Finally, she will discuss the research of F.R. Shapiro in the United States, humorously referred to as “citatology,” which indicates that the above-mentioned article is one of the most influential scientific legal works in the United States.

Rethinking Corporate Bankruptcy Theory in the Twenty-First Century

Adopting a comparative UK/US approach, this article argues for the need to rethink corporate bankruptcy theory in the light of developments in the finance market. It argues that these developments have produced an effective mechanism, in large cases, for selecting between companies which will be worth more if they continue to trade and companies which ought to be allowed to fail, such that corporate bankruptcy law need no longer concern itself with steering creditor choice away from a sale of the business and assets and towards a restructuring. Moreover, it suggests that whilst the automatic stay remains a central tenet of corporate bankruptcy law where the market decides that the business and assets should be sold, in cases where the market sees more value if a company continues to trade, corporate bankruptcy law may operate very well without a stay as a resolution procedure for deadlocked negotiations. The article identifies that in many large restructuring cases the only liabilities which are implicated are financial liabilities, and queries the extent to which the distributional concerns of the progressive movement, and US federal bankruptcy law, apply where losses are shared amongst sophisticated financial institutions. It ends with an explanation of why the analysis is limited to large cases, an indication of areas for further research and a note of caution for the future.

Legally binding precautionary and prevention principles: Aspects of epistemic uncertain causation

Abstract Legally binding precautionary principles direct societal actions through regulatory laws to prevent future catastrophic or irreversible consequences that can result from human and natural hazards. Those principles connect uncertain cause and effect to public actions and hence must be transparent, scientifically sound and, on the average, demonstrably add to societal wellbeing. Focusing on legally binding forms of precaution and prevention concerning public choices, seen as prospects, we articulate how uncertainty affects causal analyses that must satisfy their legal requirements. The common measure of uncertainty is probability, explicitly used (and framed in various guises) by the three legal systems we study: the People's Republic of China, the European Union, and the United States. Probabilities can represent different forms of uncertainty, their technical differences, but use the same calculus. They occur at the intersection of legal and scientific causation and allow abstracting, from a prospective reality via models and simulations, future catastrophic or irreversible consequences. Probabilistic causal models—e.g., frailty models, power laws, self-organizing criticalities, and scale-free regularities – link environmental and other regulatory choices to reduce exposures likely to cause adverse responses. Thus, this type of causation is the scientific basis of the EU's Precautionary Principle, its Directives and Regulations; US federal regulatory and case law, and Chinese laws regarding the prevention of hazards. We use examples that clarify and guide public policy analysts to better formalize prospective public choices to avoid ambiguities or possibly incorrect results. We find that the scientific basis necessary to the analysis of precautionary and preventive choices is invariant to the jurisdictions that use it. We conclude that precautionary choices characterized by complex causation can be qualitatively assessed through adapting nine classic epidemiological criteria.

Volatile emissions from common consumer products

Consumer products emit a range of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that can affect air quality and health. Risk reduction is hindered because of lack of information about specific product emissions. This study investigates and compares VOCs emitted from 37 common products (air fresheners, laundry products, cleaners, and personal care products), including those with certifications and claims of green and organic. It extends a prior study of 25 consumer products by adding 12 more products, including fragrance-free versions of fragranced products, representing the first such comparison in the scientific literature. This study found 156 different VOCs emitted from the 37 products, with an average of 15 VOCs per product. Of these 156 VOCs, 42 VOCs are classified as toxic or hazardous under US federal laws, and each product emitted at least one of these chemicals. Emissions of carcinogenic hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) from green fragranced products were not significantly different from regular fragranced products. The most common chemicals in fragranced products were terpenes, which were not in fragrance-free versions. Of the volatile ingredients emitted, fewer than 3 % were disclosed on any product label or material safety data sheet (MSDS). Because health effects depend on many factors, not only individual ingredients, this study makes no claims regarding possible risks. However, knowledge of product composition can be an important step to understand, assess, and reduce potential exposures and effects.

