Course Catalog

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Compares the approaches followed in different countries to deal responsibly with past violations of human rights, in order to assess the benefits and shortcomings of each. Draws upon selected readings as well as upon the individual experiences of course participants. Examines the various means of establishing accountability, including "lustration" laws, truth commissions, and national and international prosecutions. Also considers the influence of obstacles such as political instability, amnesty laws, statutes of limitations, and claims of superior orders.

Business Law, Real Estate Law

Highlights the importance of issues involving accounting to the practice of law. To practice law effectively, every lawyer should understand certain fundamentals about accounting and financial statements. Topics include the bookkeeping process; the basic financial statements; the evolving nature of generally accepted accounting principles; audit reports and accountants legal liability; the time value of money; financial statement analysis and financial ratios; drafting and negotiating agreements and legal documents containing accounting terminology and concepts; responses to an auditor's request for information about legal contingencies and related discovery issues; and cost allocation issues. Designed for students who have little or no accounting background as an aid to the study of Business Associations, Federal Taxation, Business Planning and other courses. Enrollment: limited to students who have not earned more than six semester hours of college credit or the equivalent in accounting courses.

Criminal Law, Energy and Environmental Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law, Public Law

The aim of this course is to provide students with an opportunity to study Admiralty law and to gain an insight into the important role it plays in to carriage and international trade relationships. Although Admiralty law (or Shipping law) is known as "wet law", in that it considers the relationship and liabilities arising out of the ship's adventures, it is important to appreciate the crucial impact that its ramifications may have on carriage and incidental sale liabilities. We look in depth at the procedure of ship arrests - the in rem action - and compare arrest procedure in the UK with that in other jurisdictions. This will enable us to understand the considerations that face those parties who have an interest in the ship itself and/or the carriage contracts under which the goods on board are being carried. Students will develop an understanding of how the shipping world operates, and how the variables of trade practice and underlying financial considerations affect the decisions that shipowners and charterers will make. The course aims to enable students to develop an ability to recognize and to apply the law to the complex issues that shipping adventures can raise.

Experiential Course

This course covers advocacy, legal writing, rhetoric for use in oral and written argument, memory technique, examination technique, statute mapping and evidence analysis. This is a general skills course which is not dependent on any substantive area of law. It is examined by continuous assessment covering class attendance, short in-class tests, and assignments.

Examines the statutory and administrative law processes and how to perform legal research using the materials that are produced by the government. Research using printed and on-line sources will be considered along with the factors to consider when deciding whether to search in print or on-line.

Experiential Course

This Paper-Based Small Upper-Level Course will focus on the active development of research skills during class time. Class sessions will be split between discussion of resources and processes related to the week's topic (e.g., dockets, administrative agencies, legislative history, etc.) and the practical application of those resources and processes to solve legal research problems. Three short papers, two small group presentations, and an individual presentation on an aspect of federal law will account for a substantial portion of each student's grade. However, there will also be an "open book" take-home final. This course will be especially useful for students who plan to practice law solely in federal courts, clerk or pursue a career within the federal government. THIS COURSE PROVIDES 2 CREDITS TOWARD THE UPPER-LEVEL EXPERIENTIAL COURSE REQUIREMENT! THIS COURSE DOES NOT SATISFY THE UPPER LEVEL WRITING REQUIREMENT!

This class will examine in detail the primary authorities (Constitution, Statutes, Administrative materials, case law, and international agreements) related to food and beverage law, explore the relationship between them, and discuss the various specialized secondary sources that are available to help identify and explain the laws. It will also consider the relationship between relevant federal, state, and local laws. Specific attention will be given to the administrative regulatory scheme applicable to wine. This class will provide helpful background and a solid foundation for anyone interested in practicing food and beverage law.

Experiential Course

This seminar-sized course will focus on the active development of research skills during class time. Class sessions will be split between discussion of resources and processes related to the week's topic (e.g., municipal government) and the practical application of those resources and processes to solve legal research problems. Meeting only once a week, with much of the work done in class, active participation will account for a substantial portion of each student's grade. A short presentation on an aspect of Indiana state, county, or municipal law, will take the place of a final exam. This course will be especially useful for students who expect their legal practice to encompass a wide variety of areas of law. Although this class will use Indiana as a common framework, the elements of local and state-level legal research are transferable. Consequently, students who take this course will be well prepared to employ their research skills in other jurisdictions.

Business Law, Real Estate Law

The course will focus on the application of fundamental real estate legal and practical business principles to structuring complex real estate transactions, including an overview of the economic and tax issues that drive the structure of real estate deals. The main topics will span the life cycle of real estate investment from acquisition to disposition, and will focus on topics related to finance, choice of entity and governance, tax aspects, and property management.

Advanced Topics in Constitutional Law is a seminar open to third year students who seek to deepen their understanding of the Constitution through careful study of Supreme Court opinions. Unlike other law school courses, students are required to read every word of every opinion--including concurrences and dissents. The cases are all of recent vintage and include many of the most significant decisions involving the First, Second, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments. If time permits, a few classes will include cases involving the separation of powers, federalism, and matters of great public interest. Students are required to take a midterm exam (40 points), submit a paper by the end of the semester (40 points), and to actively discuss and debate the cases in class (20 points).

Business Law

This seminar provides an in-depth examination of various issues in corporate law that are not covered adequately (if at all) in Business Associations. Corporate governance issues feature prominently. Assignments will consist primarily of law review articles. Active class participation is mandatory. Students are required to write a paper that satisfies the upper-level writing requirement and to present it in class. Prerequisite: Business Associations (LAW 70101) is a strict prerequisite.

Business Law

Provides an introduction to various federal labor statutes such as the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and the Family and Medical Leave Act among others. Also examines state statutory and common law such as unemployment insurance, workers' compensation and privacy at work. The specific topics covered will be determined considering the interests of the students enrolled in the course.

Criminal Law Experiential Course

Business Law

The course aims to provide an in-depth understanding of the alternative investment techniques available to private and institutional investors in a globalized market. In particular, the course aims to add a new dimension to the construction and management of traditional investment portfolios by focusing on alternative asset classes and by presenting them in detail within an academic and practical framework. The emphasis is on three major classes of alternative investments: Hedge Funds, Real Estate, and Art. Asset classes are examined in terms of the following aspects: key characteristics, investment strategies, and portfolio consideration (risk/return profile and their contribution to portfolio diversification). The aforementioned objectives are addressed in a series of formal lectures that are supplemented by live deals in the form of case studies and guest speakers from the industry.

In "American Constitutional Theory and Development" we shall attempt to understand the nature of the American regime and her most important principles. We will explore the American Constitution and the philosophical and political ideas that animated its creation and subsequent development. Since we lack the time for a comprehensive survey of American political thinkers, we shall examine select statesmen and critical historical periods - specifically, the Founding era, Lincoln and the slavery crisis, and the Progressive Era and New Deal.

This course examines principally non-constitutional dimensions of American legal development during the "long nineteenth century" - roughly from 1780 to World War I. The focus of the course is on the relationship between law and economic development. The topics examined include the restructuring of institutional arrangements affecting private law adjudication and ensuing developments in the law of contract, the law of property, corporate law, tort law, commercial law, and antitrust. Students will be evaluated based on class participation and a two-hour, closed-book final examination.

This course explores the role of national institutions in the American political system, with an emphasis on Congress, the presidency, and the Supreme Court. Students will consider three functions commonly ascribed to political institutions in relation to elite behavior: channeling individual preferences, constraining strategic choices, and structuring political opportunities. The goal of the course is for students to gain a basic understanding of American political institutions, synthesize the main themes in the literature, and grapple with current debates in the field.

Business Law, Criminal Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law, Public Law

Experiential Course

Criminal Law Experiential Course

Appellate Advocacy Seminar is an advocacy-oriented look at the appellate process. The course involves the study of the appellate courts, state and federal, as institutions in the judicial system - their role and manner of operation - and the important role of appellate advocates in the appeals process. We will cover key limitations on the operation of appellate courts, such as appealability and jurisdictional doctrines, and special doctrines applicable to the Supreme Court of the United States. We will also explore what constitutes effective written and oral advocacy at the appellate level. Students will also have the opportunity to hone their oral arguments skills through in-class moot court exercises. In lieu of a final exam, students will write a brief and present oral argument.

Applied Evidence—Pretrial Analysis for Civil Disputes uses the problem method and Federal Rules of Evidence to analyze evidence concepts/principles during pretrial from when a client is retained through settlement or trial / arbitration / mediation. Applied Evidence Pretrial Analysis course is designed to provide new lawyers with the analytical skills to provide valued advice on pretrial evidence matters in response to a request from a senior lawyer. Each pretrial evidence request requires analysis of how to develop facts to satisfy evidentiary foundation requirements, or defeat foundation requirements. Knowledge of evidentiary foundation requirements is necessary to provide competent advice. Also such evidentiary analysis and advice informs the need for discovery of facts to support or defeat foundation requirements. New lawyers need to add value to their employers – this course is designed to provide those tools.
Semester workshops analyze evidence problems a new lawyer will face in practice — receive a memo from a senior associate or partner to analyze facts on a client matter and report back in writing with (1) an analysis of the evidentiary matters and (2) a plan of action.  Two papers during semester on topics covered in class. Take Home Final on the evidentiary matters covered during the last few weeks of the semester.
 

Experiential Course

Experiential Course

Business Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Increasingly, international disputes involving intellectual property issues are being resolved through commercial arbitration, despite disapproval from some quarters on grounds of policy or practicality. There have also been recent cases of intellectual property being the subject of investment treaty arbitration. The module is aimed helping law students understand this developing situation and exploring some of the particular issues that arise from the application of arbitration as a dispute resolution process in international IP cases. Issues of arbitrability, drafting, choice of law, procedure, broader policy considerations, and enforceability specific to international IP cases will be discussed.

Business Law

Business Law, Public Law, Real Estate Law

Energy and Environmental Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Introduces students to the new behavioral analysis of law. A behavioral approach to legal analysis asserts that the efficacy of the law depends on its understanding of relevant patterns of human behavior. We will review the ways in which the scientific study of human judgment and decision making can inform the creation and modification of legal rules and institutions. The behavioral approach differs from both its economic counterpart and traditional legal scholarship: from the former, in recognizing the decision makers are neither strictly rational nor the maximizers of their own utility alone; from the latter, in proposing an empirically based view of human behavior as the foundation of relevant analyses. We will examine critically how behavioral findings on systematic patterns of behavior that deviates from strictly rational utility maximization are applied to the law, recognizing the unique promise of this approach as well as the current limitations of its methodology. Specifically, the course will open with an overview of behavioral decision theory - the psychological study of human judgment and decision making. Thereafter, we will examine a variety of rules and doctrines in different legal fields. Following this overview, we will evaluate the new behavioral approach - its nature and scope, its achievements and limitations - and consider the implications of our evaluation for some overarching questions of legal policy.

Energy and Environmental Law

Intellectual Property & Technology Law, Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

This course will explore the ethical, legal, and public policy issues arising from various advances in biomedical science and biotechnology. Students will be invited to consider the ways in which such developments affect law and public policy, as well as the issues that may arise in attempts to govern and regulate science according to ethical principles. Topics covered will include human reproduction (including maternal/fetal conflicts and assisted reproduction), stem cell research, human cloning, genetic screening and modification, research involving human subjects, neuroscience/ neuroethics, end-of-life matters, and relevant issues touching and concerning both intellectual property and constitutional law. No prior experience with science, medicine, philosophy, or related disciplines is assumed or necessary. Students' final grades will be based on classroom participation and a research paper.

Business Law, Criminal Law, Public Law, Real Estate Law

Studies American agency, partnership and corporate law. The first part of the course explores what makes a business entity a corporation, but includes consideration of other business forms such as sole proprietorships and partnerships. The second part of the course addresses the operation of the corporation, and considers internal and external forms of control and regulation. Both parts of the course emphasize the substantive law as well as compliance with statutory formalities such as are contained in the Delaware Corporation Code.

Business Law, Real Estate Law

This course, designed for students with no business training or experience, explores the application of basic concepts and analytical methods from the business profession and the social sciences to the practice of law. The course introduces decision analysis, game theory, accounting, finance, economics, and statistics to prepare students for legal practice. These topics offer especially important and useful tools to lawyers; failure either to recognize an opportunity to use a concept or method or to question an improper application can adversely affect a client's interests. The course seeks to apply such concepts and methods to real legal problems, such as the appropriate measure of damages or the decision whether to settle a case. In addition to litigation and negotiation, legal applications include environmental law, corporate law, criminal law, employment law, antitrust, and intellectual property. Ultimately, the course seeks to train students to recognize when a basic concept or analytical method might apply to a legal situation and to understand generally how to use that concept or method effectively. The course includes a final examination. Students who have majored, minored, or earned advanced degrees in business, including accounting, finance, management, and marketing, or economics must obtain the permission of the instructor to enroll in the course.

Business Law

This module explores the unfolding area of the human rights obligations of transnational corporations (TNCs) and other business enterprises. States have a duty to protect human rights from harm by third parties, including business enterprises, based on existing international law. While a consensus has emerged that business has a responsibility to respect human rights, the current framework of obligations on business may be considered incomplete. This module will consider the nature and scope of current obligations, challenges of accountability and enforcement, and future directions. It will critically examine the value of instruments such as the UNHRC Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights currently being incorporated by businesses and adopted by States in National Action Plans. It will consider the key challenges for the UNIGWG in the development of a UN treaty imposing legally binding obligations under international human rights law on TNCs.

This course looks at the carriage of goods in international trade. We live in a world in which the transportation of goods is a fundamental part of both international and domestic business, and litigation in respect of these carriage disputes is inevitable. The course is based on English Law, with comparisons made with practice under other jurisdictions where appropriate. English law is frequently chosen to govern shipping contracts, the common law nature of English law allowing for judicial "creativity." We see, therefore, the development of this area of contract law, which aims to meet the needs of those involved with the international shipment of goods. The course predominately covers contacts for the carriage of goods by sea and charterparties, as most goods are shipped by this mode of transport, although carriage by air and land is introduced. The course also considers difficulties that arise when goods are the subject of a multimodal contract of carriage, and problems that arise when carriage contracts are negotiated by freight forwarders. The combination of the intellectual rigors of the law and trade realities make this a rewarding subject.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Introduces students to the major documents that comprise the Catholic Church's social teachings. The documents will serve as a basis for a broader discussion of whether the social teaching has anything relevant to say about current trends in American law. Considers: whether lawyers of faith are obliged to move the law in a direction that comports with their core religious values and how that can be done in a pluralistic society; whether Catholic social teaching offers ideas and values that might find broad-based acceptance; and what happens if a lawyer determines that the profession and/or the society are hostile to the values presented in the social teaching.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

This course is designed to provide the students with a unique opportunity to examine several key areas of the China IP laws and policies - online IP enforcement, trade secret protection, patent litigations, standards-setting IP policy, IP related antitrust violations. Through the discussions of key concepts, leading cases and real war stories, the course will demystify what is going on within the China legal system and enable the students to approach China related legal and policy issues.

