Forums: Legal Facts

Featured Term (selected at random):APPELLANTS Various groups who appealed against certain decisions or doctrines of the Holy See. The best known were the appellants in Elizabethan England who protested the alleged use of political means to bring the country back to the Catholic faith; and the appellants in France, led by the Archbishop of Paris, who opposed Pope Clement XI's condemnation of Jansenism in 1713. (Etym. Latin appellare, to address, call upon, appeal to one.) All items in this dictionary are from Fr. John Hardon's Modern Catholic Dictionary, © Eternal Life. Used with permission.

Lawyers for the residents of Beit HaMachpelah in Hevron met Sunday with representatives of the IDF's Civil Administration and discussed the legality of the purchase of the home, which the residents moved into last Wednesday. The IDF representatives examined the purchase documents and confirmed that the purchase is legal. However, they said that they are awaiting the final approval of the political tier. The answer is in line with the assessment made Friday by Rabbi of Hevron and Kiryat Arba, Rav Dov Lior. "The question now is whether Defense Minister Ehud Barak will allow the residents to stay there, regardless...

More than 90 percent of criminal cases are never tried before a jury. AFTER years as a civil rights lawyer, I rarely find myself speechless. But some questions a woman I know posed during a phone conversation one recent evening gave me pause: “What would happen if we organized thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of people charged with crimes to refuse to play the game, to refuse to plea out? What if they all insisted on their Sixth Amendment right to trial? Couldn’t we bring the whole system to a halt just like that?” ... I was stunned by Susan’s...

U.S. to offer legal backing for "targeted killing": sourceBy Jeremy Pelofsky WASHINGTON | Sun Mar 4, 2012 7:23pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration on Monday plans to outline how U.S. laws empower the government to kill Americans overseas who engage in terrorism against their home country, a source familiar with the matter said, months after a drone strike killed a U.S.-born cleric who plotted attacks from Yemen. Civil liberties groups have been pressuring the administration to offer justification for what has been described as a top-secret "targeted kill" program in which Americans who have joined al Qaeda or...

Richard C. McCarty, Vanderbilt provost and vice chancellor (Vanderbilt University) Since the Supreme Court’s sharply divided and startlingly wrongheaded decision two years ago in Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, those concerned about religious liberty on campus have known that the fallout was on its way. At Vanderbilt University, it has arrived — and it’s as bad as anticipated.In Martinez, the Court determined that public institutions like the University of California’s Hastings College of the Law could require all student groups — even those based on shared belief, such as religious and political organizations — to admit members and even leaders...

There was an astonishingly revealing moment on Sunday's 60 Minutes when President Obama said, "Some of the most damaging behavior on Wall Street, in some cases, some of the least ethical behavior on Wall Street, wasn't illegal." For what should be obvious reasons, CBS's Steve Kroft didn't bother asking his guest who created, voted for or signed the pieces of legislation that allowed this "damaging behavior on Wall Street" to be legal (video follows with transcript and commentary):STEVE KROFT (SECOND PART INTRO): In a wide-ranging conversation Friday morning, President Obama discussed everything

On Black Friday, several stores of outdoor sports outfitter Cabela's gave away guns. And have you heard the one about the gun club offering photos with Santa and ammo? Guns, always popular in the US, have become even more so in a slumping, anxious economy. No wonder, as a new report exposes, a New York City-based capital management form has been buying up as many gun brands as it can get its hands on. The gun-loving conglomerate, Freedom Group, now sells more than 1.2 million guns a year, notching $40 billion in yearly revenue. (That's more than Coca-Cola, by the...