Lobbying: a critical dimension of business strategy

Purpose – This paper aims to prepare executives to pilot a US lobbying effort within the bounds of the US Federal law. Lobbying law may be thought of as the “regulation of regulation”, as it defines the ground rules for those wishing to have a direct impact upon all other regulatory systems. The article outlines what the US lobbying law requires, what it forbids and, perhaps most important, what the law does NOT regulate. Design/methodology/approach – The paper takes the full spectrum of US laws and regulations relevant to lobbying – including the Internal Revenue Service Code (tax code), the Federal Election Campaign Act, the Ethics in Government Act, the internal rules of both the House and Senate, the US Criminal Code and the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act – and organizes them into a single 2 × 2 matrix, explaining what all parties must do as well as what they must not do. Via this approach, the rules that govern the “marketplace” for lobbying in the USA are explained. The competition to shape US government policy transpires within this marketplace. Findings – Few activities the executive may engage in carry the potential payback of a well-executed lobbying campaign: empirical estimates range to returns on investment in the thousands of per cent. But the uninitiated may easily step over the line and invite both legal and public relations (PR) nightmares. Practical implications – Effective lobbying can afford a corporation or industry a lasting competitive advantage. Every well-rounded business strategy should include such a component, and every well-rounded executive should be capable of performing in this arena. A solid grounding in the legal matrix forming the boundaries of this activity is a prerequisite for effective performance. Originality/value – The paper organizes and outlines lobbying law in a fashion digestible by executives without legal training. It is of value to anyone wishing to engage in lobbying activities targeted at the US Government.

Are They Pirates or Pioneers?

In a country where the money-monsters are not criticized and perceived like angels who can save the poor children, one the most profitable business is to use the consumption power of the Veblen-effected customers who are narrow-sighted and discriminatory. So called, the ‘license musicals’ bilaterally purchased from the Broadway, and Vienna are dominantly consumed in Korea. The buyers form the oligarchic industry in Korea, and run their own business, including the management company which trains, controls, and gives business to their actors, and boasts their long-term contractual relationship with the specific productions in the primary market. In Korea, those productions are the limited liability company (LL.C), and each has their style of selection; one favors the Broadway, another favors the European nobility in the 17-18 century, and the other favors the European knights’ fights in the earlier era. All of them are based on the Western old novels, adapted or transformed more than hundreds of times in the Western countries through various kinds of cultural formants, such as movies, TV dramas, plays, TV cartoons, ballets, and the merchandized products, and dramatico-musicals, etc, and sold internationally. Korean licensed musicals are the dramatico-musicals sold by some staggering Western musical productions, including their unlimited use and the void of the healthy application of the IP laws, due to their exclusivity of the dealing and undisclosed information towards the public. The paper argues how deceptive their arguments can be with the hidden purpose of the monetary benefits. The protection of the intellectual property right (IPR) is not applied when it is commercial; it only belongs to ‘unfair use’ no matter how expansive the royalty for the license is. In the US federal copyright law, licensing - permission to patron - is not subjected to the dramatico-musical; but subjected merely to the music itself. Thus, even the sellers in the US are illegal to sell this kind of dramatico-musical bilaterally in their own law; it will be better to understand this commercial transaction is a kind of international drug dealing which is culturally blinded to determine its legality with objectivity.

The role of household members in transporting adults with disabilities in the United States

Because of certain requirements under US federal law, many studies have been published in recent years on the role of fixed-route transit and paratransit in meeting the travel needs of persons with disabilities. Although persons with disabilities are several times more likely to take rides from household members than to take public transit, little research has been conducted to explore the circumstances under which such rides are given or taken. To address this gap in literature, this study examines the role of household members in transporting persons with disabilities in contemporary America. It explores how the circumstances for the ride takers may change in the future, identifies future challenges in providing mobility to persons with disabilities, and examines ways to meet those challenges. Using nationwide data from the 2009 National Household Travel Survey, the study compares the rides taken by persons with disabilities from household members with trips made by other travel modes, the persons who take rides with those who do not take rides, and the drivers who provide rides with those who do not provide rides. Probit models are used for the comparisons. Implications of the findings are discussed in light of potential demographic changes in the future, especially the growth of single-person households and the consequent loss of household support for transportation. Due to similarities in circumstances in other developed countries, an international context to the study is also provided.

