Four faculty members of the University of Alabama School of Law gave presentations at the Law & Society Association Annual Meeting, held from June 1-4 in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The theme of this year’s meeting was “Separate and Unequal,” referring to the United States’ “doctrine of territorial incorporation,” or the constitutional doctrine that allows the U.S. to claim foreign territories as their own without making them a part of the U.S., such as Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Guam, which allows for discrepancies between the laws and policies upheld in the U.S. versus in its territories. Participants were asked to “reflect on the ways that the law normalizes discrimination and inequalities in unincorporated territories” and “how this year’s theme can become a lens to understand other relationships of power and visions of the relationship between law and society.”
To kick things off, Professor Russell Gold, with his co-author, Kay Levine, Professor at Emory University School of Law, presented their paper The Public Voice of the Defender on Thursday, June 1, during the “Rethinking Public Defense” session. The presentation was focused on the necessity of public defenders to “develop a public voice to supplement their courtroom advocacy.” Click here to read The Public Voice of the Defender.
Later Thursday afternoon, Professor Mirit Eyal-Cohen presented her paper, Taxing Artificial Inventiveness, during the “Taxation of Labor and Business” session. The presentation was focused on the question of revenue loss due to an increased usage of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology, and asks whether we should tax AI, and at what stage of the automation process. Click here to read Taxing Artificial Inventiveness.
Professor Eyal-Cohen also served as the Chair/Discussant for the “Tax Advocacy & Tax Justice” session on Friday, June 2. The session consisted of presentations that examined tax lawyers and the larger issues facing them, as well as “the role that tax law plays in lawyers’ actions and influencing their decisions.” Click here to read more.
On Saturday, June 3, Professor Julie Hill presented her paper, From Cannabis to Crypto: Federal Reserve Discretion in Payments, during the “Corporations and Their Shareholders” section. Professor Hill discussed the Federal Reserve’s recent efforts to keep a cannabis credit union, a narrow bank, and a crypto currency custody bank from connecting to payment systems in the United States. Click here to read From Cannabis to Crypto: Federal Reserve Discretion in Payments.
To round out the weekend, Professor Montré Carodine presented her paper, Testi-lying and Rule 609, during the “Addressing Bias in Evidence Rule 609’s Use of Prior Convictions for Impeachment and Questioning ‘Credibility’ Assessments of Witnesses Generally” section on Sunday, June 4. Professor Carodine discussed the need to de-normalize the practice of police officers “lying and manufacturing evidence” in criminal cases. Click here to read more.