Army Pfc. Bradley Manning , who is accused of leaking confidential documents to WikiLeaks , offered a guilty plea on Wednesday to several of the charges that the government has leveled against him. Manning was charged for allegedly leaking more than 700,000 classified government documents to WikiLeaks, which purports to be a whistleblower website. Manning [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit , sitting en banc Wednesday, ruled that two American citizens cannot sue former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld for alleged torture by US soldiers in Iraq. The plaintiffs, who worked for a private security firm in Iraq, were arrested in 2006 by military personnel after being suspected [...]

The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Wednesday in two cases. The issue in the first case, Already, LLC v. Nike, Inc. , was whether a federal court has Article III jurisdiction over a party’s challenge to the validity of a trademark if the owner of the trademark has agreed not to sue the party [...]

Voters passed ballot measures on Tuesday seeking to limit the amount of money that can be directed to political campaigns in Colorado and Montana . The measure in Colorado will amend that state’s constitution to declare that the people of the state find that “large campaign contributions to political candidates create the potential for corruption,” [...]

Montana voters on Tuesday approved a referendum that would require parental notification prior to an abortion for a minor. The measure, which was passed by 66 percent of Montana voters, would require abortion facilities and doctors to inform parents and legal guardians of minors under 16 48 hours before a planned abortion procedure. This requirement [...]

Voters in Montana and Maryland went to the polls to decide upon two state immigration initiatives on Tuesday. In Maryland, Question 4 , often called “Maryland’s Dream Act,” passed with approximately 59 percent of the votes affirming the law’s passage. The measure allows for most undocumented immigrants who went to Maryland high schools for at [...]

Ballot proposals to exempt residents from portions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) were approved Tuesday in Montana , Alabama and Wyoming . A similar amendment in Florida was narrowly defeated by voters. The PPACA was a comprehensive health care reform law passed in March 2010. The amendments seek to exempt residents [...]

Virginia voters passed Question 1 on Tuesday by 76 percent , amending the state Constitution to include prohibitions on the State utilizing eminent domain to seize private property. Question 1 amends Article 1, Section 11 of the state Constitution to “require that eminent domain only be exercised where the property taken or damaged is for [...]

California voters passed Proposition 36 on Tuesday, modifying the state’s “three strikes” law to apply a mandatory life sentence only if the third strike is a serious or violent crime. Before the referendum, the three strikes law would mandate a life sentence for a third conviction after two convictions for violent felonies. In practice, this [...]

JURIST Guest Columnist Christopher Elsee, St. John’s University School of Law Class of 2013, is the author of the tenth article in a 15-part series from the staffers of the Journal of Civil Rights and Economic Development. He discusses the weaknesses of the Terrorist Expatriation Act and suggests how to improve it…