Students and faculty in this colloquium course will engage a variety of cases and materials on the legal and other relationships among Church, State, and Society and on controversies, past and present, involving them. After several introductory meetings, guest-scholars from other institutions or other units at the University of Notre Dame will present relevant works-in-progress to the class, and participants will reflect on and respond to, both in writing and in seminar discussions, these projects. Prior study of or familiarity with First Amendment cases and doctrine is not required.

Examines the procedures used to resolve civil litigation, with an emphasis on litigation in federal courts and on federal constitutional provisions also relevant in state court. Addresses jurisdictional principles and procedural doctrines involved in structuring a lawsuit; commencing a lawsuit; developing facts and narrowing legal claims during pretrial; trying a lawsuit; and determining post-trial consequences of a judgment. Also considers the extent to which state law must be applied in federal court. If time permits, explores settlement and other alternative methods for resolving disputes.

Criminal Law, Public Law

Business Law

Sales is one of three courses in the basic commercial law curriculum. Building upon principles and themes of contract law taught during the first year of law school, Sales covers in greater depth the law concerning transactions in goods. Specifically, the course surveys UCC Articles 2 and 2A. Course topics include contract formation, warranties, risk of loss, breach and remedies, as well as the developing law governing sales in the e-commerce world.

Business Law, Energy and Environmental Law, Real Estate Law

Business Law, Criminal Law, Real Estate Law Experiential Course

This is a 5-credit, letter-graded course providing training in basic lawyering skills, including interviewing and counseling, as well as ethics, substantive law and procedural law relevant to the representation of clients in litigation and transactions. Students represent clients under the close supervision of a clinical faculty member. The case types vary somewhat among the sections, as described below. The classroom component of the course uses a combined lecture and mock exercise format. Students are sometimes required to participate in a community education presentation. Pre- or co-requisite: Law 70101 or 74101

Business Law, Criminal Law, Real Estate Law Experiential Course

Variable credit and letter-graded course open to students who have satisfactorily completed Clinic I. Clinic II allows students to progress to more advanced lawyering skills. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor.

With a principal focus on American antitrust law, this course will also consider several other competition law regimes, including those of the European Union, individual European countries, Japan and China. The course will address the policies underlying competition law, along with consideration both of substantive doctrine and enforcement mechanisms. Course materials will include both leading antitrust cases and secondary sources

Global Law, Public Law

This seminar situates the subject of comparative constitutional law in a broader framework of comparative legal traditions, starting with a discussion of the aims and methods of comparative law, then proceeding to constitutional history and theory, and considering the idea of "constitutional identity." From there we will discuss both structural topics such as federalism, separation of powers, and judicial review, as well as selected fundamental rights. Examples and topics will be drawn from a variety of different constitutional systems. A research paper will be required, as well as regular participation in weekly class meetings.

Global Law

This course will examine the religious and philosophical foundations of the world's major legal traditions: Civil, Common, Catholic, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, and Confucian. We will study how these traditions come to be codified and how they transmit related values, concepts and institutions over the centuries. We will also explore what happens when these legal traditions encounter each other, including points of tension and possibilities for co-existence.

The seminar introduces students to the most important rules and relevant case law in the field of false and misleading advertising an area of law at the crossroads of competition law and consumer protection. The problems will be analyzed at a global level, comparing the legal approaches of the U.S., the EU and some of its Member States. The course will give an overview of the most important concepts of EU law, economic theories and also the moral foundations of the laws. We will analyze in some more detail the European directive on unfair commercial practices that harmonized national legislation all over Europe. Topics to be addressed include misleading omissions in the telecoms sector, health claims, comparative advertising. We will conclude by evaluating which institutional background and which type of sanction provides the most effective way of enforcement.

Criminal Law

Who Should Take This Course: Students who are hoping to be a federal or state judge on the trial or appellate level; a federal or state legislator; a law professor; a federal or state judicial law clerk; a federal or state prosecutor or public defender; or any student who might want to work within a "White Collar" Crime unit of a major or boutique law firm that handles, among other matters, corporate compliance and internal investigations. While this course has no prerequisites, law students would maximize their learning experience if they also first or simultaneously take one or more of the following courses: "Constitutional Criminal Procedure: Adjudication" (70451), "Constitutional G43Criminal Procedure: Investigations" (70452), "Criminal Law" (60302), "Criminal Process" (75110), "Federal Criminal Law" (70362), as well as more specialized courses, such as "Human Trafficking" (70410) "International Criminal Law" (70403), "Law of Terrorism" (70426), and "National Security Law" (70324).

Criminal Law, Public Law

Criminal Law, Public Law

Examines the manner in which, and the extent to which, the U.S. Constitution - particularly the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments - imposes constraints on the investigation of crime. Topics include theories of constitutional interpretation, the incorporation of the Bill of Rights, search and seizure, interrogation, and the right to counsel. Although no longer required for graduation, this course is recommended for students interested in advanced study and/or practice in the criminal law field. While not a formal prerequisite, the course is highly recommended for students interested in enrolling in Federal Criminal Law (LAW 70362), Criminal and Scientific Evidence (LAW 70205), or Complex Criminal Litigation (LAW 70361).

Public Law

Criminal Law, Public Law

Covers the individual rights secured by the fifth and fourteenth amendments to the United States Constitution, with a primary focus on the right to due process of law (its procedural and substantive components) and the right to equal protection of the laws (including scrutiny of race- and gender-based classifications).

This class will focus on "the history of originalism" in two different senses of that phase. First, it will explore the history of the Supreme Court's efforts to resolve some of its cases by reference to the original meaning of the Constitution, from the Court's initial review of the constitutionality of a federal tax statute in 1796 to 21st century cases about legislative prayer and gun control. Second, it will examine how the justices have identified and employed various types of historical evidence to reach those decisions. In reviewing these historical issues, we will have the opportunity to reflect on two significant questions: Where should we look for a provision's original meaning, and is it really possible to find it? If we do find it, what role should it play in constitutional decision-making?

Business Law, Real Estate Law Experiential Course

The aim of this course is to enable students to become informed producers and consumers of contract language. By the end of the course, students will have learned the following: how to concisely articulate deal points in a contract in a way that addresses the issues and avoids confusion; the shortcomings of traditional contract language; what information to include in the front and back of a contract, and what information to omit; how to spot issues when turning deal points into a contract; how to spot issues when reviewing a draft contract prepared by the other side to a transaction; the function and dysfunction of "boilerplate" provisions; the shortcomings of the traditional copy-and-paste contract process, and how document assembly works; and the role of inertia in how contracts are drafted, and the prospects for change. The focus of this course is not what to say in a contract, but how to say clearly and effectively whatever you want to say. This course would provide a valuable foundation for transactional work, whatever the specialty, and would also be useful preparation for anyone who expects to litigate contract disputes.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Business Law, Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Corporate Compliance has increased in importance over the past decade. Private firms are responsible for ensuring that their employees and members are complying with legal and regulatory requirements. Yet this can be a tricky objective to achieve in a regulatory environment that is in a constant state of change. Moreover, there are many areas of the law where the "right" course of conduct is less than clear. Issues of compliance are not black and white; they are an intense shade of gray. Thus, organizations must find mechanisms to develop "cultures of compliance." They must both train their employees on what their obligations are under the law and develop a culture that promotes ethical awareness and decision-making. Unfortunately this last insight, the idea of encouraging a strong culture of ethicality, is often lost in discussions of compliance. This course will study both issues in tandem and has four objectives. First, develop an understanding of the field of Corporate Compliance and the types of issues that lawyers are responsible for overseeing. Second, obtain an understanding of the applicability, and limitations, of the Model Rules of Professional Conduct within the context of the field of Corporate Compliance. Third, establish a strong foundation in insights from behavioral ethics literature and traditional legal ethics. Fourth, draft persuasive arguments regarding the strengths and weaknesses of the compliance efforts undertaken by the organizations studied during the course. Students may take the course for two or three credits. For two credits, participation will account for 20% of students' grades and students will be required to write four, 2,500 word response papers with each worth 20% of the students' grades. For three credits, participation will account for 20% of the students' grades and students will be required to write (i) four, 2,500 word response papers with each worth 12.5% of the students' grades and (ii) one 5,000 word paper discussing the Model Rules of Professional Conduct within the context of compliance issues discussed throughout the course. Students who take the three credit option will satisfy the Professional Responsibility requirement. Please note: Business Associations is a pre- or co-requisite for this course.

Business Law Experiential Course

The Corporate Counsel Externship course allows students to perform 8-12 hours of legal work per week in in an in-house corporate counsel office while participating in a companion weekly seminar. Placements include private sector, non-profit, and governmental corporate counsel. Students earn three credits (two of which are fieldwork credits) for an eight hour weekly field placement or four credits (three of which are fieldwork credits) for a 12 hour weekly field placement. Placements must involve substantial legal work under the careful supervision of an attorney. Placements are typically in the Michiana area, but students are free to choose placements in other regional cities including Chicago and Indianapolis. All placements must be approved by the instructor and must be finalized before a student may enroll in the course.

Business Law, Real Estate Law

Business Law

This seminar will introduce students to both foundational and current issues in corporate governance. Corporate governance concerns the myriad rules and institutions that determine the functioning of corporations generally and the means for obtaining the efficient management of corporations more specifically. This field is one of the most actively researched areas in law, economics, management and related disciplines, and corporate lawyers and business managers must grapple daily with its challenges. Moreover, corporate governance issues are at the forefront of current public policy debates, particularly those surrounding high-profile corporate scandals and failures over the last decade and, most notably, many aspects of the recent global financial crisis.

Business Law, Energy and Environmental Law, Real Estate Law

(formerly Business Reorganizations in Bankruptcy) Studies in-depth the law of business reorganizations under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code. Focuses on the steps that must be taken to resurrect a distressed business under Chapter 11 including: the decision to file a Chapter 11 case; the initial steps of staying proceedings against the debtor; finding cash with which to operate; the actual turnaround of the business; the adjudication of claims by and against the estate; the restructuring of the estate's capital structure; the confirmation of a restructuring plan; and the issues that arise after the consummation of the bankruptcy.

Criminal Law Experiential Course

Criminal Law, Public Law

For the student interested in criminal law, explores how the law of evidence is applied in criminal cases. Considers how certain rules of evidence are used more often (if not exclusively) in the criminal context. Examines the admission of co-conspirator statements; prior bad acts evidence offered to prove the defendant's "motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity or absence of mistake or accident"; evidence of a pertinent character trait; evidence of an alleged rape victim's past sexual history; autopsy and crime scene photographs; and courtroom demonstrations. Additionally, helps students develop an understanding of scientific techniques used in the courtroom beyond just the basic tests for admission of expert testimony (i.e., DNA testing, "profile" evidence and "syndrome" evidence.)

Criminal Law, Public Law

Criminal Law

Criminal Law

It would also be helpful to have taken Criminal Procedure, Evidence, and/or Trial Advocacy. This course, taught by a federal prosecutor, examines the life cycle of a federal criminal case, from investigation through post-trial proceedings. While the course is presented from a prosecution perspective in a federal criminal case, the knowledge and skills are relevant to lawyers representing any parties in both civil and criminal matters, in federal or state court. The course emphasizes the practical knowledge necessary to try a case, including choosing and drafting motions, picking a jury, delivering opening and closing arguments, examining witnesses, arguing evidentiary issues, and handling post-trial matters. The course will analyze actual criminal cases and will utilize materials that were filed in court.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

This course examines the unique aspects of internet/computer or "cyber" crime. It surveys federal statutes pertaining to computer and internet related crimes and their application, sentencing issues, and first amendment and fourth amendment issues that arise in this context. The instructor will also cover practical aspects of computer crime investigation and prosecution and current computer forensic examination capabilities throughout the course.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Focuses on fundamental questions about how, if at all, existing legal rules should apply to new technologies. Explores various legal and policy problems that arise in cyberspace including: issues of sovereignty and jurisdiction; legal and technological regulation of on-line speech; issues of privacy, anonymity and accountability; computer crime; and ownership and protection of intellectual property in digital form.

Business Law

The Deals course focuses on the legal and economic structuring of corporate and business transactions. This innovative course combines a strong practical dimension and a rigorous academic approach to provide insights concerning the interaction of legal and market dynamics in transactional settings. Particular emphasis is placed on the economic factors underlying the judgment calls lawyers make and the technical means available for negotiating and implementing deals successfully. The Deals course emphasizes how lawyers can successfully navigate legal challenges and regulatory requirements to achieve beneficial outcomes for their clients.Each week the Deals course will consider a different real world transaction, with the particular transactions selected to give the students a range of subject matter in order to highlight a common set of problems that arise in all settings. The transactions are chosen on a year-to-year basis, but likely will include a joint venture agreement, a private equity investment document, a real estate transaction term sheet, a leasing agreement and office and ground lease, an IPO prospectus and related offering documents, a merger agreement, and a cross-border joint venture, together with related and alternative financing documents and structures. With each transaction students are introduced to the economic fundamentals underlying the deal, consider documentation and contractual terms likely to be used, assess ways the deal structure might be improved, and canvass plausible alternative options. Students also gain insights into the negotiation process that provides the foundation for the structuring of deals. The course will be oriented around ongoing active student participation supplemented by guest speakers who have substantial experience running deals. Grades are based on class participation, a group presentation, and a final paper based on a case study of an actual deal. Business Associations is a pre-requisite or co-requisite for this course. 

Experiential Course

Intellectual Property & Technology Law Experiential Course

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

The last decade has seen a dramatic increase in the focus on, and relevance of, drug and medical device companies. As such, regulatory, compliance, and litigation issues have become paramount for these companies. This is a course with significant relevance for those who want to practice in this world - whether in a government capacity regulating these companies, prosecuting them in private and/or government settings, or defending these companies' interests in myriad ways. In addition, those with medical or engineering backgrounds looking for an interesting elective should find this class most interesting! We will explore the major areas in which newer attorneys are having (and can have) immediate impact in the drug and medical device world. In this way, a primary goal will be arming the student with the know-how in order to be knowledgeable and conversant with potential interviewers. You should come out of this Course understanding, analyzing, and being conversant on rudimentary regulatory, compliance, and litigation issues in various drug and medical device settings, as well as policy considerations from all perspectives, which should hopefully make you an attractive commodity for a future employer. Administrative Law is a pre-requisite or co-requisite course. Law of Medical Malpractice, Insurance Law, and Personal Injury Litigation are also recommended, but not required, courses.

