Media Mentions

It violates medical ethics, but is it clearly against the law for a doctor to touch a patient sexually under the guise that it’s critical to her care? In some states it is illegal, but not in Massachusetts, according to the Middlesex district attorney’s office. This gap in state law is the reason the office recently decided not to prosecute Dr. Roger Ian Hardy, the popular fertility specialist accused of molesting patients, according to a lawyer for one of his alleged victims...Jeannie Suk Gersen, a Harvard Law School professor, questioned why prosecutors did not charge Hardy with indecent assault and battery, since the patient did not give explicit consent for Hardy to touch her clitoris.

An op-ed by Cass Sunstein. Many Democrats do not merely disagree with the Republican Party platform and with the speakers at this week’s convention. They may even struggle to understand what they are reading and hearing. That’s a problem for Republican politicians, who hope to connect with Democratic voters, but even more for Democrats, who hope to keep the presidency and to capture the Senate. The reason is that Republicans are appealing to deep and honorable strands in American political culture, which Democrats ignore at their peril.

An op-ed by Noah Feldman. The Obama administration has asked the Supreme Court to wait until it has nine justices and rehear U.S. v. Texas, the case in which a 4-4 court affirmed a lower court’s decision to block the president’s executive action on immigration. The effort is unlikely to succeed, because the court’s rules require a majority to grant rehearing, and right now the court doesn’t have one. But in a more logical world, the court would agree now to reconsider this extremely important case, which would grant temporary legal status to some 4 million people who entered the U.S. illegally, when it is at full strength. That it probably won’t shows just how dysfunctional an eight-justice court really is.

An op-ed by Noah Feldman. In the wake of the coup attempt, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan can hardly be blamed for purging the military. But firing 2,745 judges without any investigation or demonstrated connection to the coup is another matter. The action threatens the rule of law in Turkey going forward. And the way it was done signals some of the methods Erdogan can be expected to use in the weeks and months ahead.

An op-ed by Mark Roe. Jeb Hensarling, the Republican chair of the Financial Services Committee in the US House of Representatives, delivered a wide-ranging speech last month at the Economic Club of New York, proposing to overhaul US financial regulation. Hensarling blamed regulators and excused Wall Street for the financial crisis; condemned government-funded bank bailouts; characterized the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial-reform legislation as a power grab; and called for increased congressional oversight of the Federal Reserve. Most of Hensarling’s proposals – even backed, as they now are, by a partisan-sounding document from the House Banking committee and a favorable Wall Street Journal review – are political nonstarters...They have already been sharply criticized by Democrats as being too risky and pro-bank – which they largely are. That said, one of Hensarling’s ideas is well worth exploring: an “off-ramp,” as he put it, from Dodd-Frank regulation for banks that willingly increase their available capital.

“Western civilization is in a war,” former Republican presidential candidate (and now former Trump-VP hopeful) Newt Gingrich said during a live FOX News interview with Sean Hannity, hours after a man drove a truck into a crowd in Nice, France, and killed 84, while injuring 202...This is not the first time that Newt Gingrich has proven that he knows nothing about Islam and our United States Constitution. ..“In fact, for most of its history, Islamic law offered the most liberal and humane legal principles available anywhere in the world,” Harvard Law Professor Noah Feldman once proclaimed in a New York Times Magazine article on the anti-sharia hysteria sweeping across the Republican party today...any mainstream Islamic religious scholar will tell you that there is no sin­gle monolithic definition of Sharia as it exists today any­where in the world. Very generally speaking, the concept of Sharia has come to be defined as “the ideal law of God according to Islamic tradition,” according to Professor Intisar Rabb, director of the Islamic Legal Studies Program at Harvard Law School. But as Professor Rabb has also made clear: “Sharia has tremendous diversity..."

If drafts of the Republican Party platform are any indication, banking -- specifically, reshaping financial regulation -- would be a big priority under a Trump administration...Hal Scott, professor of law at Harvard Law School and director of the Committee on Capital Markets Regulation, sees the platform as a positive step toward paring back regulation he says is stifling the economy. "Some people have had their heads in the sand in thinking that overregulation doesn't have any negative impact on growth," Scott says.

