Course Descriptions

Discussion - 1 unit. The first week of law school constitutes a basic introduction to the concepts of the law, the historical roots of common law and equity, the precedent system in its practical operation, the modes of reasoning used by courts and attorneys, and the fundamentals of statutory interpretation.

Grading Mode:  Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Discussion - 2 hours. Course is only offered to LL.M. students. History and fundamental principles of the United States legal system. Important current legal issues, developments and trends. Required for LL.M. students who have not attended a U.S. law school. Fall semester only.

This course is the laboratory companion to Law 200S and must be taken in conjunction with Law 200S. This course is taught by an experienced legal professional who lead interactive activities as well as assess, and provide constructive feedback on, the lawyering skills addressed in Law 200S. Units for this course count towards the skills requirement for graduation.

Classroom Policies: The course has a no-laptop and an attendance policy.

This course introduces students to different types of interactive skills needed for effective litigation and transactional work. Students will gain a better appreciation for the varied tasks in which different types of lawyers engage. In conjunction with the companion laboratory course (Law 200L), this course provides simulation-based opportunities to hone basic skills in negotiation, client interviewing, networking, and other important skills that are critical determinants of’ professional success. The benefits of honing these skills as early as the 1L year are emphasized. Units for this course count towards the skills requirement for graduation.

Classroom Policies: The course has a no-laptop and an attendance policy.

Discussion - 4 hours. Study the doctrines and concepts of property law with primary emphasis on real property. Course topics include the estates in land system, the landlord-tenant relationship, conveyancing and private and public land use control.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 4 hours. This course examines the sorts of promises that are enforced and the nature of protection given promissory obligations in both commercial and noncommercial transactions. Inquiry is made into the means by which traditional doctrine adjusts or fails to adjust to changing social demands.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 5 hours. A study of civil actions including the methods used by federal and state courts to resolve civil disputes. Among the topics covered are the relation between federal and state courts; the power of courts over persons, property and subject matter; the scope of litigation; preparation for trial through pleading, discovery and pretrial; devices for resolving actions and issues before and during trial; functions of judge and jury; and the finality of the trial court's disposition.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 4 hours. Familiarizes students with legal rules, concepts and approaches pertinent to the recovery for personal injuries, property damages and harm done to intangible interests. The course covers claims for assault, battery, false imprisonment and other intentional torts, as well as negligence and strict liability.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 4 hours. Learn the principles, doctrines and controversies regarding the basic structure of and division of powers in American government. Specific topics include judicial review, jurisdiction, standing to sue, federalism, federal and state powers and immunities and the separation of powers among the branches of the federal government.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hours. This course studies the bases and limits of criminal liability. It covers the constitutional, statutory and case law rules that define, limit and provide defenses to individual liability for the major criminal offenses.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours. Integrated legal research and writing skills course.  Basic legal research resources and strategies are introduced and practiced.

Seminar - 2 hours. Satisfies Professional Skills Requirement. The course will introduce students to advanced legal research tools and techniques used in practice, including efficient computer research techniques. Includes coverage of legal research methodology, strategies and materials touched upon in the first year Legal Research and Writing course.  Class sessions will be problem based and requirements include the completion of several graded exercises. Class limit: 35 students.

1 unit. This course introduces the basic rules, structure, and resources used in civil litigation practice in California. Students will be required to use various research materials, practice, forms and trial manuals to prepare documents  that a practitioner would use during the pendency of an action. The timeline of a litigated case will be outlined from inception of the cause of action, to case work-up, through trial. 

The course will include a combination of lectures and in-class exercises that include working with both print, and electronic, legal research materials to prepare responses to various fact patterns.  The use of real-world case scenarios will be used extensively to mimic conditions likely encountered by legal practitioners. Half of the course time will be lecture, while the other half will consist of in-class practical assignments or discussion designed to enhance the students’ understanding of the concepts introduced. 