This is a course about constitutional development from the founding of the first colonies in British North America to the American Civil War. The topics considered will include constitutional understandings and practices in 17th and 18th Century Great Britain and her North American colonies; the role that differing constitutional understandings and practices played in the precipitation of the American Revolution; the constitutional arrangements that emerged in and among the states during and in the immediate wake of the Revolution, and the role that perceived shortcomings in those arrangements played in the decision to formulate a new Constitution of the United States; the manner in which participants in the framing and ratification of the Constitution sought to redress the deficiencies of preceding institutional arrangements; constitutional issues arising in the Early National Period; the nullification crisis of 1832-1833; the constitutional controversies presented by the existence of chattel slavery in a federal union; and the manner in which differing understandings of state and federal power under the Constitution contributed to secession and Civil War. Students will be evaluated based on class participation and a two-hour, closed book final examination.

Criminal Law Experiential Course

Criminal Law Experiential Course

Studies the key sources of law and policy issues relating to employer-sponsored retirement and welfare- benefit plans, including primarily the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, and case law. Gives special attention to employee-benefits issues arising from the Enron bankruptcy, the treatment of employee benefits in major corporate transactions, and ethical issues arising in the practice of employee-benefits law.

Public Law

Studies the substantive and procedural aspects of federal legislation dealing with employment discrimination, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Energy and Environmental Law

Energy and Environmental Law

This course introduces students to the many legal and regulatory issues related to the generation, distribution, and consumption of energy in the United States. Particular attention will be given to the emerging law of renewable energy as it compares to the established legal frameworks for energy from fossil fuels. Course readings will include generous coverage of the political, environmental, and economic concerns that shape energy law.

This course examines the principal features of the English legal system and of the constitutional structure, institutions, law and practice of the United Kingdom. Topics studied are designed to draw attention to differences between the English and U.K. systems and the position in the United States. Topics include the structure and organization of the courts; the legal profession; legal education; judges; the jury; costs and litigation; legal aid; the U.K. parliament; sources of constitutional law and practice; the U.K. government; the European dimension; and human rights in the U.K. 

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

This course provides an overview of the legal issues commonly faced by authors, musicians, and visual artists.  We will focus on the representation of authors, musicians and artists as the basis for our analysis, although we will also discuss the competing interests of the people that contract with authors and artists.  This class will be of particular interest to students who hope to practice as entertainment lawyers. However, the plight of the struggling artist is well known, and entertainment law is an area well suited for pro bono work.  With this course, regardless of your practice area, you will be well equipped to volunteer at one of the many creative artist pro bono organizations across the country with confidence that you can handle most of the issues that will arise.

Energy and Environmental Law, Public Law, Real Estate Law

Provides a survey of most of the major federal environmental laws, exploring foundational issues of environmental ethics, politics and economics in these various legal contexts. The course focuses on analyzing the variety of existing and potential regulatory mechanisms for protecting and regulating usage of the environment, including more recent initiatives like market-based schemes, cost-benefit analysis, information disclosure, and technology forcing. In addition, the course will use hypothetical simulations to explore applications of environmental law as practiced from the perspective of environmental groups, government agencies, and regulated entities.

Energy and Environmental Law, Real Estate Law

This course will explore how environmental interests are balanced in the context of economic development, with a specific focus on the redevelopment of former industrial sites ("Brownfields"). We will engage in an overview of environmental laws that may impact development including the Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and CERCLA. We will then undertake a case study of a local brownfield project--the former Studebaker Corporation automotive factory site in downtown South Bend--to explore various legal facets of brownfield redevelopment including environmental counseling, transactional law and litigation. The course will also provide the opportunity for students to develop practical legal skills and strategies in the environmental context including reading and interpreting environmental reports, drafting pleadings and conducting fact and expert discovery. Lastly we will consider the impact of environmental justice, smart growth and sustainability considerations on current and future development efforts.

Business Law

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

This two-credit seminar meets for 100 minutes weekly for fourteen sessions. In it, we will study the law applicable to a few of the most pressing end-of-life legal issues that confront the United States and other technologically advanced nations today. The law in question in this seminar will usually be the federal constitutional law of the United States, the law (statutory and decisional) of one or more of the states of the United States, or a uniform law that the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Law has proposed and that has been widely adopted by the states of the United States. On occasion we will consider the legal regime governing end-of-life issues that other nations have created in recent years. Students taking this course will be expected to attend and to participate actively in each session of this seminar and to write a paper that is at least twenty pages long on a law-at-the-end-of-life topic that is agreed upon between the student and me by September 14th of this year. A rough draft of that paper will be due by November 2nd and the final draft will be due by December 21st.

Criminal Law

Involves formulating solutions to ethical problems in the criminal justice system. Meets once per week. May be graded at the option of the instructor. Satisfies Ethics II requirement. Pre- or co-requisite: Legal Externship - Public Defender (LAW 75733)

Global Law

This course introduces students to the legal system of the European Union (EU) and the substantive law of the internal market. Constitutional, administrative, commercial and trade law of the EU are all covered. The topics which will be discussed in this course include the political and economic origins of the EU, its institutional structures (with emphasis on the Court of Justice of the European Union), the Treaties, the interrelationship between Union Law and the laws of the twenty seven member States, and the four freedoms: the free movement of goods, workers, capital and services. The course will concentrate on the transnational protection of economic and social rights, the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice and the particular contribution made by the Court in the development of the four freedoms. There will also be a brief examination of other subjects that are intertwined with the market and European Union policy: competition law, environmental protection, discrimination, and external relations.

Criminal Law, Public Law

Experiential Course

The Exoneration Justice Project (EJP) clinic is committed to correcting the miscarriage of justice and investigating, litigating, and overturning wrongful convictions. The clinic provides law students real-world lawyering experience representing clients that were wrongfully convicted. By working in the EJP clinic students will gain invaluable insight into the criminal justice system. The EJP clinic affords students an opportunity to work on building relationships with clients, interviewing witnesses, investigating case facts, developing case theories, conducting legal research, drafting motions for discovery and DNA testing, drafting witness affidavits and state petitions for post-conviction relief and federal habeas petitions, and participating in evidentiary hearings and other court proceedings. Students appearing in court will do so under the supervision of a state-licensed attorney. Students will also participate in skills training sessions, such as how to interview your client, how to interview a non-cooperative witness, and how to prepare a witness to testify at trial. Students will attend lectures from various NGOs and social service agencies that assist inmates in reintegrating into society after release from prison. The EJP clinic is a year-long program. Evidence, Professional Responsibility, and Intensive Trial Advocacy are pre-requisites or co-requisites for the EJP clinic. These courses must be taken either before enrollment or while enrolled in the clinic. Post-conviction remedies and Criminal Investigation and Adjudication are strongly encouraged.

Experiential Course

For students who have completed Exoneration Justice Clinic already and have instructor permission to continue work in the clinic.

Experiential Course

This two credit seminar explores the concepts of marriage, family and parenthood in a changing social environment in which the law tries to keep pace. Central to the development of modern family law are constitutionalization, federalization, and internationalization, which in some situations have created an interesting blend of (traditional) private family law and public law. Students will read assigned cases and statutes and excerpts from scholarly articles and write a research paper. Family Law is not required.

Public Law

Focuses on the federalism and separation-of-powers issues created by the existence of dual state- and federal-court systems.Topics covered include constitutional and statutory limits on the jurisdiction of the federal courts; appellate and collateral review of state- court judgments; and federal common-law rulemaking; and the scope of the immunity of governments and government officials from suit.

Criminal Law, Public Law

Criminal Law, Public Law

Business Law, Public Law, Real Estate Law

Energy and Environmental Law

This course examines federal policies toward Native Americans since the early 1800's and the implications of those policies on Native Americans today. Specific topics to be covered include the sovereignty of Indian Nations, federal trust responsibilities, equal protection issues, criminal, civil and regulatory jurisdiction, protection of religious practices and sacred sites, gaming, Indian land rights and environmental issues. A key goal of the course is to gain an understanding of the unique rules and procedures that apply when representing Indians or representing non-Indians and Governmental agencies in dealing with Indian Country.

Public Law

This seminar examines what the Supreme Court has described as the oldest question of constitutional law in America: the relationship between national and state governmental authority. It considers the history, political theory, and constitutional doctrine of federalism, addressing relationships between and among political and judicial institutions in the American federal system. Though the focus of the seminar is on American federalism, the matters examined implicate questions involving international law and comparative analysis. Readings include historical materials, scholarly analyses, and judicial cases.

Criminal Law

The Federal White Collar Criminal Law Seminar is taught by two Assistant United States Attorneys for the United States Attorney's Office in the Northern District of Illinois, Tyler Murray (Chief, Financial Crimes Section) and Heather McShain (Deputy Chief, Financial Crimes Section and Supervisor of the Healthcare Fraud Unit). The course seeks to expand students' knowledge of the substance and practical application of federal "white collar" criminal law, and will challenge students to think and act as practicing prosecutors and defense attorneys. The course will review seven areas of federal white collar criminal law: (1) mail and wire fraud; (2) healthcare fraud; (3) financial institution fraud; (4) Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA); (5) official corruption; (6) money laundering; and (7) securities and commodities fraud. Students will gain a working knowledge of the substantive law on these topics and also a "real world" understanding of how a white collar case makes its way through the federal criminal justice system.

Criminal Law

Advanced Criminal Justice Externship fieldwork (3 credits s/u) The Advanced Criminal Justice Externship is a 4 credit course through which students provide representation to criminal defendants in the St. Joseph Superior Court pursuant to a Student Practice Certification. With direct supervision by Public Defender and Adjunct Assistant Professor Stanley Wruble, students represent indigent clients charged with low-level felonies (Class D felonies) which can routinely be resolved within one (1) semester. Students represent their clients through all phases of the criminal justice system from charging through plea negotiation or trial and will perform the following tasks: client interviewing and counseling, factual investigation, legal research, case theory formulation, motion practice, suppression and evidentiary hearings, plea negotiation with deputy prosecutors, and trials. Students will attend classroom sessions in the Law School; case work will be performed at the law offices of Professor Wruble in downtown South Bend. Three of the four credits will be classified as field work credits. Professional Responsibility is a pre-requisite or co-requisite. Enrollment by permission only. Pre-requisites/Co-requisites Evidence is a pre-requisite or co-requisite course. It is preferred, although not formally required, that students applying for this Externship will have taken either or both of the following: Constitutional Criminal Procedure: Adjudication and Constitutional Criminal Procedure: Investigations. Trial Advocacy, either Comprehensive or Intensive, is another preferred pre-requisite or co-requisite but will not be formally required.

Criminal Law

Advanced Criminal Justice Externship Course (01 credit letter-graded) The Advanced Criminal Justice Externship is a 1 credit course through which students provide representation to criminal defendants in the St. Joseph Superior Court pursuant to a Student Practice Certification. With direct supervision by Public Defender and Adjunct Assistant Professor Stanley Wruble, students represent indigent clients charged with low-level felonies (Class D felonies) which can routinely be resolved within one (1) semester. Students represent their clients through all phases of the criminal justice system from charging through plea negotiation or trial and will perform the following tasks: client interviewing and counseling, factual investigation, legal research, case theory formulation, motion practice, suppression and evidentiary hearings, plea negotiation with deputy prosecutors, and trials. Students will attend classroom sessions in the Law School; case work will be performed at the law offices of Professor Wruble in downtown South Bend. Three of the four credits will be classified as field work credits. Professional Responsibility is a pre-requisite or co-requisite. Enrollment by permission only. Pre-requisites/Co-requisites Evidence is a pre-requisite or co-requisite course. It is preferred, although not formally required, that students applying for this Externship will have taken either or both of the following: Constitutional Criminal Procedure: Adjudication and Constitutional Criminal Procedure: Investigations. Trial Advocacy, either Comprehensive or Intensive, is another preferred pre-requisite or co-requisite but will not be formally required.

Criminal Law

Studies the anti-bribery Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) from the standpoint of a practitioner advising a U.S. client engaging in a business opportunity overseas. Topics to be addressed include: the FCPA's legislative history; the current state, and possible future trends, of FCPA enforcement by the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission; compliance, due diligence, and mitigation strategies; and other laws that might be relevant to U.S. clients operating overseas such as the UK Bribery Act, the Travel Act, and anti-money laundering, fraud, and commercial bribery laws. Grading for the class will be based on class participation and on the writing and presentation of a research paper that may, with prior approval, be used to satisfy the Upper Level Writing Requirement. There are no pre or co-requisites for this course, other than the basic required course in Criminal Law. Class size is limited to 15 students.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy, Public Law

The Freedom of Religion is widely regarded as a fundamental human right and as Americans' "first freedom." But what, exactly, are the content, implications, and foundations of this freedom? This course examines the precedents and doctrines relating to the Religion Clauses of the First Amendment, the history and purposes of these provisions, and the theoretical foundations of the freedom they protect. The approaches taken to religious-freedom questions in other legal regimes will also be considered. Topics include public funding for religious education, religious expression and activity in public spaces, exemptions from generally applicable laws for religious believers and religiously motivated conduct, the extent to which state action and laws may reflect religious purposes and values, the autonomy and independence of religious institutions, and the ability of government to protect and promote religious freedom as a human good.

Focuses specifically on the relationship between law and religion, under the United States Constitution and beyond. Thus, our focus will be on the law of the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses of the First Amendment, although we will also have occasion to discuss broader philosophical questions concerning the relationship between religion and politics, the intermediary role of religious institutions, and other issues.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy, Public Law

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy, Public Law

This course will focus on examining the principles, doctrines, and precedents that define the freedom of speech protected under the United States Constitution. The course will also undertake comparative analysis of the protection of free speech in other countries. Questions to be considered include: How, and why, do we define and protect the Freedom of Speech? What are the benefits, and what are the costs, of free speech? When is the regulation or censorship of expression justified? Are courts and legislators ever justified in assigning greater value to some messages and forms of expression than to others, or in silencing some speakers in order to amplify the voice of others? Does the government have a role to play in creating the conditions necessary for the freedom of speech to flourish, or is the freedom of speech best considered as a constraint on government? Is the freedom of speech primarily an individual right or a structural feature of constitutional government? May not have taken Law 70307. 

Galilee is a signature NDLS course that challenges students to think broadly about their career paths by exposing them to a wide range of public service, public interest, and pro bono legal work in cities around the country.  Students form small groups, choose a city to visit in early January before classes resume for the spring semester, and plan a 3-4 day trip to visit non-profits, governmental agencies, courts, and the pro bono department of a private firm. This course is open to first year students as well as all other J.D. and LL.M. students.

Global Law

Focuses primarily on the Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, (CEDAW), and the Optional Protocol to the Convention. Students will explore the status of CEDAW as an international treaty, and familiarize themselves with the kinds of reservations that signatories to CEDAW have entered. The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action will also be briefly covered, as will other international instruments such as the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children. Since CEDAW defines what constitutes discrimination against women and sets up an agenda for national action to end such discrimination, the course will explore how successful CEDAW has been in encouraging states: to incorporate the principle of equality of men and women in their legal system, abolish all discriminatory laws, and adopt appropriate ones prohibiting discrimination against women; to establish tribunals and other public institutions to ensure the effective protection of women against discrimination; and to ensure elimination of all acts of discrimination against women by persons, organizations, or enterprises. The course will also explore the kinds of remedies and recourse women have when states fail to meet their obligations under CEDAW, and examine cases that reflect tensions between the rights articulated in CEDAW, and various cultural practices.