A forensic pathologist׳s view on the usage of the Taser® Axon™ Flex™ camera on-site and during autopsy

Abstract The Axon™ Flex™ camera was developed by Taser® to allow US federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to capture events live and to store, manage, share and analyze the video. Filming what the officer sees is claimed to help resolving false claims [1] . The Camera itself can be easily mounted on any kind of eyewear, cap, collar or epaulet. We wanted to see if the Axon™ Flex™ camera helps the forensic pathologists (I) on a potential crime scene to document the exact finding of a body and its location and (II) during autopsy transmitting what is seen by the forensic pathologists via live stream to a screen for teaching reasons.

WHEN DOES PUBLIC INTEREST JUSTIFY GOVERNMENT INTERFERENCE AND SURVEILLANCE?

This article examines the 16 December 2013 opinion of the US District Court for the District of Columbia in Klayman v Obama which intimated that the objective of the PRISM project, that is, the collection of metadata, violates the right to privacy. It assesses whether this opinion finds support in US federal laws, international law and the municipal laws of Hong Kong by surveying recent developments in balancing the conflict between public interest and the right to privacy. Societal attitude towards privacy is likewise accorded weight. The article concludes with the observation that while a handful of municipal legislation contains public interest exceptions to the right to privacy, there is an increasing clamour in international law to protect such right.

Ripping Improves Tree Survival and Growth on Unused Reclaimed Mined Lands

There is renewed interest in re-establishing trees on 0.6 million ha of mining-disturbed lands in the Appalachian mountains of Eastern United States. Many coal-mined lands reclaimed to meet requirements of US federal law have thick herbaceous vegetation and compacted soils which impede tree establishment. Mitigation practices were applied on three mine sites and evaluated for success in enabling planted trees to become established. Eastern white pine (Pinus strobus), hybrid poplar (Populus deltoids × Populus trichocarpa), and mixed Appalachian hardwoods were established using weed control only and weed control with subsoil ripping. Trees were measured in October of 2008 after 5 years of growth. Subsoil ripping increased mixed hardwood survival from 43 to 71%, hybrid poplar biomass index from 1.51 to 8.97 Mg ha(-1), and Eastern white pine biomass index from 0.10 to 0.32 Mg ha(-1). When restoring trees to unused mined sites, subsoil ripping can aid survival and growth to an extent that will result in a valuable forest.

Cannabis legalization and public health: legal niceties, commercialization and countercultures

Cannabis legalization and public health : legal niceties, commercialization and countercultures

Out of View but in Plain Sight: The Illegal Sale of Single Cigarettes

The practice of selling single cigarettes (loosies) through an informal economy is prevalent in urban, low socioeconomic (low SES) communities. Although US state and federal laws make this practice illegal, it may be occurring more frequently with the recent increase in taxes on cigarettes. This investigation provides information concerning the illegal practice of selling single cigarettes to better understand this behavior and to inform intervention programs and policymakers. A total of 488 African American young adults were recruited and surveyed at two education and employment training programs in Baltimore City from 2005 to 2008. Fifty-one percent of the sample reported smoking cigarettes in the past month; only 3.7% of the sample were former smokers. Approximately 65% of respondents reported seeing single cigarettes sold daily on the street. Multivariate logistic regression modeling found that respondents who reported seeing single cigarettes sold on the street several times a week were more than two times as likely to be current smokers compared to participants who reported that they never or infrequently saw single cigarettes being sold, after controlling for demographics (OR = 2.16; p = 0.034). Tax increases have led to an overall reduction in cigarette smoking. However, smoking rates in urban, low SES communities and among young adults remain high. Attention and resources are needed to address the environmental, normative, and behavioral conditions influencing tobacco use and the disparities it causes. Addressing these factors would help reduce future health care costs and save lives.

