The New Jersey Legislature Tuesday passed a bill to completely ban hydraulic fracturing , or “fracking,” a controversial technique used to release natural shale gas. The Senate passed the bill 33-1 and then it passed the Assembly later in the day 58-11 with 8 abstentions. The bill now goes to New Jersey Governor Chris Christie [...]

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) filed an appeal in the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on Monday contesting a bankruptcy court ruling that the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional. DOMA is a federal law barring

The Chinese government has implemented measures aimed at suppressing lawyers pursuing human rights cases , Amnesty International (AI) reported Thursday. The report, entitled “Against the Law: Crackdown on China’s Human Rights Lawyers Deepens,” presents evidence that human rights lawyers have increasingly had their licenses revoked or suspended and have faced harassment and torture in some [...]

On April 16, 2010, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a civil action against Goldman, Sachs & Co. for the structuring and marketing of a synthetic collateralized debt obligation (CDO). The synthetic CDO, a complex financial security used to speculate or manage the risk that an obligation will not be paid, was tied to [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit on Wednesday found the individual mandate provision of the new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) constitutional. The Thomas More Law Center (TMLC) , joined by four individuals, challenged the individual mandate provision of PPACA, arguing that it unconstitutionally compels the purchase of health insurance. [...]

Megan McKee, University of Pittsburgh School of Law Class of 2012, worked as a legal researcher for the Centre for International Sustainable Development Law and is currently working in Lebanon. She writes about the need for greater rights for migrant workers in that country, especially for those employed as domestic workers… It is estimated that [...]

William Duncan, Director of the Marriage Law Foundation, argues that whether or not same-sex marriage is a beneficial public policy, the New York legislation sets a bad precedent and is possibly unconstitutional under the state constitution due to violations of procedural requirements…

Bahraini King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa announced on Wednesday that an independent commission will investigate human rights violations related to the country’s pro-democracy protests. During a televised speech , Khalifa indicated that he had ordered a committee under the Chairmanship of the Deputy Prime Minister to look into abuses that took place in Bahrain [...]

Oman’s Misdemeanour Court of First Instance in Muscat sentenced 13 protesters on Wednesday, handing five-year sentences to seven of the activists. Those seven were charged with shutting down a government organization. Six others were given fines and between three and four-month sentences for blocking roads and assaulting government employees. An additional 55 were sentenced for [...]

Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller filed a notice of appeal Tuesday challenging a preliminary injunction blocking parts of a state law denying that medicaid funds go to Planned Parenthood of Indiana (PPIN) . The state is challenging a decision in the US District Court for the Southern District of Indiana by Judge Tanya Walton Pratt [...]