According to the 2021 Statistical Report of the Catholic Health Association of the United States, there are 668 Catholic hospitals and 1,589 Catholic continuing care facilities across the United States, providing acute care, skilled nursing and other services including hospice, home health, assisted living and senior housing. The 2019 American Hospital Association Annual Survey reported that more than 1 in 7 patients are cared for in a Catholic hospital every day, with nearly 5 million admissions to Catholic hospitals in a one-year period. Catholic hospitals employed 525,844 full-time employees and 213,838 part-time workers. Catholic health care must comply with both civil law and ecclesiastical law. Knowledge of the Church’s own legal system, known as canon law, and how it interacts with civil law is essential for lawyers and administrators responsible for the management of ecclesiastical entities such as Catholic hospitals and health care systems.

Examples of specific issues would be in the areas relating to Catholic identity, sponsorship, mergers and joint ventures involving Catholic health care institutions; incorporation and tax-exempt status of religious organizations; the acquisition and sale (alienation) of ecclesiastical property; wills, estates, bequests and gifts involving ecclesiastical goods; liability for clergy and employee misconduct; immigration law aspects of foreign religious workers; and the interface between government regulations and the Church’s ethical and religious directives.

Moreover, the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services issued by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops present the theological principles that guide the Church’s vision of health care. This course will examine in detail the two-fold purpose of the Ethical and Religious Directives: first, to affirm the ethical standards of behavior in health care that flow from the Church’s teaching about the dignity of the human person, and second, to provide authoritative guidance on certain moral issues that face Catholic health care today.

Health Care Issues in Canon Law should be of particular interest for law students and business students interested in the management of Catholic health care institutions. This course will be conducted as a seminar in which students will be invited to write a research paper and make a presentation on some issue of canon law and Catholic health care.

Intellectual property is a relatively new area of law humans created, invented, and branded long before the advent of copyright, patents and trademarks. This course considers both the history and development of intellectual property law, with a particular focus on Britain and the United States, and the theories posed to justify its existence. Students will read and discuss classic works of intellectual property scholarship alongside more recent work on IP history and theory in order to better understand the origins of modern day legal regimes and analyze the coherence and legitimacy of contemporary law.

Global Law

Should our shared human dignity create our global economy? Is international human rights law deeply involved in global trade, investment, finance, banking, intellectual property, competition and antitrust, technology and automation, and the processes, institutions, constituencies, and structures that comprise our global economy? This course introduces students to the basic legal, policy, and institutional frameworks that constitute the key pillars of the international economic system (world trade, foreign investment, development finance, international banking and monetary policy, intellectual property protection, competition and antitrust, technology and automation), in order to situate, explore, and examine redress for the ongoing fundamental human rights challenges (civil, political, economic, social, cultural, labor, environmental) inimitably embedded in our global economy. Merging case studies from ongoing legal disputes, policy reports, and pending international initiatives on global business and human rights, this course is designed to provide students with a basic law and policy understanding of our global economy and the ethical decision-making necessary to address serious human rights issues in global policy-making in the international economic system. Issues that will be discussed include, among others, fiscal and monetary planning during economic crises; supply chains in the world trading system; responsible and sustainable foreign investment; homelessness, displacement, and labor issues in the "sharing" or "gig" economies; privacy and autonomy issues in automation of production processes; the preservation of cultural knowledge in the intellectual property system; among a range of urgent issues on the evolving shape and contours of our global economy.

Criminal Law

Energy and Environmental Law, Global Law

How does the international human rights system advance sustainable environmental practices and the protection of our global commons? This course explores the deepening integration between international human rights law and international environmental governance towards achieving the overarching objectives of sustainable development under the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially in the context of international law principles such as the State's duty to ensure sustainable use of natural resources; the principle of intergenerational equity and the right to development; the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities; the precautionary principle for human health and ecosystems; and the principles of public participation, transparency, and access to justice. Merging a problem-based and interdisciplinary case approach with lectures, the course will problematize the linkages in case studies of: 1) sustainability-driven international regulatory reforms over the methods of production, global supply chains, and the activities of multinational enterprises, especially under the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and related environmental treaties, the World Trade Organization agreements, and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights; 2) the duty of States to conduct meaningful human rights-based due diligence review and design human rights impact assessments for foreign investment, trade, banking, infrastructure development projects in their jurisdictions, as well as for other cross-border economic activities; and 3) the mandate for greater participation of indigenous peoples and local communities in international environmental and human rights fact-finding, governance, and protection over natural resources and the protection of the global commons, and the recognition and application of this mandate in select cases at the International Court of Justice, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the European Court of Human Rights, national human rights commissions, and other fora.

Criminal Law

Global Law, Public Law

This course surveys immigration and citizenship law in the United States. We will examine the admission, presence, expulsion, and naturalization of noncitizens, and the content and significance of U.S. citizenship and nationality, from a variety of perspectives: constitutional, statutory, and regulatory. Specific topics will include Congress; plenary power over immigration; the interaction between immigration and federalism; the constitutional rights of noncitizens; the criteria for the admission of noncitizens on a temporary or permanent basis; the grounds for exclusion and removal; the rules governing adjustment of status; and the law governing refugees and asylum. The core issues at stake in this course - the boundaries of political membership and the systems for managing migrant populations - play a significant role in many areas of the law and present fundamental challenges to the United States in the twenty-first century in terms of national security, domestic and foreign policy Recommended pre- or co-requisites: Administrative Law and Constitutional Law.

The course is divided in two major blocks. The first block will examine the dynamics that drive growth, the long-term evolution of inequality, and the concentration of wealth. The second block will examine the role of the corporate form in addressing the increased inequality. The course will be based on cross-country analysis with a special emphasis on the United States. Topics will include: (i) neoclassical, Keynesian, and Neo-Ricardian models of production and growth; (ii) market incompleteness and failures; (iii) patterns of growth and inequality in the US and OECD countries; (iv) inequality, the welfare state, and taxation; (v) growth, inequality, and corporatism; (vi) communitarians and contractarians theories of the corporate form; (vii) corporate social responsibility. Pre-requisite (or co-requisite): Business Association.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

The law of information privacy has profound implications for the media, law enforcement agencies, health care providers, online sellers, and beyond. It also helps to define citizens' interactions with each other, especially in the modern technological age. In this seminar, we will examine the law of information privacy across these and other domains. We will study the legal rules and frameworks for privacy protection, and we will explore the themes and tensions that arise as the law attempts to balance privacy against a host of other values. Course requirements include regular participation and two analytical papers.

Criminal Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Provides a broad-based analysis of the legal issues confronted in today's information technology (IT) arena. It provides a foundation of the basic intellectual property concepts upon which IT activities and transactions are based; the transactions, such as the licensing of software or information resources, the outsourcing or hosting of services or information, development of software or websites (along with the allocation of associated rights); and the challenges posed by e-commerce. It also addresses existing and pending laws and regulations impacting the use of IT systems, including electronic privacy and security mandates, commercial law related to IT, and the use of electronic signatures. The course examines potential liabilities based on the operation of IT systems, including Internet-based problems (e.g., hacking, denial of service, cyber-torts), domain name/trademark issues, and intellectual property concerns, including the impact of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The course also addresses the attorney's and client's responsibilities in potential or actual litigation with respect to electronic discovery and handling of electronic evidence.

Criminal Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law Experiential Course

Criminal Law Experiential Course

Intellectual Property & Technology Law Experiential Course

The course focuses on the law and application of intellectual property licensing. Topics include common license provisions, drafting of licenses, and issues specific to licensing of various types of intellectual property (i.e., patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret, and right of publicity). The course will also examine industry specific issues in software, information and database licensing, university intellectual property transfers, and government contracts. In addition to analyzing and discussing substantive case law, class work will require students to draft or revise license provisions on a weekly basis. Pre-req: Law 70134 or 70137 or 70909 or 70128.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law, Public Law

Experiential Course

The Intercollegiate Externship will provide an opportunity for law students to gain practical experience and academic credit in intercollegiate athletics administration through a classroom component taught by Law School faculty and senior-level administrator-attorneys from Athletics and via non-classroom externship work. Potential duties include reviewing contracts; assisting in the creation and revision of departmental policy; researching legal issues related to athletics; researching compliance issues; drafting, reviewing and revising compliance education materials; and auditing eligibility and other compliance-related forms.

The Intercollegiate Externship will provide an opportunity for law students to gain practical experience and academic credit in intercollegiate athletics administration through a classroom component taught by Law School faculty and senior-level administrator-attorneys from Athletics and via non-classroom externship work. Potential duties include reviewing contracts; assisting in the creation and revision of departmental policy; researching legal issues related to athletics; researching compliance issues; drafting, reviewing and revising compliance education materials; and auditing eligibility and other compliance-related forms.

Business Law

Examines the structure and operation of the International Labour Organization, a specialized agency of the United Nations system charged with promulgating and enforcing international labor standards. Places particular focus on the content and interpretation of ILO conventions 87, 98 and 111. Includes a comparative examination of the labor-law systems of selected countries (based on student interest), with an analysis of whether those systems comply with the relevant ILO conventions.

This course will introduce international commercial and investor-State arbitration. Arbitration is one of the oldest forms of dispute resolution, but it has grown in importance along with the spread of globalisation. It is now the most favoured form of international dispute resolution. During this course, we will consider why arbitration works so well to resolve international disputes. We will study the complex legal framework within which international commercial and investor-State arbitrations take place. We will also study some of the treaties that support that framework, including the New York Convention of 1958, which imposes an obligation on national courts around the world to recognize and enforce international arbitration agreements and awards. We will also study the procedural aspects of international arbitration, which are characterized by neutrality, confidentiality, party autonomy and flexibility. These characteristics, along with the enforceability of arbitral awards, are the keys to international arbitration's popularity and success.

Business Law, Global Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Business Law, Global Law

International Commercial Arbitration: This course provides a comprehensive overview of international arbitration law and practice. Topics explored include the making and enforcement of arbitration agreements; the selection and appointment of the arbitral tribunal; preliminary proceedings, including procedural orders and interim relief; the arbitration hearing; and the making and enforcement of the arbitral award. Particular attention is paid to the enforcement of arbitration agreements and awards, the role of the New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards and other treaties, and their interplay with national laws as a backdrop for private arbitration agreements.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

This course will examine the most important international agreements for copyright, neighboring rights, patents, trademarks, and geographical indications. It will also cover aspects of national IP laws and address questions of acquisition, territoriality, exhaustion, and international enforcement of IPRs. Topics covered include: filing and prosecuting patents around the word, acquiring copyrights in foreign countries, protecting well-known or famous marks, and the exhaustion of IP rights which have become fundamental for companies operating in our global economy.

Global Law

Examines international crimes, including: crimes against humanity; genocide; war crimes; torture; forced disappearances, and acts of terrorism. The course covers other important topics such as the scope of criminal liability under the doctrine of command responsibility, joint criminal enterprise doctrine, and head of state immunity, as well as extraterritorial jurisdiction, extradition, irregular rendition (fugitive snatching), the political offense exception, and application of the U.S. Constitution to law enforcement activities abroad.  The course also examines the use of force during an armed conflict, including targeted killings, and use of force in self-defense.  Finally, the course covers the prosecution of international crimes before military tribunals and international tribunals such as the ad hoc International Tribunals for the Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, and International Criminal Court.

Global Law

Law exists for the peaceful settlement of society’s questions. It does so through the variety of substantive and procedural principles. This course introduces students to the law and methods available for resolving international questions peacefully. Students will study negotiation, mediation, fact-finding, conciliation, arbitration and judicial settlement. Our emphasis will be on how these mechanisms operate in contemporary disputes and on how the law governs their use.  We will use a casebook but will supplement the guest speakers, streaming live oral arguments from a variety of international courts and tribunals, and other additions. We will work toward a capstone project involving the simulation of a current, high-level global dispute. Past simulations have involved negotiating a comprehensive environmental dispute resolution mechanism; negotiating a uniform principle governing payment of ransom in international hostage situations, and mediating an end to the Syrian conflict. Students will prepare a position paper for their assigned role in the capstone. The final grade in the course will be based on class participation, the capstone paper and oral presentation, as well as a short take-home exam.

A prior course in international law is recommended but not required. It is a two-credit hour course that will meet once a week.

Energy and Environmental Law, Global Law

Environmental regulation has expanded from a domestic phenomenon to one that has both global impacts and global participants. In this course, we will determine when the international community is likely to act with respect to environmental problems, what legal processes it uses to address these problems, and how to assess the success of these regulatory interventions. In addition to discussing the status quo of international environmental law [IEL], we will also consider how this state of affairs came to be and what alternate policy options exist for handling these problems. Finally, we will aim to identify the most significant challenges for IEL in the coming fifty years and critically assess IEL's ability to confront these challenges.

This course examines the role of international law in the protection of the earth's environment. It views the international organizations that develop environmental laws and policy, and the roles, rights, and obligations of states in enacting and enforcing those laws. Environmental issues covered include environmental disasters, transboundary air pollution, climate change, marine pollution, hazardous waste, the law of war and environmental protection, freshwater resources, biodiversity and wildlife conservation, protection of habitat, and how international disputes in these areas are settled.

Experiential Course

In this seminar, students will learn about: a) key legal mechanisms for human rights defense at the international level; b) effective advocacy strategies to complement these legal approaches; and c) various advantages and challenges of international human rights practice. The seminar will consist of class discussion, reading, and lawyering skills simulations - all of which will draw from real cases pending before international commissions and courts. Lawyering skills simulations will include sessions on fact-finding, client representation, negotiation, human rights reporting, and media advocacy. Student evaluations will be based on class participation, in-class lawyering exercises, and short papers. 

Criminal Law, Global Law

We live in an ever-shrinking world in which social, cultural, and economic life is global. People everywhere are aware of the suffering in Syria and the impact of climate change. They want to be part of how cyber space and outer space are regulated. People want to maintain national identity and security, while being able to travel, trade, and connect everywhere. International law is the one means available to all to peacefully achieve a common vision of a better future. It is a system of rules, principles and procedures that regulate activity at the inter-state level. International law is an integral part of contemporary life, effecting issues of war and peace, the global economy, human rights, and the natural environment. International law is a complete system of law, distinctive from national legal systems.  The main objective of the course is to provide a comprehensive overview of the system of international law by introducing how international law is made, applied, and enforced. The course will also introduce the major subfields. It will prepare students for both the practice of law and many other careers in the 21^st century.

The course takes a traditional approach to the study and evaluation of international law, using a classic casebook and end of the semester final exam. Strong or weak class participation is also taken into account. The approach demonstrates that international law is a foundational course in the law curriculum and beyond. It is a required or recommended course for advanced international law courses and is important various moot court competitions, journals, and other co- and extra-curricular activities. 

International law is a three-credit hour course, meeting two days a week.

