Ohio Attorney General Mike Dewine determined on Monday that a proposed amendment to the state constitution that would overturn its current ban on gay marriage had obtained the requisite number of signatures and satisfied the requirement that it be a “fair and truthful statement of the proposed law.” The proposed amendment, entitled the “Freedom to [...]

The New Mexico Supreme Court ruled on Monday that the state must recognize the tribal status of the Fort Sill Apache . Consisting of 712 members, the Fort Sill Apache, formerly known as the Chiricahua and Warm Springs Apache, were forced from their homelands in 1886 and relocated to Oklahoma, where they now have their [...]

The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia determined during a session on Tuesday that sufficient evidence exists to uphold charges on two counts of genocide against Ratko Mladic, the former Bosnian Serb general, for his alleged role in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre . The Srebrenica massacre is considered to be one of Europe’s worst [...]

Egypt’s Primary Alexandria Court on Tuesday declared the nation’s Supreme Election Commission is forbidden from accepting a nomination from members of the Muslim Brotherhood in the upcoming presidential election scheduled for May 26-27 and the parliamentary elections to follow. The ruling came after an anti-Brotherhood group filed a petition calling for the ban. A lawyer [...]

The Supreme Court of India issued a ruling on Tuesday recognizing the country’s large transgender population as a legal third gender. In so ruling, the court ordered that the government ensure that transgender people are not discriminated against and are eligible for government jobs and education in the same way as it does with other [...]

Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton on Monday signed into law a bill raising the state’s minimum wage for the first time in nearly a decade. The law is incremental, raising the minimum wage on August 1 of each year before reaching $9.50 per hour in 2016. The 2016 minimum wage is more than three dollars higher [...]

The Maltese Parliament passed new legislation on Monday legalizing same-sex civil unions , and providing such unions with the same rights as are afforded heterosexual marriages in the country. The bill also provides for the recognition of same-sex marriages legally performed abroad . Notably, the law provides participants in a same-sex relationships the right to [...]

JURIST Guest Columnist Sara Benson of the University of Illinois College of Law discusses how the best argument for same-sex marriage is that same-sex partners should be treated equally under the law … As you likely have heard, the US Supreme Court issued an opinion striking down part of the federal Defense of Marriage Act [...]

US Army Major General Jeffery S. Buchanan on Monday upheld Private Chelsea Manning’s conviction and prison sentence for turning over classified information to WikiLeaks . Manning is currently serving her 35-year prison sentence in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and she could be released as early as February 2020 with good behavior. The case will be automatically [...]

UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran Ahmed Shaheed on Monday urged Iran to immediately halt the execution of Reyhaneh Jabbari, a woman sentenced to death of murdering Mortez Abdolali Sarbandi, a former employee of the Iranian Intelligence Ministry . Jabbari, who is scheduled to be executed [...]