Category Archives: Law: Everything Else

Contracts: Deptula v. Simpson and Stambovsky v. Ackley.

Civil Procedure: US ex rel. Mayo v. Satan and His Staff.

Law students — please be aware that this is understatement:

Unsurprisingly, caselaw on coverage for inserting boar tusks into anesthetized patients is rather thin.

Actually, the whole article from which this is drawn Can This Pig Fly? How A Dentist Assaulted A Patient And Made A Million Dollars: Part One in a Two-Part Series and especially part two is pretty interesting and will teach you something about insurance law.

Recently re-elected Senator Craig Thomas has died.

Here, for the ghoulishly curious, is the relevant part W.S. § 22-18-111, the relevant Wyoming law on how a vacant Senate seat gets filled:

(i) If a vacancy occurs in the office of United States senator or in any state office other than the office of justice of the supreme court and the office of district court judge, the governor shall immediately notify in writing the chairman of the state central committee of the political party which the last incumbent represented at the time of his election under W.S. 22-6-120(a)(vii), or at the time of his appointment if not elected to office. The chairman shall call a meeting of the state central committee to be held not later than fifteen (15) days after he receives notice of the vacancy. At the meeting the state central committee shall select and transmit to the governor the names of three (3) persons qualified to fill the vacancy. Within five (5) days after receiving these three (3) names, the governor shall fill the vacancy by temporary appointment of one (1) of the three (3) to hold the office.

So the state GOP proposes three names, the (Democratic) Governor picks one.

However, if I read the following correctly, the appointed Senator serves only until a special election (held at the next general election) to determine who will fill out the rest of the term:

Any vacancy in any other elective office in the state except representative in congress or the board of trustees of a school or community college district, shall be filled by the governing body, or as otherwise provided in this section, by appointment of a temporary successor to serve until a successor for the remainder of the unexpired term is elected at the next general election and takes office on the first Monday of the following January.

Congressional representatives have their own statute. I presume the next general election is November 2008, but invite correction if there is one earlier.

Talk left has found one of the devils in the details of the new immigration reform proposal: Here Come the Detention Camps: Immigration Legislation:

Among the provisions of the compromise immigration bill is one calling for the building of more detention camps.

Reading this LA Times story about how Law & Order reruns might have to be pulled if Fred Thompson runs for President made me wonder. If stations are so afraid of having to give equal time for other candidates that they'd rather pull the episodes, then surely it would be economically rational for the studios to put a routine “no running for office” clause in actors' contracts that would apply so long as the reruns are showing?

My question is whether that term would be enforceable: would it be against public policy? Or maybe fall to the same sort of doctrines that disfavor non-compete clauses that last more than a few months to (at most) a couple of years?

Employment law is not my thing, but I bet someone reading this could hazard an answer.