Prerequisite:  First year LRW I and LRW II
Recommended: Some experience using Lexis/Westlaw
Final Assessment: Combined scores from several graded exercises
Grading Mode: Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement

This course will be taught as an accelerated course. Class will meet for first 7 weeks only.

1 unit. The course is designed to develop professional level research skills using intellectual property print and online materials. A brief lecture will start each class with the remaining class time spent researching real-world fact patterns and discussing findings in class.

Prerequisite: First year LRW I and LRW II
Final Assessment: Combined scores from several graded exercises
Grading Mode: Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement

This course will be taught as an accelerated course. Class will meet for first 7 weeks only.

Discussion - 2 hours.  Persuasive writing and oral advocacy.  Students will complete integrated research and writing assignments, including a complaint, a strategic defense office memorandum, a motion to dismiss in federal court, and an appellate brief, with oral arguments by all students.

Lecture/Discussion - 2 hours. Persuasive writing and oral advocacy. LL.M. section students complete integrated research and writing assignments, including a complaint, a strategic defense office memorandum, a motion to dismiss in federal court, and an appellate brief, with oral arguments by all students.

Lecture - 3 hours. This course is designed to provide foreign students with background skills at a more basic level than U.S. Legal Methods A and B. Students will audit carefully selected courses in the regular curriculum and complete assignments for Associate Dean Beth Greenwood related to those courses. Students receiving credit for this course will not take any exams or do other graded assessments in the courses they audit. The units that students receive for this course will be reflected on their transcripts but will not count towards any degree or towards the units required to take a bar exam. A student who audits a course in the regular curriculum through this course may later take the course in the regular curriculum for credit. Students may take this course and U.S. Legal Methods A concurrently. Students will be placed in the course by Dean Greenwood.

Course is only offered to LL.M. students.

Note:  This course will not apply toward the 20 units required for graduation from the UC Davis LL.M. Program.  Units from this course will also not count toward the number of units required for taking bar exams in California, New York or any other American state.

Lecture/Discussion - 3 hours. Course is only offered to LL.M. students. This course is designed to provide foreign and other students with background skills necessary to succeed in both law school and legal practice. In addition to gaining a working knowledge of how the litigation system works, students will learn how to effectively brief cases, write memoranda, understand legal terminology, produce legal essays and exams, and speak in a legal context. Students will be placed in the course by Associate Dean Beth Greenwood.

Course is only offered to LL.M. students. The objective of this class is to improve legal writing skills, with a focus on law school essay exams. The class focuses on the following skills: 1) how understand the goals of a US law school exam and the expectations of the professor; 2) how to structure an answer logically; 3) how to write clearly; 4) how to explain reasoning and discuss complex legal issues. This is an experiential class.

Final Assessment: Exam
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Course is only offered to LL.M. students. The objective of this class is to improve legal writing skills. This class will focus on bar essay exams. The class focuses on the following skills: 1) how to understand the goals of a US bar; 2) how to structure an answer logically; 3) how to write clearly; 4) how to explain reasoning and discuss complex legal issues. This is an experiential class.

Final Assessment: Exam
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 3 hours. This course covers all essential aspects of patent law, including: prosecution, post-grant proceedings, patentable subject matter, utility, enablement and description, novelty, statutory bars, nonobviousness, infringement, and remedies.  Students will examine legal doctrine as well as the patent system's public policy objectives and theoretical foundations.  This course is designed for both the non-patent specialist as well as the future patent attorney.  No scientific background is required.

Prerequisites: 274 Intellectual Property or instructor consent.
Classroom Policies: This course has a participation policy.
Final Assessment: Exam.

Seminar - 2 hours. This skill-based course examines the core requirements and strategies for drafting and prosecuting a patent application before the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (US PTO). We will examine the theory and practice of drafting patent claims and their supporting disclosure, conducting inventor interviews, and performing patentability searches and other preparatory fact investigations. A major objective of the course will be in helping students draft and prosecute a complete patent application in a real-world setting. Students will interact with real inventors and US PTO examiners to gain the experience of getting a patent issued – through interactions with an inventor to develop an idea and draft a patent application, responding to rejections and office actions from the US PTO after filing the patent application, through interactions with a US PTO examiner to interview the office action and getting the application issued. Students are evaluated on participation, in-class and take-home exercises, and projects relating to the drafting and prosecution of a patent application.