Challenging Illicit Bulk Cash Flows: Next Steps for US Law Enforcement

This article examines key issues contributing to the limited success of US Federal law enforcement in disrupting illicit bulk cash flows across the Mexico-US border. It highlights the negative consequences of narco-dollars on the Mexican formal economy and social fabric and examines the limitations in federal law enforcement’s strategic approach to disrupting these cross-border flows. It illustrates the overwhelming challenge to interdiction efforts on the US-Mexico border and calls for a whole-of-government approach in focusing on disrupting the processes that bind criminal group interactions rather than the current mainstream focus on “kingpin” elimination and singular group dismantlement. The article concludes that law enforcement must be as agile and adaptive as its adversaries, with a continuous need for self-assessment based on the evolving dynamics of the threat landscape.

Cookies in E-Commerce: Balancing Privacy and Business.

The article discusses issues of cookies usage: Internet advertising practices of consumer tracking; types and elements of cookies; actual US constitutional regulation on cookies; FTC activity; applicable US Federal laws; recent and the most important cases on privacy issues.

Off-label use of medicine in pediatrics

To provide current information on off-label medication use in pediatric gastroenterology, including a discussion on US legislative efforts to address the issue. Medications used to treat pediatric gastrointestinal illnesses are frequently prescribed off-label. Acid suppressors, antiemetics, laxatives, and antitumor necrosis factor therapies are types of medications frequently used off-label in the pediatric gastroenterology arena. Pediatric studies conducted under US Federal laws are generating much-needed data on the safety and effectiveness of medications used to treat pediatric patients. Moreover, a new US law, the Food and Drug Administration Safety and Innovation Act, may further the development of pediatric medications in part by requiring pediatric-specific study plans earlier in the overall drug development process. As of today, there still are gaps in our knowledge about these medications, including for the treatment of pediatric gastroenterology diseases. Medications are widely used off-label in pediatrics, including medications intended to treat gastrointestinal diseases, such as antitumor necrosis factor and laxatives. Although legislation is helping to generate and make available important information about pediatric medications, most still do not contain pediatric data. Therefore, providers need to understand the potential risks and benefits of prescribing off-label products to pediatric patients.

Awareness of the US Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008: an online survey

Objective The US Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) of 2008 prohibits discrimination in health insurance and employment in the USA based on genetic information and provides important protection to Americans who undergo genetic tests. Consumers need to understand GINA to take advantage of the protections it provides against genetic discrimination. However, research regarding people's awareness of this law is scant. This study used an online survey to evaluate people's awareness of the GINA 2008 in the USA. Methods An anonymous online survey was distributed by Qualtrics to a general population panel of US residents in April 2011. The inclusion criterion for the study was adults aged 18–64. The 17-item survey included two multiple-choice questions to measure awareness and knowledge of the GINA. Key findings A total of 295 responses were collected over 4 days. Only 26 respondents (8.8%) indicated they had ever heard of the GINA 2008. When those who have heard of the Act were asked about further details, only 10 people (3.4%) could correctly identify that the GINA prohibits the improper use of genetic information in health insurance and employment. Respondents with male gender, family history of Alzheimer's disease and caregiving experience for Alzheimer's disease patients were more likely to be aware of the GINA 2008. Conclusion Three years after GINA 2008 was signed into US federal law, people's awareness of this law was found to be low. More effective dissemination of information related to this federal law may be required to improve protection against genetic discrimination.

Migraine and Disability Rights

Patients with migraine often have substantial disabilities. US federal law provides protections for disabled Americans. This discussion provides information regarding the disability rights of patients with transformed migraine.