Criminal Law, Global Law, Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

The very origins of international law lie in the attempt to control major violence between communities. Thus, international law on the use of force is the oldest of the major subfields of general international law. It is also the area that makes headlines most often today from the violence of civil wars to the development of killer robots. International law on the use of force is relevant to the military, legislators, judges, human rights advocates, the media, ethicists, manufacturers, service providers, and a well-informed electorate. Our course will cover the three main areas within the subfield: the law governing resort to force (jus ad bellum), the conduct of armed conflict (jus in bello or International Humanitarian Law (IHL)), and the means and methods of warfare, in particular, weapons law.

The course is designed as an advanced international law course. It aims to give students a deeper and broader understanding of international law as well as providing an opportunity to hone skills in legal reasoning, research, and advocacy—written and oral. At the midpoint of the course, students will be assigned a current controversy and asked to present a legal case on one side of the controversy or the other in a moot and for analysis in a research paper. Grades are based on three components: class participation, the oral presentation, and the final paper. 

This is a two-credit our course that will meet once a week. A prior course in international law is required. The prior course need not have been at Notre Dame but must have been a general introduction covering how international law is made, applied, and enforced.

This course will draw students into the growing international discourse on children's rights. Together we will examine the background to and the operation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, the most signed and ratified international treaty ever. The United States is alone in the developed world in not having ratified the Convention. The Holy See of the Roman Catholic Church was one of the first state parties to sign and ratify the Convention. We will take a close look at the impact of the Convention on the Holy See in particular. Course assessment will be by way of an essay of not more than 2,500 words. Students are free to choose a relevant topic and one of the classes will be devoted to discussing possible areas of interest for their essays.

International organizations ("IOs") are at the forefront of almost every aspect of international relations and the global economy. From the United Nations to the World Bank, and the International Criminal Court to the International Atomic Energy Agency, IOs are indispensable to modern world affairs. An IO is typically defined as a treaty-based intergovernmental entity, constituted by states, with a legal identity separate from state members. It has international legal personality and privileges and immunities within national legal systems consistent with its functions. The implications and exercise of these attributes is the subject of international organizations law. This course examines the legal issues and controversies common to all IOs, irrespective of object and purposes. Through a study of applicable legal principles and practices it considers underlying themes of world governance and accountability. It also facilitates a good working knowledge of the diverse IO community.

Business Law

This course covers cross-border sales transactions between parties in different nations, and how both international treaties (such as the Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods, "CISG") and domestic laws (such as the Uniform Commercial Code, "UCC") impact the creation of international sales agreements and the resolution of sales disputes.  Issues covered will include offer, acceptance, formation, the statute of frauds, express and implied warranties, risk of loss, remedies, damages, and payments systems (letters of credit). The course will also touch upon the major issues in dispute resolution, namely, the role of enforcing arbitration agreements and confirming arbitral awards.

Business Law, Global Law

Business Law, Global Law

Examines U.S. income tax laws and policies relating to transnational transactions. Covers taxation of U.S. income received by foreign individuals and entities, as well as taxation of foreign income received by U.S. citizens, residents and corporations. Emphasizes fundamental issues in international tax including jurisdiction to tax, source of income, foreign tax credit, tax treaties and the use of controlled subsidiaries and other entities to conduct business overseas. Pre- or corequisite: Federal Income Taxation (LAW 605) 

Surveys American legal institutions and principles of the American common-law system. Includes a study of the role of the three branches of government - judicial, legislative and executive - in making, interpreting and enforcing law; the role of precedent, statutes, secondary sources, etc., in determining law; the structure of the American court system; the nature of the American federal system and the relationships between state and federal governments; the differences between civil and criminal laws; the role of the U.S. Constitution in defining legal relationships, rights and duties; and a description of the processes of both civil and criminal litigation in American courts, from initiation of an action through trial and appeal.

Civil lawyers represent and counsel Catholic dioceses, parishes, colleges, universities, grade schools, high schools, hospitals, nursing homes and other charitable entities. In such matters, some knowledge or familiarity with the Church's own legal system, known as canon law, would be valuable. Canon law plays a central role in determining how the Catholic Church handles the broad spectrum of issues involved in the daily management of a world-wide multinational organization. Examples of these involve personnel and real estate matters, rights and duties of the Christian faithful, professional misconduct, foreign religious workers, the administration of ecclesiastical goods, mergers and joint ventures, and, of course, marriage and family law, especially divorces and annulments. This course will be conducted as a seminar in which students write a research paper and make a classroom presentation on some issue that involves aspects of both civil law and canon law.

Surveys American legal institutions and principles of the American common-law system. Includes a study of the role of the three branches of government - judicial, legislative and executive - in making, interpreting and enforcing law; the role of precedent, statutes, secondary sources, etc., in determining law; the structure of the American court system; the nature of the American federal system and the relationships between state and federal governments; the differences between civil and criminal laws; the role of the U.S. Constitution in defining legal relationships, rights and duties; and a description of the processes of both civil and criminal litigation in American courts, from initiation of an action through trial and appeal. This course is required of all students in the London LL.M. Programme who did not graduate from an American law school. American law-school graduates cannot take this course for credit toward the LL.M. degree.

Business Law, Real Estate Law

This seminar offers an introduction to Islamic law and Islamic constitutionalism. How does the world of Islam understand the concept of law? What is Islamic justice? Do constitutions of Islamic law states differ from those of the West? How does governance relate to religion in the Islamic world? How did this relationship evolve? Students will consider the meaning of Islamic justice, its embodiment in the legal system, its execution, the way it has evolved, and the principles that underpin it. We will examine the role of Muslim religion in the shaping of the law, and how a faith-based concept of law relates to modern governance. The aim of this seminar is to acquire a better understanding of Islamic law (sharia) as an expression of the divine will, and as a system of laws and justice, through focusing on classic texts, Islamic law states' constitutions, as well as photography, art and sculpture.

Student staff members may earn academic credit by researching, writing, or editing material for publication in the Journal of College and University Law.

Experiential Course

The Judicial Externship course allows students to perform 8-12 hours of legal work per week in a state or federal court while participating in a companion weekly seminar. Placements are typically in the Michiana area, but students may also work in Chicago, southern Michigan, or other cities in northern Indiana. Students earn three credits (two of which are fieldwork credits) for an eight hour weekly field placement or four credits (three of which are fieldwork credits) for a twelve hour weekly field placement. All placements must be approved by the instructor and must be finalized before a student may enroll in the course.

The goal of this course is to introduce students to the social scientific study of law and courts in American politics. The course will focus on two questions: First, what factors - legal ideological, strategic, institutional, or otherwise - influence the behavior of judicial actors? Second, what are the effects - social, political, or otherwise - of judicial behavior and institutions? Students will explore (1) seminal works that have defined the principal questions in the field, (2) prominent and cutting-edge answers to these questions, (3) both traditional and alternative methodological approaches, and (4) avenues for future research. Topics will include judicial selection, agenda setting, decision making, independence, legitimacy, policymaking, hierarchy, compliance, implementation, and impact. Although the course will focus on the study of the U.S. Supreme Court, we will also consider the study of lower federal courts and state courts.

Criminal Law, Law, Ethics, and Public Policy, Public Law

Affords students the opportunity to confront the question that Justice Cardozo presented in his famous work on the judicial process: "What is it that I do when I decide a case?" Through class discussion, explores the intellectual roots of the American judicial tradition and addresses the problems that confront that tradition in the modern American courtroom. Explores critically the judicial role in the common-law context, in modern statutory interpretation, in administrative practice, and in constitutional adjudication. Helps students appreciate how the judicial mind goes about the craft of deciding a case in the hope that the student, once admitted to practice, will be able to better respond to the needs of that mind and therefore, will be a better advocate. While constitutional law is not a required prerequisite, it is helpful to have a background in that area. Some time is spent in acclimating students to the responsibilities of a federal or state clerkship. Requires a term paper on a topic approved by the instructor.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Studies different accounts of the nature of law and the place of non-legal elements - moral, historical, sociological, economic in legal decision making. Emphasizes concrete legal cases and attempts to relate philosophical and theological insights to professional insights developed in other courses. Aims to help students relate their personal commitments to their professional lives, and to give students a better understanding of particular legal dispositions through studying them within the context of the whole fabric of the law.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

This advanced jurisprudence seminar will explore a number of questions about the common law and its place in our legal system as whole. First, students will explore the nature of the common law: the character of common law reasoning, theories of precedent, and arguments about how – or if – the common law is different than other forms of law. Second, students will consider arguments about how the common law interacts with enacted legislation. Third, students will address questions about the role common law reasoning plays, or should play, in constitutional interpretation and adjudication.

This course satisfies the basic Jurisprudence requirement for JD students, but it does so by using the system of international human rights law as an overarching context in which to examine focal jurisprudential questions. For example, what is the basis for asserting the existence and universality of human rights? How can we plausibly do so across the pluralistic array of different ethical, juridical, and cultural traditions that characterize the human family? To what extent and in what ways can or should human rights principles be "positivized" through international treaties and institutions? What are the meanings and significance of principles of human dignity, subsidiarity, sovereignty, democracy, and the common good in international human rights law? How do we draw the boundaries of legitimate pluralism in a system that aspires by definition to universality? What is the role of adjudication? In examining these and other questions, we will take up and compare a variety of different theories of human rights, both Western and non-Western, religious and secular, in both historical and contemporary perspectives.  No prior knowledge of international law or human rights law is required. (Note that if you have taken Professor Carozza's Foundations of International Human Rights Law course in Fall 2016 you are not eligible to enroll in this course.)

Public Law

Examines how both the common law and the statutory law impact the employment relationship in the private sector. Gives special attention to contract- and tort- based exceptions to employment-at-will, the National Labor Relations Act, and the role of unions in the workplace.

Energy and Environmental Law, Public Law, Real Estate Law

This course examines the land development process. It explores the various legal tools used to regulate land uses - nuisance, covenants, zoning, subdivision controls, growth management tools, historic preservation regulations, etc. - as well as constitutional limits on land use regulation. Attention will be given to the comparative advantages of different regulatory devices, as well as to the legal, political, and economic factors that influence public and private decisions land uses.

Law and language are inseparable. This course offers a study of selected topics where this connection is especially strong: ambiguity, the relationship of form and content, legal fictions, the interpretation of legal and religious texts, the writing of judicial opinions, law and/as translation, and corpus linguistics as used in the interpretation of fiction and law. Readings will be drawn from law, literature, theology, philosophy, linguistics, and translation studies, but a background in these fields is not required. Evaluation will be based on class participation and two analytical papers. The course is open to law students and graduate students in other disciplines.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Business Law, Energy and Environmental Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law, Law, Ethics, and Public Policy, Real Estate Law

Provides an introduction to issues in the economic analysis of law and a forum for investigating ongoing research in law and economics, law and business, and law and the social sciences. Explores the major areas of research in law and economics (such as property, contracts, torts, intellectual property, and business associations) but also extends beyond these areas to examine subjects and problems traditionally underrepresented in the field. The seminar will consist of (i) a number of guided discussions on topics within law and economics (e.g., empirical methods, public choice theory, and behavioral law and economics); and (ii) a series of workshop presentations in which invited speakers (from the Law School, other departments within the University, and other law schools and universities) deliver working papers and students have the opportunity to ask questions and offer comments. Students are expected to participate in class discussions and the question-and-answer sessions, submit brief written comments on the papers in advance of the presentations, and complete a final paper of 15-20 pages. Students with a particular interest in or prior studies pertaining to economics, business, or the social sciences might find the seminar especially appealing, but neither a background in these disciplines nor knowledge of technical economics is necessary for enrolling in the course.

Business Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law, Real Estate Law

Neither a clinical nor a "drafting" course, Law and the Entrepreneur is an advanced elective intended to provide "deeper dive" into entrepreneurship for the legal professional, exploring the socio-cultural, economic and legal aspects of startup ventures. The course also provides an opportunity for discussion of the role of entrepreneurial behavior in economic growth, some comparative study of economic and legal systems, and the extent to which these foster or stifle entrepreneurial behavior. Law and the Entrepreneur examines the multiple places along the life cycle of a startup where the law intersects with and impacts new businesses, including choice of entity, intellectual property and technology commercialization, capitalization and finance, immigration, family business, and social entrepreneurship. Emphasis will be placed on public policy as it impacts entrepreneurship, identification of competing interests inherent in these policy debates, and the arguments about the proper balancing of those interests.
Reading materials will be provided by the instructor, and will include essays by legal scholars, some social science research, and excerpts from contemporary periodicals, as well as more traditional legal cases and statutory materials. Rules for Growth: Promoting Innovation and Growth Through Legal Reform, Kauffman Task Force on Law, Innovation and Growth (2011), 494 pp.
Students' grades in the course will be a function of significant in-class and online participation, and a final research paper on a topic of the student's choice, related to the subject matter of the course. The best student papers will have the opportunity for publication.

Business Law

This seminar examines the centuries long Catholic teaching and philosophy relating to law and business. From pre-Christian writers who anticipated the Catholic intellectual tradition, such as Aristotle, through the modern era, the seminar will conduct a survey of the Catholic perspective on the nature of law, the nature of business and their relationship. Topics to be considered will include, the relationship between natural and human law, the obligations and limitations on human law making, usury, just price doctrine, private property, corporate governance, and the conflicting claims of capitalism and socialism.

This seminar is designed primarily to support students in Program on Law and Human Development summer research internships and in other NDLS experiential learning internships/externships on global justice issues. A broad range of topics related to law and human development will be explored, and students will complete in-depth writing projects (such as case studies, research papers, or extensive reflection pieces), typically defined by their summer experience. This seminar will help students gain a deeper understanding of the situations they confront in research or experiential learning experiences by building their capacity to investigate and reflect upon complex, real-world issues in human development. Specifically, they will: have a clear understanding of the theoretical, historical and practical features of the emerging field of law and human development, including the human capabilities approach and Catholic Social Tradition's contributions; explore how various legal approaches relate to human development; and develop skills necessary to research and critically evaluate law's role in advancing or hindering human development in specific, concrete situations. The classroom meetings for this seminar will be offered in two parts, before and after summer internships/externships. The first part of seminar sessions will engage the students in the course topics through readings, other media, and classroom discussion. Each student will identify a major research topic in law and human development based upon their summer intern/externship placements. Students will prepare a detailed research proposal (including research questions and methodology, bibliography, list of contacts and resources on the ground, and preliminary outline). Over the summer, they will present for approval an extensive final outline of their paper, and then prepare a draft, of 20-30 pages minimum. This draft paper will be shared and vetted during the second part of seminar sessions, in oral and written formats. In a structured manner, students will present their work to the class as well as provide feedback on classmates' work. The final draft of the paper will be submitted at the end of this second set of meetings; it is expected that a number would be candidates for publication. The two seminar sessions of one credit each will be offered for a total of two credits. The spring semester session will meet over one week between finals and graduation in May; the second session in the fall semester takes place over seven weekly meetings August-October. The instructor will authorize student registration in the course based upon acceptance to PLHD and other summer internships/externships and academic qualifications for up to nine participants.