...The entanglement of the judiciary and the political world was on full display recently with Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s now-regretted unloading on presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump....The condemnation of Ginsburg’s remarks by Republican politicians and conservatives was unsurprising. More interesting was the split on the left, where most of the legal establishment resides. Reaction to Ginsburg launched a thousand op-eds and blog posts. “To the extent that the current flap tells us something interesting about contemporary norms regarding the Court, it is that many people think there’s something important about maintaining the facade that the Justices are above politics, at least when they are considering actual cases,” Harvard law professor Mark Tushnet wrote on the liberal blog Balkinization. “But I have a bridge to sell you if you think that the Justices (any of them) were above politics in . . . Bush v. Gore, or in many recent cases.”

Even before the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, question marks hovered over Europe’s ability to conclude the mammoth transatlantic trade deals under negotiation...Could free trade be dead? POLITICO asked experts, trade representatives and writers from across the political spectrum to weigh in...Mark Wu: A backlash against free trade and economic integration has been brewing in advanced economies worldwide. Europe is no exception, as the Brexit vote made clear. But the reaction we are witnessing is as much against globalization and immigration as it is against free trade. If the project is to move forward, political leaders will have to make a more convincing case about the benefits of greater integration.

An op-ed by Cass Sunstein. In recent years, Republicans have argued that Congress is a more responsible policymaker than the executive branch. But when it comes to regulation, Congress is often much worse, and for just one reason: Executive agencies almost always focus on both costs and benefits, and Congress usually doesn’t. As a case in point, consider the Senate’s recent vote, by a margin of 63-30, in favor of a new law to require national labels for foods containing genetically modified organisms. The House is expected to pass the bill in the near future. However popular it might be, the coming law would almost certainly fail the minimal requirements that American presidents -- from Ronald Reagan to Barack Obama -- have imposed on federal regulators before they can finalize similar rules.

An op-ed by Noah Feldman. In an important decision with immense consequences for data storage services and law enforcement, a federal appeals court has quashed a warrant for e-mails that Microsoft was storing on a server in Ireland. Unless Congress changes the relevant law, this ruling creates the incentive for criminals -- or anyone else who wants privacy protection from government surveillance -- to make sure their data is held outside the borders of the U.S. The reasoning of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan arguably followed from Supreme Court precedent -- but it was probably a mistake nonetheless, and it isn’t really a win for privacy rights.

An op-ed by Noah Feldman. Doesn’t everyone have an outspoken Jewish grandmother? That was my thought on reading the indignant commentary on Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s unflattering assessment of Donald Trump in an interview with the New York Times. To put the point more seriously, there’s nothing wrong with a sitting Supreme Court justice expressing her personal political views when they don’t implicate any case that’s currently before the court.

In a rather confusing and seemingly contradictory statement, FBI Director James Comey announced Tuesday that the agency would not recommend bringing charges against Hillary Clinton for her use of a private email server while she served as secretary of state..."There are lots of statutes that deal with the mishandling of classified information, but what they all have in common is that it's intentionally or knowingly reckless, not careless," Nancy Gertner, a Harvard Law School lecturer who specializes in criminal law, told Business Insider. "If carelessness were sufficient, we would have indicted half the government."

Noah Feldman, a Harvard law school professor and Bloomberg view columnist, and Steven Sanders, a professor at Indiana University Maurer School of Law, discuss the escalating feud between presumptive republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, and Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The conflict has escalated over the last week as Ginsburg doubled down on her anti-Trump views in three interviews, with CNN, the AP and the New York Times, and is leaving legal experts divided on the political place of the Supreme Court. They speak with Bloomberg Law hosts June Grasso and Greg Stohr on Bloomberg Radio’s "Bloomberg Law."

