Presentation – Municipal Legal Research – Sanctuary Cities. 

As the Trump administration begins to implement its immigration policy agenda, the issue of local assistance with federal immigration enforcement officials is back in the spotlight.

Sanctuary counties (municipalities) are counties that do not assist federal immigration enforcement officials by holding people in custody beyond their release date Using an Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, dataset obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request filed by the Immigrant Legal Resource Center.²

There is data indicating that sanctuary counties provide a safer and more humane living environment for everybody, not only for the immigrant residents, across a range of social and economic indicators when compared to nonsanctuary counties.

This is only one example demonstrating that municipalities constitute important governmental entities. As such, let’s see how we can perform municipal legal research.

Researching Administrative Law – A Process Oriented Approach

Topics:

• Introduction to administrative law research: Locating federal administrative law
• A non-bibliographic, process-oriented approach: Developing the expertise to Incorporate Search engine and legal database results

Research Situation/Problem

You work for an environmental clinic in NJ, representing New Jersey landowners who could potentially be affected by the private corporation PennEast’s pipeline construction. Luckily, the 3rd circuit has denied the private corporation the right to take your clients’ property for their commercial purpose.

the federal government’s eminent domain power and its exemption from Eleventh Amendment immunity. Eminent domain is the power of a sovereign to condemn property for its own use, and there is no exception under the Natural Gas Act that allows private entities to condemn land.
In re PennEast Pipeline Co., LLC, 938 F.3d 96, 104 (3d Cir. 2019), as amended (Sept. 11, 2019), as amended (Sept. 19, 2019)

But what about the Natural Gas Act (215 U.S.C. § 717f(h)), which is under FERC’s  interpretation authority? Can Penneast still use the agency interpretation to influence a US S.Ct appeal (~agency deference argument~) on ground that the court’s and the agency’s interpretations are “split”?  

From an administrative research point of view, what do you need to know to advance your client’s position?

Question:

1. Is there a way to know if FERC has been called upon to issue such a declaratory judgment?
2. Was there a notification process about it?
3. What about comments (interventions) to FERC’s litigation?
4. Is there such a declaratory judgment?
5. Where would you find it?

Strategy:

• Know the specificity of administrative research – it benefits from collaborative expertise
• Know the best access points for administrative law research (news articles; google and agency web sites)
• Learn about administrative (hard and soft) law and how to find it;
• Find the relevant agencies; the rule-making as well as the decision-making rules

e-library:

• Kysor v. Wilkie
• FERC
• 170 FERC 61064
• In Re PennEast Pipeline Co

Class Presentation

Spring Refreshers 2020

Dana Neacsu / January 22, 2020

• In Class Prezi Presenation Problem 4
  • (complaint + SJ brief)
• In Class Prezi Presentation Problem 6
  • (complaint + SJ brief)
• In Class Prezi Presentation Problem 11
  • (complaint + SJ brief)

2019 Legal Research Refresher Workshops

Dana Neacsu / January 24, 2019

Happy New Year!

Here are my presentations for the legal research refresher session for the Foundation Moot Court Class

Problem 3 (Askanase/Bernhardt) – Friday, January 25, 10-10:50 AM, JGH, 102B

Problem 5 (Amend/Statsinger) – Friday, February 1, 10-10:50 AM. JGH 102A

Problem 6 (Ma/Strauss) – Friday, February 1, 1-1:50 PM, JGH 105

Problem 8 (Paulson/Ruocco) – Thursday, January 31, 5-5:50 PM, JGH 107

Problem 10 (Kreiner/McCamphill) – Thursday, January 31, 6:20-7:10 PM JGH 107January 24, 2019 in 1L students, 2019, LPW Research Teaching.

LPW 2018

Dana Neacsu / September 27, 2018

First Class:

• First take-home assignment  (via Canvas)

Second Class

• Second take-home assignment (via Canvas)

Third Class

• Third take-home assignment (via Canvas)

Optional reading:

The Rise of the Supreme Court Reporter: An Institutional Perspective on Marshall Court Ascendancy	Appendix A	Mandeville v. JoseRiddle v. Mandeville

Fourth Class: Putting it all together

Finding Statutes (federal OR state)	Finding cases (federal OR state)
1.     by title:  Rule Against Perpetuities (NY)	1.     by title:  Shepherd v. Florida
2.     by citation:NY Est POW & Trst § 9-1.1	2.    by citation:  341 U.S. 50 (1951)
3.     cited in a secondary source	3.    starting with a “good case” cited in a secondary source
	4.    from statutory annotations (case notes//notes of decisions)
4.     using the index// table of contents of the statutory codification	5.     using the Keynumber (Digest) system
	6.     using “narrow by this headnote” feature
	7.     using citators
5.  using pre-search filters & performing full-text (Boolean) searches (using terms and connectors) or relying on natural language (relevance) algorithms.	8.     using pre-search filters & performing full-text (Boolean) searches (using terms and connectors) or relying on natural language (relevance) algorithms.

September 27, 2018 in 1L students, 2018, LPW Research Teaching, Posts by Years.