Classics

There are two basic approaches to assessing the “well-founded fear” requirement in the Refugee Convention.  On the one hand, the United States, many other common law jurisdictions, and UNHCR require that the applicant have a subjective fear of persecution and that this fear be grounded in objective reality.  On the other hand, New Zealand, civil law jurisdictions, and the Michigan Guidelines require either a softer inquiry into subjective emotional state or no subjective fear inquiry at all.  The subjective fear element in common law jurisdictions is a product of strict textualist interpretation.  The de-emphasis on the subjective fear in civil law jurisdiction stems from the approach in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, which mandates interpretation of the Refugee Convention’s text in light of its context and object and purpose. Interpreting “well-founded fear” in a strictly textual way, as the United States has done, fails to effectuate the goals of the Refugee Convention and misses a small but salient shift in the meaning of the word fear. This interpretation should be revisited.

Modern forensic evidence suffers from a number of flaws, including insufficient scientific grounding, exaggerated testimony, lack of uniform best practices, and an inefficacious standard for admission that regularly allows judges to admit scientifically unsound evidence. This Note discusses these problems, lays out the current landscape of forensic science reform, and suggests the addition of a new special relevance rule to the Federal Rules of Evidence (and similar rules in state evidence codes). This proposed rule would cabin judicial discretion to admit non-DNA forensic evidence by barring prosecutorial introduction of such evidence in criminal trials absent a competing defense expert or a high showing of scientific viability.

Abstract: In laying the groundwork for a new edition of Macrobius' Saturnalia, I have extensively checked the reports of the manuscripts in the Teubner edition of James Willis (1963), drawn on the collations of two important manuscripts published by MJ Carton in 1966, and collated ...

Abstract: British Library Cotton Vitellius C.III (= O, s. IX3/4, northern France) comprises Books 1-3 of Macrobius' Saturnalia. Ignored by James Willis in his Teubner edition, it can be shown to be an older sibling of Vatican latinus 5207 (L, s. X1/4), a collation of which was ...

Abstract: Cambridge Corpus Christi College 71 (= C), written in the twelfth century (St. Albans), can be shown to be a gemellus of Cambridge University Library Ff.3.5, also written in the twelfth century (Bury St. Edmunds). Used by Gronovius and judged by La Penna ...