Examines selected legal aspects of education including students' rights, teachers' rights, desegregation, educational finance and church-state matters.

This seminar course will canvass a number of legal issues faced by colleges and universities, including academic freedom, tenure, religion and higher education, financial aid, admissions and affirmative action, finances, students' rights and responsibilities, universities' responsibilities to students, intellectual property questions, and collegiate athletics. Where appropriate, students will be asked to engage in a comparative evaluation of these issues at public v. private/religious colleges and universities. Research paper required.

Business Law, Global Law

Global Law

The purpose of this course is to introduce students to international law, as portrayed by international law scholars as well as political scientists. In the beginning of the semester, we will focus on general characteristics of international law, such as its nature, historical development, main thinkers, subjects, and sources of law. Second, we will study several substantive areas of international law, such as international criminal law, or the law of the sea. Next, we will examine international courts and other means for peaceful resolution of international disputes (mediation, conciliation, arbitration, etc). We will conclude the course with analyzing international law through the lenses of domestic legal systems. This course brings together theories and approaches to "law among nations" present in the international legal literature and international relations scholarship.

Criminal Law, Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

The Law of Terrorism explores the relationship between law and national security policy as it relates to responding to the threat of transnational terrorism. This requires analyzing the U.S. response to this threat through three primary modalities: first, military response; second, criminal law enforcement response; and finally, economic response. Each of these response modalities offers certain advantages and disadvantages in this struggle. More importantly, each of these modalities implicates a fundamentally different legal framework. The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 have revealed two fundamental dilemmas that have generated legal uncertainty. First, where does terrorism fit within the continuum of international threats? Second, if certain terrorist threats necessitate the invocation of war powers, where is the line between the law enforcement and the wartime components of this struggle to be drawn? More specifically, the course will examine whether the armed struggle with deadly terrorist groups may constitute an armed conflict implicating principles of international humanitarian law, including the right to detain terrorists for the duration of the conflict and prosecute them before a military tribunal. The course will also consider whether attacks by terrorist organizations may trigger a State's inherent right of self-defense under the United Nations Charter and customary international law. Further, the course will examine the primary tool in the contemporary criminal law arsenal for combating terrorism, the federal offense of providing material support to terrorist organizations, 18 U.S.C. §2339B. This statute has generated significant questions as to whether it infringes on fundamental constitutional values including First Amendment freedom of speech and freedom of association, and Fifth Amendment due process protections. The course will examine the government's authority to freeze the assets of suspected terrorists. A robust body of U.S. law now enables the federal government to investigate, track, and seize assets connected to terrorist organizations. The course will also explore the gathering of counter-terrorism intelligence pursuant to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Finally, the course with analyze several important statutes enacted by Congress authorizing civil liability for personal injury or death caused by acts of international terrorism. Civil causes of action benefit the victims of terrorism by affording them the remedies of American tort law against the actual perpetrators of terrorist acts as well as their financial sponsors and facilitators.

This course offers a comparative perspective on law and legal institutions. Looking comparatively helps shed light on our own system and question what is "normal" or "natural." From what it means to be a lawyer to notions of what is "just" or "fair," courts and dispute resolution outside the U.S. can be both very different and, at times, surprisingly familiar. After an overview of concepts and classic approaches to the study of law and society, the course will explore these differences and similarities in three Asian settings: China, Japan, and India. Topics include courts and the legal profession, crime, inequality, and environmental protection, to see how each country's history, political structure, values, and interests shape how legal issues are defined and play out.

Experiential Course

The Lawyering Practice Externship Course allows students to perform 8-12 hours of legal work per week in in any court, governmental agency, nonprofit organization, or in-house corporate counsel office while participating in a companion weekly seminar. Students earn three credits (two of which are fieldwork credits) for an eight hour weekly field placement or four credits (three of which are fieldwork credits) for a 12 hour weekly field placement. Placements must involve substantial legal work under the careful supervision of an attorney or judge. Placements are typically in the Michiana area, but students are free to choose placements in other regional cities including Chicago and Indianapolis. Students may not choose placements already offered in existing local externship courses (St. Joseph County Public Defender, South Bend office of the National Immigrant Justice Center, Notre Dame Athletic Department or athletics compliance within Notre Dame’s General Counsel’s Office). All placements must be approved by the instructor and must be finalized before a student may enroll in the course.

Experiential Course

The purpose of this course is to examine the influence Hollywood has had on how lawyers perceive themselves and how society in general perceives lawyers, the legal profession, and the ethical standards of the legal profession -- specifically by studying relevant scholarly material and by critiquing film and television depictions of lawyers, lawyering and the ethics of the profession.

Students may earn academic credit through clinical work and participation in seminars relating to legal-aid topics. Activities selected may include trial work on family law issues, landlord-tenant relations, immigration and legal issues relating to homelessness and its prevention. See the Legal Aid Clinic director for particulars.

The law is engaged in a constant struggle to strike the appropriate balance between progress and stability, efficacy and consistency, past and future. In this seminar, we will explore the dynamics of legal change across a variety of substantive and methodological domains. Drawing on topics that range from constitutional theory to administrative law to income taxation, we will consider the complex dimensions of change. When should change be allowed to occur? Who should be its precipitator? How should we treat parties who detrimentally relied on the previous rules? Questions like these are integral to the operation of any legal system. This seminar is designed to investigate them. Course requirements include regular participation and two analytical papers.

Experiential Course

Criminal Law, Public Law Experiential Course

Involves assisting actual public defenders in representing indigent clients at the St. Joseph County Courthouse –€“ Trial and Misdemeanor Division. Students can expect to represent clients in many capacities, some of which include negotiating plea bargains with prosecutors; preparing and conducting bench trials; interviewing and subpoenaing witnesses; writing and filing discovery motions; and other activities within the administration of justice. Students are expected to work at the courthouse one full morning or afternoon each week. Besides the courtroom experience, students must attend class sessions that feature prosecutors, police officers, public defenders, judges, and probation officers lecturing on their duties as officers of the court. Enrollment: limited each semester at the discretion of the instructor.

One unit of co-curricular academic credit may be awarded for student volunteer legal work of at least four weeks and 160 hours or more of work undertaken during the summer months in a court, governmental agency, nonprofit organization, public law office or in-house corporate counsel office. The work must be conducted under faculty supervision, conform to the approved standards of the faculty, and have the advance approval of the dean. This one unit of co-curricular credit may count toward graduation requirements as one of the six maximum allowable co-curricular credits, but cannot count toward the minimum hours required during any semester for residency. It will be reflected on a student'€™s transcript.

Experiential Course

This course is a 3-credit upper-level skills course designed to explore the theoretical and ethical foundations which inform the work of an attorney as Counselor. As a skills course, each topic addressed throughout the semester will be developed through practice with an eye toward the formation of the law student as practitioner.

At its core, law governs relationships and all areas of the law, at some level, are about relationships between persons. The professionally distinct fiduciary role of the lawyer as Counselor, while also always Advocate and Officer of the Court, will be examined with awareness given to the relational character of the legal enterprise and one's client. The dual purpose of lawyer-client counseling, which includes informed decision-making by both the client and the attorney, will be highlighted throughout the entire course.

Global Law

Human trafficking is now a crime in nearly every country, and has taken center stage in recent years as a widespread threat to human rights. International legal instruments outline with broad strokes states' obligations to provide legal remedies for trafficking victims, but the rhetoric of treaties and protocols provides little concrete guidance for how to implement their laudable goals. In this seminar, students will tackle the question of how to provide effective and appropriate legal remedies for trafficking victims by comparing approaches and outcomes across countries, including the United States. Students will perform in-depth research on specific countries, and apply theoretical frameworks to evaluate different methods of implementation. Foreign students will be encouraged to draw on knowledge of and experience with their home countries' legal systems. Grades will be based on class participation, research papers, and presentations.

As intercollegiate athletics and commercialism become more entwined, the relationship with its host "institutions of higher education" becomes more complex, raising urgent questions challenging traditional understandings of the role of higher education and amateurism in collegiate sport. This course explores these questions by examining various involved topics, including: the philosophy of amateur athletics and threats to its model; NCAA's legal limits, with an emphasis on anti-trust issues; the student-athlete experience, including the compensation debate, first amendment and privacy questions; various reform efforts, including the reframing of academic misconduct and the Rice Commission; gender equity and Title IX; and operational issues, such as risk-management and contractual concerns. As we probe these topics, we will seek to gain not only a sophisticated understanding of the myriad legal and policy elements influencing and, perhaps, irrevocably altering intercollegiate athletics, but will use this intensified understanding to freshly examine the foundation of the implicated legal concepts and deepen our own discernment thereof.

Energy and Environmental Law, Public Law

This course seeks to provide the understanding of the legislative and administrative process that is needed to practice law in the United States in the twenty-first century. It is based on a course that students are required to take in their first year at the Harvard Law School in order "to bring the first-year law school curriculum more in line with the realities of modern legal practice and the structure of our legal system - in particular, the centrality of statutes and regulations," and "to teach students how judges and administrative interpreters construe these legal materials. The course includes three sections: (1) an initial overview of the law of the lawmaking process; (2) an introduction to statutory interpretation; and (3) an analysis of the regulatory process. It also includes several skills components requiring the drafting of a proposed statute and commenting on proposed administrative regulations. The course thus provides a foundation for the numerous classes that study specific statutory and regulatory schemes. There is no prerequisite for the course. Students who have already taken either Statutory Interpretation or Administrative Law may not take Legislation & Regulation.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

This course seeks to provide the understanding of the legislative and administrative process that is needed to practice law in the United States in the twenty-first century. It is based on a course that students are required to take in their first year at the Harvard Law School in order to bring the first-year law school curriculum more in line with the realities of modern legal practice and the structure of our legal system - in particular, the centrality of statutes and regulations, and to teach students how judges and administrative interpreters construe these legal materials. The course includes three sections: (1) an initial overview of the law of the lawmaking process; (2) an introduction to statutory interpretation; and (3) an analysis of the regulatory process. It also includes several skills components requiring the drafting of a proposed statute and commenting on proposed administrative regulations. The course thus provides a foundation for the numerous classes that study specific statutory and regulatory schemes. There is no prerequisite for the course. Students can take LAW 70315 Administrative Law either concurrently with this course or after, but may not take Administrative Law first and Legislation & Regulation second.

Experiential Course

Public Law, Real Estate Law

The Lochner Era This seminar will examine significant developments in the areas of constitutional law governing social and economic regulation in the so-called "Lochner Era," extending roughly from 1880 to 1940. Attention will be given to restrictions on and changes in the scope of the federal powers to tax, to spend, and to regulate interstate commerce, as well as to limitations placed upon state and federal regulatory competence by the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, the Equal Protection Clause, the Tenth Amendment, and the Dormant Commerce Clause. We will seek to understand how these limitations and developments presented both obstacles and opportunities to regulatory reformers, how they constrained and shaped their legal strategies, and why they succeeded or failed in securing their regulatory objectives. Each student will be required to produce a substantial research paper on a topic chosen in consultation with the instructor.

Experiential Course

Students may work for employers in exchange for academic credit. The intern must work a total of fifty-six hours to receive one credit or one-hundred twelve hours to receive two credits. Maximum credits per year: 2. This course does count for experiential credit.

In today's world of 24-7 news cycles, cell-phone cameras, blogs, and social media, the race to publish provocative, cutting-edge content has lead to high-profile instances where legal lines have been crossed to get a story, picture, or video. This course explores the fundamentals of defamation law, invasion of privacy, and liability for torts and crimes committed in the course of newsgathering activities ¿ and how First Amendment principles have evolved to address these issues in the modern age of electronic media. Through lectures, class discussions, and written assignments, students will not only gain a broad understanding of the substantive law ¿ but also understand the important policy implications for the public, reporters, and the subjects of their stories. The seminar will also feature interactive classroom exercises in which students will research, present, and advocate opposite sides of current issues taken directly from the headlines in real-world media cases, including media shield laws, anti-SLAPP statutes, public vs. private figures, group libel, fact vs. opinion, prior restraints on publication, media liability for torts and crimes committed by third parties, and the liability of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and administrators of interactive online websites. Practical aspects of representing clients in media matters, including jurisdiction and choice-of-law issues, are also examined.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Business Law

Business Law

Explores federal and state law governing business combinations. The main areas of study include the legal requirements and mechanics of business combinations and the fiduciary duties of management in connection with friendly and hostile transactions. Prerequisite (or corequisite with permission): Business Associations (LAW 70101 or 74101)

This course is designed to give an overview of Military Law and make it relevant to State and Federal civil and criminal practice. We will study the Manual for Courts-Martial of the United States (MCM) as well as portions of other relevant military and civilian publications.

The MCM contains the criminal procedural rules upon which the Military Justice System operates but also Military Rules of Evidence, the Punitive Articles upon which an individual may charged, but also numerous other relevant forms, guides and analysis's.

Students will be exposed to the history of Military Law, a comparative analysis of Military Law, basic procedural and substantive operation of the Military Legal System and learn why this course will make them a better lawyer.

The final exam will be a two hour in class exam, some portion being written questions requiring short answers and some portion consisting of multiple choice and True and False questions.

Public Law

This course examines a variety of questions about and approaches to American constitutional law and interpretation, drawing from case law, early secondary sources, and contemporary scholarship. These questions include, among others: What is the nature and function of a constitution? What is the Supreme Court's role in interpreting our Constitution? Should other actors have an interpretive role as well? How is the Constitution to be interpreted? What theories or methods should we use? What is a theory of constitutional interpretation and what is it for? This course may be taken for either two or three credits. Students taking the course for three credits will complete a substantial research paper that satisfies the Law School's Upper-Level Writing Requirement.

Second- and third-year students may earn co-curricular academic credit through participation in Moot Court arguments and as members of the Law School's National Moot Court Team, as well as through the representation of indigent defendants at the appellate level. Includes brief writing and oral arguments. Students will participate in weekly workshops to develop their skills in all aspects of trial practice.

Experiential Course

Criminal Law Experiential Course

NDLS has two (2) mock trial teams that compete in competitions during the spring semester: the National Trial Competition (NTC) trial team and the American Association of Justice (AAJ) trial team. Students tryout and are chosen for the both teams during the first week of classes in the fall. It is very helpful to be enrolled in the fall Intensive Trial Ad course prior to tryouts or have taken Comprehensive or Intensive Trial Ad prior to tryouts. Students who are selected for the teams are automatically enrolled in the fall Moot Court Trial Class, which meets once per week for 75 minutes. Third-year students who enrolled in the course and participated on the team during their second year, and who are studying away from the main campus during the fall semester, may be considered for participation on the teams at the discretion of the instructors. Each team is typically comprised of a mixture of 2L€™s and 3L€™s. The Moot Court Trial Class is designed specifically to prepare students for competition. The class is a combination of lecture and performance.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Examines in detail the central jurisprudential issue of this century-the relation between the human law and the higher law as that law is seen in the natural law and revelation. Focuses on the Treatise on Law of St. Thomas Aquinas and its intellectual foundations. Emphasizes original sources in the examination of Marxist, natural rights, utilitarian, positivist and other theories of law. Readings include Aristotle, Cicero, Aquinas, Kant, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Jhering, Savigny, Bentham, Mill, Stephen, H.L.A. Hart, Devlin, Kelsen, Austin, Holmes, Pound, Rommen, Solzhenitsyn and Pope John Paul II. Studies the theoretical and practical differences among the various approaches, with particular reference to issues involving legal personhood, the inception and termination of life, the legal status of the family, economic justice, national defense and other matters. Includes an evaluation of these issues with reference to the social teachings of the Catholic Church.