Mitt Romney is sitting out the 2016 election cycle, but that doesn’t necessarily mean his campaign isn’t running ads. Or, more accurately, that his campaign ads aren’t being run. Kelli Ward, a former Arizona state senator challenging Sen. John McCain, apparently ripped a 2008 Romney campaign ad to use in her Republican primary campaign this year...Harvard Law School professor and copyright law expert Larry Lessig told Boston.com that many campaigns make video footage freely available online as a work around to allow super PACs, which are prohibited from coordinating with campaigns, to legally use the material. However, he said that did not appear to be the case here, in which the Ward campaign used nearly an exact duplicate of an ad the Romney campaign pushed online itself in 2008. “I don’t think it’s fair use,” Lessig said, reiterating the view of the Romney camp.

Passcode’s group of digital security and privacy experts say the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) – meant to prevent illicit trespassing on computer systems – is written far too broadly and often results in punishments that are too harsh for the infractions. ...The broad legal boundaries of the CFAA have also allowed prosecutions of computer crimes to proceed if hackers are found to have violated a website’s terms-of-service agreement, some Influencers say. “That overreading should be soundly rejected,” says Jonathan Zittrain, a professor at Harvard Law School.

When Ronald S. Sullivan starts teaching his class at Harvard Law School each semester, he asks his students how many of them have been spread eagle over a police car. Every year, it's the same answer: Two or three black students and maybe one other person of color raises their hand. "These are the kids who made it to Harvard Law at the top of their class," Sullivan said. "The common denominator is color." Many of the high-profile killings of black men at the hands of police, including Eric Garner, Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, have involved minor infractions like driving with a broken taillight or selling loose cigarettes. Most of these men have also been poor or working class. But high-earning professional black men say, they too, face challenges when dealing with police -- though sometimes the slights are less violent and more subtle. Wealth "helps, but its not a complete insulator," Sullivan said. "Race is still seen as a proxy for criminality."

At a memorial service in Dallas Tuesday for five police officers killed last week, President Obama called for Americans to participate in honest dialogue about race. The president said such conversations are the antidote to the violence and despair set off by the killings of two black men last week by police in Louisiana and Minnesota, incidents that proceeded what followed in Dallas. Those seven deaths last week, far from Boston, remain the source of confusion and frustration for many families in Greater Boston. Parents are trying to figure out what to say to children, especially black children, about justice, safety and progress. Three parents discussed these concerns on Morning Edition...David Harris...is African-American and managing director of the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice at Harvard Law School.

President Obama is fondly voicing support for his close friend and mentor, Harvard Law School professor Charles Ogletree, who has announced he has Alzheimer’s disease. Obama has spoken of Ogletree as a constant source of inspiration to him, particularly during difficult times. In a statement to the Globe, the president said Tuesday that he and his wife, Michelle, are saddened to hear of the diagnosis. Michelle Obama is a 1988 Harvard Law School graduate. “Professor Charles Ogletree has been a dear friend and mentor to Michelle and me since we met him as law students more than two decades ago,” Obama said. “But we are just two of the many people he has helped, supported, taught, advised and encouraged throughout his life. “We were saddened to hear of his recent diagnosis, but we were also so inspired by Charles’s courageous response,” the president continued.

After decades of fighting for justice, civil rights, and equality, the man whose friends call him “Tree” is now ready for a new battle. “You have to fight it; you have to address it,” Charles J. Ogletree Jr. says of his recently announced diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease. Despite revealing that he has the disease, the Harvard Law School professor, activist, and author said Monday that he has no plans to retire or clear his busy schedule. Instead, he feels called to spread awareness, especially among other people of color, who are disproportionately likely to develop the neurological disorder.

The shooting deaths of two black men in Louisiana and Minnesota at the hands of police last week, captured on social media, followed by the killing of five Dallas officers by a retaliating sniper, shocked the nation and left many Americans feeling like the country is unraveling. Police supporters and critics of the Black Lives Matter movement complain that citizen protests and inflammatory rhetoric are inciting violence against law enforcement. Movement supporters and protestors seeking reforms say that unpunished police violence against black people is fanning community anger. Professor Ronald S. Sullivan is a legal theorist in areas including criminal law, criminal procedure, and race theory, and serves as faculty director of the Criminal Justice Institute at Harvard Law School. In a Q&A session, Sullivan spoke with the Gazette about the shootings and the longstanding tensions between police and African-Americans.