Business Law

The course provides students with a working knowledge of mutual funds, as well as hedge funds, from a legal and practical perspective. While we pay particular attention to the Investment Company Act of 1940 and the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, the course supplements the analysis of this regulatory framework with guest speakers and regular reviews of press articles, regulatory developments and enforcement actions, and advertisements appearing in the financial media. The course covers issues relating to fund organization and distribution, rights of shareholders, investment performance, advisory fees and expenses, governance, including the independence of directors, trading practices and compliance matters. We will examine the roles of independent counsel to the fund and its disinterested directors, in-house counsel to the fund's investment adviser, and special counsel in governmental investigations and litigation. There will be an emphasis on real-world situations currently faced by mutual fund management firms, directors and their counsel. The course will conclude with a written take-home paper. The paper topic will be assigned by the professors.

Experiential Course

Criminal Law

The primary objective of the course is to introduce law students to the principal legal issues raised in protecting vital national security interests, and the tension that often arises between national security and civil liberties. More specifically, the course examines five important levers of governmental power utilized in combatting national security threats: diplomacy; intelligence; military; economic sanctions (both domestic and international); and criminal prosecution. Further, important national security law issues will be analyzed within a framework of six different "friction points," which involve a balancing of important competing interests that arise in attempting to detect, prevent, and combat serious threats to national security. These "friction points" include: (1) the friction between the branches of government, and frictions within branches of government; (2) the friction between national security and liberty; (3) the friction between separate sovereigns: national security and federalism; (4) the friction between national security and open government; (5) the friction between economic freedom and national security; and (6) the friction between national security and international law. The course will also bring together core principles of separation of powers, justiciability, regulatory law, criminal law, First Amendment law, constitutional due process, and principles of international law, to name only a few, as they relate to issues of national security.

This module will explore the growth of national security law as a discipline, and in particular the rule of law and human rights concerns that are in tension. The course will have an international emphasis, with considerable examination of the UK, and other major common law countries' experiences dealing with national security law issues. In addition, the module will examine Irish law and practice where it touches on national security law issues, and will include examination of evidentiary concepts including informer and public interest privilege that are invoked when national security considerations are at play. 

Energy and Environmental Law, Real Estate Law

This course examines federal natural resource management. A sizable fraction of our nation's land is owned by the United States, and these lands are home to extraordinary resources -- resources which are useful for a host of purposes, including energy, mineral, and timber production, as well as ranching, agriculture, recreation, and conservation. Fierce battles over the guiding principles of resource management have yielded a complex body of law that structures day-to-day decision making by federal land management agencies. This course will be of interest to anyone considering a career in energy, environmental, or natural resources law, as well as those seeking a better understanding of federal natural resource policy.

Business Law, Criminal Law, Real Estate Law Experiential Course

This class provides a grounding in negotiation theory and also examines negotiation strategies, tactics, and frameworks. It also provides students with an opportunity to put theory into practice because students will typically engage in a negotiation simulation exercise during each class period and followed by an in-class discussion of their results. 

Experiential Course

Four NDLS students will have the opportunity to practice immigration law under the supervision of an experienced NIJC immigration attorney by providing immigration legal services to low-income immigrants in Indiana through NIJC. NIJC will select, screen and house all cases handled through this externship. Students will meet as a class once a week for one hour of instruction on substantive immigration law and lawyering skills, guided discussion and case review. Students will spend an additional eight hours each week conducting case work. Students will handle the representation of one or more NIJC clients and seek immigration benefits before federal agencies and courts. Students will conduct initial intake interviews, identify client eligibility for immigration benefits, complete immigration applications, compile supporting documentation and write legal memoranda. There are no required courses students must take in advance of participating in this externship. However, Administrative Law (70315), Advanced Legal Research (70207), Appellate Advocacy Seminar (73314), Immigration Law (70301), and Introduction to International Human Rights (70417) are recommended. Registration is by permission only. Interested students should submit a cover letter, resume and informal transcript to Lisa Koop at LKoop@heartalliance.org.

Business Law

Business Law Experiential Course

Experiential Course

Students in the Chicago Program will earn 8 academic credits for working  32 hours per week in a Chicago-area non-profit legal agency, governmental law office (local, state or federal), judicial chambers (state or federal), or in-house corporate counsel office. Students will engage in substantive legal work under the careful supervision of an attorney or judge who commits to serving in a mentoring role. Some placements such as low income legal services providers, public defender offices or state government agencies may allow students to provide direct legal representation and appear in court pursuant to an Illinois 711 license. Students earn 8 fieldwork credits, graded on an S/U basis, during their externship placements. They may not receive compensation for their work. Enrollment is by permission only.

Students who enroll in this course must also enroll in the companion two-credit letter-graded Chicago program seminar which meets weekly in Chicago.  The seminar is designed to enhance the learning that occurs during the field placement by deepening students' reflection on the justice system, lawyering skills, professional identity, ethics, and their own professional development. Students will have reading assignments, regular short writing assignments, and responsibility for class presentations.

In addition to the ten credits earned through the field placement and associated seminar, participating students must earn 4 additional credits through non-externship courses offered in either South Bend or Chicago.

Experiential Course

Students in the DC Program will earn 8 academic credits for working 32 hours per week in  federal government-related positions, including federal agencies, executive branch offices, congressional offices and committees, federal courts and non-profit groups engaged in policy research or advocacy. Students will engage in substantive legal work under the careful supervision of an attorney or judge who commits to serving in a mentoring role. Students earn 8 fieldwork credits, graded on an S/U basis, during their externship placements. They may not receive compensation for their work.  Enrollment is by permission only.

Students who enroll in this course must also enroll in the companion two-credit, letter-graded DC Program Seminar which meets weekly in DC. The seminar is designed to enhance the learning that occurs during the field placement by deepening students' reflection on the justice system, lawyering skills, professional identity, ethics, and their own professional development. Students will have reading assignments, regular brief writing assignments, and responsibility for class presentations.

In addition to the ten credits earned through the field placement and associated seminar, participating students must earn 4 additional credits through non-externship courses offered in either South Bend or DC.

Business Law

The Patent Legal Writing I & II sequence teaches the legal writing skills necessary in day-to-day practice as a Patent Agent. These skills are not directly tested by the Patent Bar examination, but are a critical part of the success of a Patent Agent. Topics covered in the first semester include: (1) Legal and Patent Research; (2) Patent Prosecution and Correspondence with the USPTO; (3) Patent Forms and Formalities.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law Experiential Course

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Focuses on United States patent law. Topics covered include the requirements for patentability, patent prosecution, and enforcement and litigation issues. A technical background is not required for Patent Law.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

The Patent Law and Prosecution I & II sequence teaches the legal information required to be successful in the day-to-day practice of patent law. Topics covered in the first semester include: (1) Introduction to Patent Law; (2) 35 U.S.C., 37 C.F.R., and the MPEP; and (3) Precedential Case Law.

Business Law, Criminal Law

The Patent Legal Studies I & II sequence teaches the legal information required both to pass the patent bar and to be successful in day-to-day practice of patent law. Professionalism issues, critical to a student's success in the corporate world, are addressed contextually. Topics covered in the first semester include: (1) Intellectual Property in the American Legal System; (2) Introduction to Patent Law; (3) 37 C.F.R., 35 U.S.C. and the MPEP; and (4) Precedential Case Law.

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

This course is designed to introduce students to issues faced when litigating a patent infringement case. It will cover: pretrial investigations; venue selection; defense strategies for cost-effective resolution, including ex parte reexamination, inter partes and post grant review, bifurcation, and early summary judgment motions; motions to dismiss; motions to transfer; litigation hold requirements and electronic discovery issues; typical fact discovery and fact discovery disputes; identifying and selecting experts; expert discovery and expert discovery disputes; patent claim construction canons and claim construction hearings; motions in limine; trial strategy and common trial issues; post-trial motions; settlement considerations and strategies; and a review of the 25 cases every patent litigator should know by name. Patent Law is a pre-co/requisite unless approval is obtained. No technical background is required.

Business Law, Criminal Law

The Patent Legal Writing I & II sequence teaches the legal writing skills necessary in day-to-day practice as a Patent Agent. These skills are not directly tested by the Patent Bar examination, but are a critical part of the success of a Patent Agent. Topics covered in the first semester include: (1) Legal and Patent Research; (2) Patent Prosecution and Correspondence with the USPTO; (3) Patent Forms and Formalities.

Business Law

Focuses primarily on the law of negotiable instruments - checks and promissory notes - as set out in Articles Three and Four of the Uniform Commercial Code. Also deals with credit and debit cards, letters of credit, and electronic fund transfers.

Criminal Law

This seminar will focus on world of plea bargaining that has become the reality of criminal justice in modern America. The criminal trial is a rarity; in some jurisdictions, it is practically nonexistent. The course will begin with a brief discussion of some of the historical pressures that led to the widespread use of plea bargaining in America today. The introductory discussion also will cover the mechanics of the plea bargaining process. We then will discuss plea bargaining's perceived advantages and disadvantages: whether, on the one hand, it unduly sacrifices procedural fairness and protections for the good of efficiency; or, on the other hand, whether it facilitates compromise and rehabilitation in lieu of costly adversarial combat. We will bear in mind the distinct roles of the prosecutor, defense attorney, and judge in the plea bargaining process, and any constraints that constitutional law may impose on plea bargains. We will examine in detail the issue of coercion in the plea bargaining context. The class will explore numerous ethical issues, such as those involved in the use of cooperating defendants, defendants who want plea deals but who assert innocence, and plea agreements that impose novel punishments not contemplated by statutory law. We will ask whether plea bargaining is a proper means to ameliorate criminal punishment where legislatures lack the political will or capacity to ameliorate criminal statutes, and whether there is a role for mercy in the plea bargaining process. Relatedly, we will evaluate whether greater public participation and transparency are needed for plea bargaining to serve as a democratically legitimate process for resolving criminal cases.  (Note the possibility of taking an additional credit if the student wants to do the upper-level writing requirement.) The only prerequisite is Criminal Law. Criminal Procedure would not be required any relevant criminal procedure matters will be covered as they arise. 

Criminal Law, Public Law

This course addresses fundamental questions about private law, understood as encompassing the law of obligations (e.g., tort, contract, property, and fiduciary law) and the law of remedies (e.g., restitutionary, compensatory, and punitive damages). Private law supplies terms of interaction for individuals acting independently and interdependently in a private capacity. This course will encourage students to develop broad, critical perspectives on the role of private law in civil society, the relationships between private and public law, the boundaries between various categories of private liability, and the functions performed and values served by private law.

Private law comprises legal matters arising between private parties, in which the state has a limited presence. It classically centers on contracts, torts, and property. This seminar aims to build upon, and go beyond, students’ familiarity with these topics from the first-year curriculum to introduce them to the frontiers of thinking in private law. It does so by direct engagement with scholars presenting their works in progress. Students will be given introductory readings in foundational theories in private law, and texts relevant to contextualize works in progress. Students will then read works in progress and submit questions and responses about them. The culmination for each work in progress is a colloquium with the author.

Products liability law has evolved considerably in the last 50 years. This class examines modern American products liability law. We will consider the various forms of product defect in tort, the cousins of strict liability and negligence, related contractual and warranty theories of recovery, causation, defenses, and damages. This class will include practical components often faced by product liability lawyers, including the role of experts, warning and warranty preparation, and litigation avoidance techniques.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Takes an in-depth view of certain ethical issues in the legal profession. Among the issues discussed are: confidentiality, conflict of interests, unpopular clients, lawyers' speech and advertising, admission to and regulation of the bar, and responsibilities to some special clients. The course examines the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct and relevant cases. In an attempt to uncover the foundation that might be claimed to underpin the rules, a spectrum of philosophical, theological, pragmatic, and utilitarian theories are considered. The course thus deals with the application of the rules of professional responsibility to real ethical conflicts and critically examines the possibilities of the moral values reflected in the law. This course satisfies the Ethics II requirement for graduation.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Takes an in-depth view of ethical issues in the legal profession relating to representing clients in the practice of law. Course will focus on ethical issues pertaining to who is the client, competence, confidentiality, conflict of interests, and representing unpopular clients. The course examines the ABA Model Rules and relevant cases in an attempt to understand the rationale for the ethical principles and Model Rules. The course will deal with the application of the rules of professional responsibility to real ethical issues as they may arise in a lawyer's life as a professional. The course will also focus on the law as a profession as opposed to a business, within the realities of paying off student loans and supporting yourself and a family.

The course deals with the nature of and justification for the ownership of property, including land, personal property, and intellectual property. It considers which things may be treated as property, how property is acquired, and the rights included with property ownership. Much of the course considers the ownership and use of land, covering such topics as the estates system, easements, covenants, and servitudes, zoning, the government's eminent domain power, and takings law.

Criminal Law

The subject matter of this seminar is regularly in the news from the "Islamic State" destroying antiquities on religious grounds to major corporations pouring millions into restoring ancient sites to lawsuits against museums in possession of objects allegedly stolen during war and colonial occupation. The law on protection of cultural heritage is a well-recognized subfield of international law, also known as international art law. The course will cover what counts as cultural heritage and why humanity cares so deeply about it as demonstrated by the near-universal membership in the Convention on Illicit Trafficking of Cultural Property and the Hague Convention on the Protection of Cultural Property in Time of Armed Conflict. We will discuss the law and relevant institutions in the context of history, philosophy, and art. This is a two-credit hour seminar. A prior course in international law is highly recommended but not required. Anyone who has not had a course in international law should contact the professor prior to the first session for introductory reading. Several current controversies from the world of cultural heritage protection will be selected as case studies. Students will focus on a case and present an argument on behalf of one side in the controversy. Evaluation will be based on class participation, the presentation, and a research paper. The course will use readings and materials selected by the professor. It is open to law students, Kroc MA students in peace studies, and graduate students in other disciplines.

This course is designed to familiarize students with the landscape of proceedings for prosecuting patent applications and challenging patents at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in the aftermath of the America Invents Act (AIA). The course examines the role of the examining corps and the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) and the interplay between preexisting and new USPTO proceedings. Topics include: original prosecution (examination and appeal), inventorship (interferences / derivations), post-issuance prosecution (reissue / supplemental examination / ex parte reexam), citation of prior art / info (section 301 submissions / protests / third-party submissions), and challenging patents (inter-partes review (IPR) / post-grant review (PGR) / covered business method (CBM) review). This class will be of interest primarily to students who intend to practice patent law, including in either patent prosecution or patent litigation. Patent Law is a pre-req.

Experiential Course

Criminal Law

This seminar will take a broad look at how policing and race interact. We will read selections from books, articles or speeches of people such as Michelle Alexander, Paul Butler, Ta-Nehisi Coates, James Comey, Alice Goffman, Jill Leovy, Tracey Meares, Jonathan Pfaff, Stephen Rushin, and William Stuntz. We will also read some primary materials and research on the DOJ's investigation of Ferguson, stop and frisk policies, and structural reform litigation. Students will be required to write a short reaction paper for the week's reading, due before class and published on the course website for fellow students to read. Grading will depend heavily on active participation in discussion.

Real Estate Law

This course will provide an overview and analysis of selected topics within real estate finance, investment, and law. The real estate colloquium will expose students to academic and industry perspectives on a range of topics, from NYSE-listed real estate investment trusts and private equity to joint ventures and commercial leases. Leaders from the U.S. and international real estate industry will serve as guest speakers as part of the course. In this way, students will obtain a practical understanding of fundamental real estate concepts as well as exposure to various important related topics and the careers paths they may wish to pursue.

Business Law, Energy and Environmental Law, Real Estate Law

Studies the regional systems that currently exist to protect human rights in the Americas, Europe, and Africa. Compares the rights guaranteed and the procedures established to enforce them. Addresses selected topics such as the death penalty, impunity, and disappearances. Emphasizes the mechanisms for bringing a case and the remedies available. Includes discussions of a potential Asian human rights protection system. Pre-requisite: International Law (LAW 70401 or 74401)

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy, Public Law

The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States provides that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion[.]" This prohibition has long been at the heart of the American experiment in religious liberty under law. However, its history, meaning, foundations, and implications have long been and will continue to be debated in courts, legislatures, and the public square.

This shorter seminar course will focus on the "Establishment Clause", its interpretation and application by the Supreme Court of the United States, and its role in protecting and promoting religious freedom. It will feature an intensive week-long series of meetings with Associate Justice Clarence Thomas of the Supreme Court of the United States and several other prominent visiting scholars of church-state relations and constitutional law. In addition, the course will meet with Prof. Garnett during the weeks before and following Justice Thomas's visit to Notre Dame Law School.

Experiential Course

This lab class is a 2-credit class open to 8 students interested in working with religious nonprofit organizations. Students will work collaboratively in teams to tackle a large problem for a religious organization with the goal of developing work product that can be used by the religious organization and similarly situated organizations in the future. The class will include a mix of in-class instruction, individual research, and direct work with religious nonprofit organizations. Religious organizations that students may serve during the 2021 fall semester include a shrine church, a women's crisis pregnancy center, a healthcare sharing ministry, a Catholic diocese, and a donor-advised fund sponsor that supports religious organizations. Students may be asked to help these organizations address a variety of questions related to their religious mission and identity, including but not limited to the formation of new nonprofit affiliates, the classification of workers as ministers for employment law purposes, and the qualification of employees for the parsonage allowance. Through this experiential course, students will gain an understanding of nonprofit organizations' law, tax law applicable to nonprofit religious organizations, current case law impacting religious organizations, and important First Amendment principles that shape the way religious organizations govern themselves and operate. Students will be evaluated on class participation, a paper, and a presentation to the leadership of one of the participating religious organizations.The course will be taught by Brendan Wilson, a 2004 NDLS graduate and a partner in the nonprofit organizations' practice at Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP.

Energy and Environmental Law, Real Estate Law

Substantive courses (Contracts, Torts, Property, etc.) address the question of what rights will be recognized and enforced by courts. This course addresses the bottom line - what form will that enforcement take: damages for a plaintiff's loss (whether compensatory or punitive), recovery of the defendant's unjust enrichment (restitution), or an order to a party to do or refrain from doing something (injunction). Enforcement of remedies through attachment, contempt, and the like are also be considered, as will the use of injunctive relief in complex institutional-reform litigation.

Energy and Environmental Law

Scenic Law (2 credits). For many people, scenic values are the most important reason for protecting the environment. Yet environmental law typically overlooks scenic values in favor of threats to public health (as regulated by the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and other pollution control statutes) and to ecosystem services (as regulated by the Endangered Species Act and other federal laws that protect biodiversity). This seminar offers an opportunity examine why we regard scenic areas as valuable, how we identify which places are scenic, and the role of the law in protecting scenic landscapes. National parks are our most famous scenic places, but we will also consider other federal lands that contain scenic areas, state regulation of scenic coastlines, and foreign approaches such as Britain's "Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty." The seminar will require the preparation of two papers: a short paper examining a national park, and a longer seminar paper examining any topic related to scenic preservation.

Public Law

Business Law

This course considers the law of linkages between debts and assets.  It covers the creation, perfection, and enforcement of security interests in property, both real and personal, with particular emphasis on Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code.

Business Law, Public Law

Criminal Law

This seminar focuses on the theory and practice of imposing punishment for criminal wrongdoing. Course readings will examine the justifications for imposing punishment, as well as the legal, social, and practical challenges to imposing and executing sentences that advance the purposes of punishment. Throughout the course, students will engage in research and reflection on a topic of personal interest related to the course topic, culminating in a research paper.

Experiential Course

Four third-year students on the Moot Court Board each year write briefs and conduct oral arguments in appointed cases before the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit under the supervision of Adjunct Professor Robert Palmer, a leading appellate practitioner. The students typically write a brief during the fall semester and argue their cases during the spring semester. The students are chosen during their second year through the Moot Court Board'€™s internal competition. Participating students earn 3 total academic credits during the fall of their third year through the Lawyering Practice Externship seminar (1 credit) and the Seventh Circuit Practice fieldwork course (2 credits).

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Through a close study of the thought, language, and imagery of four or five Shakespeare plays (with allusions to other of his works), discloses the penetrating thought of the author on conscience, legitimacy, and revolution; the rule of law; bad government; faith and politics; and related matters.

Law, Ethics, and Public Policy

Examines the ethical and methodological foundations of social theory along with a selection of topics of current interest, including limited government; law's authority and obligation; the bases and limits of property rights; and unconditional human rights.

This course explores the nature and significance of state constitutional law. The course covers rights and structure, and in both settings it compares the federal model to the various state models. Of particular emphasis is the role of the state courts in protecting liberty and property rights under their own constitutions, and most notably whether they should construe these guarantees to offer protections that the federal courts have not provided in construing the federal constitution. Examples include litigation involving school funding, marriage, property takings, criminal procedure, the free exercise of religion, among others. The course also considers the amendment procedures of the state constitutions, the election of state court judges, the non-unitary executive under most state constitutions and other structural issues.

Public Law

Explores and critically evaluates leading contemporary approaches to statutory interpretation, paying particular attention to the constitutional and public-choice theories that drive the modern debate. Topics include purposive interpretation, dynamic statutory interpretation, textualism, canons of construction, and the use of legislative history.

Business Law, Real Estate Law

Business Law Experiential Course

Students in the Tax Clinic represent low income clients in controversies with the Internal Revenue Service and in litigation in the United States Tax Court and possibly other federal courts. The clinic is located in the Clinical Law Center at 725 Howard Street. Students play a "first chair" role interviewing and counseling clients, conducting factual investigations, determining alternatives for resolving disputes, advocating on the client's behalf, and negotiating agreements with the IRS. Students may also participate in community outreach and education on taxpayer issues. The classroom portion of the course covers tax procedure and relevant substantive law along with basic lawyering skills necessary to effective representation of taxpayers. Pre-requisite: Federal Income Taxation (70605). Additional pre-requisite or co-requisite: Professional Responsibility (70807 or 70808).

Business Law Experiential Course

Variable credit and letter-graded course open to students who have satisfactorily completed Tax Clinic I. Tax Clinic II allows students to progress to more advanced lawyering skills as applied to federal tax controversies. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor.

Business Law

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Criminal Law

An introduction to the Laws of War in contemporary international law and International practice. Studies the legal framework of conduct of hostilities, Jus ad bellum and jus in bello under the UN Charter, International Humanitarian law and International Human Rights Law. Also considers the different types of armed conflicts including the concept of armed conflict, the distinction between international and non-international armed conflicts, reasons and relativity of the distinction and comparison of the two regimes, and contemporary problems of qualification and practical consequences.

This seminar explores and critically evaluates leading contemporary approaches to statutory interpretation, paying particular attention to the constitutional, public-choice, and jurisprudential theories that drive the modern debate. Topics include intentionalism, purposive interpretation, dynamic statutory interpretation, textualism, canons of construction, and the relationship between common law and statutes. The seminar will include a component comparing interpretive practice and debates in the United States and United Kingdom. 

Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Intellectual Property & Technology Law, Public Law Experiential Course

Concentrates on the procedural and substantive requirements for filing a federal trademark registration before the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and extensions of that registration through the Madrid Protocol. The class will also focus on the filing of registrations before the USPTO by foreign applicants under the Lanham Act and the Madrid Protocol. This type of actual practice knowledge and prosecution skills will serve as useful tools for those students who have a strong interest in intellectual property law. Furthermore, for those students who will practice transactional law, administrative procedures before the USPTO are similar to other administrative procedures before other federal agencies, probate courts, etc. An understanding of the procedures used by the US Trademark Office will benefit those students who may practice before other government entities, federal courts, or state courts. Lastly, for those students who may need an understanding of trademark prosecution in either a litigation or corporate practice, this class will enhance their legal background. In order to take this course, I recommend that the student have basic knowledge of trademarks. At a minimum, the IP Survey course is a prerequisite to this course in order to understand the subject matter of this course. As an alternative to the IP Survey course as a prerequisite, a student may take the Trademarks and Unfair Competition class as a prerequisite or a co-requisite to Trademark Prosecution.

Business Law

Addresses a form of commercial litigation that has become popular in federal and state courts. Covers commercial defamation, trade libel, deceptive advertising and fraudulent transfers. Also analyzes enforcement of and defense against Uniform Trade Secrets Act claims, claims concerning employment covenants-not-to-compete and covenants-not-to-compete ancillary to the sale of a business.

Business Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Law

Business Law, Real Estate Law Experiential Course

As part of its transition away from 22 years of authoritarian rule, The Gambian government has recently established a Truth, Reconciliation & Reparations Commission (TRRC) tasked with documenting human rights violations and providing remedies for victims. This course provides students with an understanding of international standards for human rights violations and approaches to truth and reconciliation processes, combined with a hands-on opportunity to contribute to the Gambian TRRC. It uses the specific example of the Gambian case to examine some of the challenges presented by transitional justice. Students will evaluate the international legal standards for accountability and weigh them against the need for reconciliation. They will also examine the challenges of establishing a "true" account of events and ensuring non-repetition. As an outcome of the course, students will apply what they have learned to draft a memorandum that analyzes a specific event or topic from the Gambian case, which will be provided to the TRRC in support of its work.

Global Law

Designed to be a seminar, this seminar seeks to address the kinds of issues that a lawyer in the United States actually will encounter when involved in civil litigation that includes transnational parties, evidence or claims. It combines lecture and experiential learning approaches to address the following topics: basic choice of law and choice of forum analysis; prescriptive jurisdiction; extraterritorial application of United States laws; international judicial assistance (service of process and discovery abroad); enforcement of foreign judgments; and numerous defenses raised in the transnational civil litigation context, including sovereign immunity, act of state, forum non conveniens, political question, and preemption.

Global Law

Criminal Law, Public Law Experiential Course

Criminal Law Experiential Course

This course starts the week before the semester begins. The class meets from 9:00 am until 6:30 p.m. each of the eight days of the intensive week.  Students learn trial skills, which they will apply in two trials. This course is designed for students whose primary career interest is litigation. It is intended to help students develop a familiarity with the techniques by which evidence of controverted facts is presented at trial before judges and juries. Classroom sessions in conjunction with a judge and jury trial for each student provide an examination and analysis of trial advocacy skills and issues of professional responsibility. The course involves workshop sessions and learning-by-doing through simulated courtroom exercises. Students study trial advocacy techniques through student participation, faculty critique, lectures, and demonstrations by practicing lawyers. The various trial advocacy skills are put together in two full trials, one to a judge and one to a jury. The class also meets one night a week from 6:00 to 8:00 pm for approximately seven weeks. Attendance during the entirety of the intensive week, the trial weekend, and semester classes is required.  NOTE: Due to the unique nature of the course, the deadline for dropping the class is before the semester begins. Enrollment is currently limited to 48 students.

Real Estate Law

Introduces students to the fundamentals of the law governing the intergenerational transfer of wealth. Using the Uniform Probate Code as a model, surveys the law of intestacy, wills, will substitutes, and trusts. As time allows, also touches upon the law of future interests, perpetuities law, and the rudiments of estate and gift taxation. At every point, is sensitive to the ethical challenges that are inherent in the practice of this body of law.

Real Estate Law

Introduces students to the fundamentals of the law governing the intergenerational transfer of wealth. Using the Uniform Probate Code as a model, surveys the law of intestacy, wills, will substitutes and trusts. As time allows, also touches upon the law of future interests, perpetuities law and the rudiments of estate and gift taxation. At every point, is sensitive to the ethical challenges that are inherent in the practice of this body of law. 

Business Law

Unjust enrichment is a long neglected but reemerging area in American law. For litigators, knowledge of the law of unjust enrichment is highly useful, because it provides another basis of liability besides tort and contract. It is often invoked, for example, in cases of mistake or mass fraud (e.g., Ponzi schemes). For anyone interested in legal structure and theory, unjust enrichment raises fundamental questions about the connection between law and justice. And in many other legal systems, unjust enrichment is the subject of intense interest. This seminar will consider the law of unjust enrichment, emphasizing American cases. It will also include extensive consideration of the restitutionary remedies that are typically given in cases of unjust enrichment.

Energy and Environmental Law, Real Estate Law

Criminal Law Experiential Course

The purpose of the Wrongful Conviction Externship is to provide students real-world lawyering experience representing and advising clients believed to have been wrongfully convicted of serious crimes in the state of Indiana. These lawyering tasks will be conducted under the supervision of a staff attorney with the Exoneration Project in Chicago, Illinois. In the classroom component, students will examine the principal causes of wrongful convictions, the application of those causes to the cases assigned to the students, proposed solutions to prevent wrongful convictions in the future, and related ethical issues. The externship will provide students an opportunity to engage in legal research and writing, conduct client and witness interviews, develop a case plan, draft motions for DNA testing, and draft petitions for post-conviction relief and federal habeas corpus petitions. Students will also have an opportunity to participate in courtroom proceedings seeking post-conviction relief under the supervision of a state-licensed attorney.