Class taught on accelerated, non-traditional schedule. Class will meet 7 times:
Thursdays: August 24, September 7, September 21, October 5, and October 19 from 4:10-7pm
Saturdays: November 4, and November 18 from 9-4pm

Prerequisites: 274 Intellectual Property or instructor consent.
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Practicum - 2 hours. This practicum will include: (1) weekly in-class lectures regarding patent laws and rules, followed by (2) student participation time preparing a patentability analysis and drafting a provisional patent application. Invention assignments may be sourced from UC Davis Innovation Access (pending approval). Students may also collaborate with entrepreneurs at UC Davis and the surrounding community to identify inventions worthy of patent protection. Students will gain experience analyzing if an invention is directed to patentable subject matter, identifying prior art, analyzing patentability, and drafting and electronically filing a provisional patent application with the US Patent and Trademark office. Students will work independently on their assignments if enough inventions are identified; otherwise in pairs. The class will include lectures about relevant case law and USPTO rules and applying this content to their assignments. Portions of the class time will be spent discussing the student’s assignments.

Prerequisite: Law 209A Patent Law (pre or co-requisite)
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
 

Seminar - 2 hours.  The course maps a rapidly changing area of patent law that directly affects hi-tech industries.  Since 2010, the Supreme Court has pushed back against an established trend of increasingly broad interpretation of patentable subject matter, which had come to include business models and diagnostic methods in addition to genetic and software patenting.  AMP v. Myriad Genetics (2013) determined that isolated genes no longer constitute patentable subject matter, while Alice Corp v. CLS Bank (2014), Mayo v. Prometheus Laboratories (2012), and Bilski v. Kappos (2010) have curtailed, respectively, the patent eligibility of software, medical diagnostic methods, and business models.  This seminar takes an in-depth look at these recent cases, while also tracing the key cases behind genetic patenting (Diamond v. Chackrabarty (1980)), software (Diamond v. Diehr (1981)); business models (State Street Bank v. Signature Financial Group (1998)); diagnostic methods (LabCorp v. Metabolite (1999)), and others.  Students who have not taken a course in Intellectual Property should contact the instructor prior to enrolling in this course.  Class attendance and participation is mandatory. 

This course introduces you to the basics of Patent Litigation and examines the U.S. patent enforcement system. We will examine the legal and practical considerations faced by patentees in deciding when and where to file a patent infringement lawsuit. You will learn how a patent litigation proceeds, focusing on both pre- and post-trial proceedings. The course examines substantive patent laws, and it also examines how those laws come into play during the course of a patent litigation.

Final Assessment: Exam

Spring 2018: Class taught on accelerated, non-traditional schedule. Please see meeting times below:

• January 16 (Tuesday) 3:10PM - 5:40PM
• January 23 (Tuesday) 3:10PM - 5:40PM
• February 10 (Saturday) 10:00AM - 1:00PM
• February 27 (Tuesday) 3:10PM - 5:10PM
• March 27 (Tuesday) 3:10PM - 5:10PM

Seminar - 2 units. This seminar course will evaluate the privacy and cybersecurity issues that arise from technological advancements. The course will primarily focus on corporate surveillance and consumer data trade arrangements with corporate actors. Likely topics that the course will cover include the Internet of Things and legal responses to privacy related problems, such as the European General Data Protection Regulation and the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018. Other possible topics include the discriminatory implications of companies’ commodification of consumer generated data.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours. Focus on major current criminal justice issues: policing ethnic neighborhoods; use of deadly force; methods of pre-trial release; modernizing the work of prosecutors and defense counsel.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy the Advanced Writing Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper, Class participation.

Discussion - 2 hours. What are the expectations and roles of the police in a democratic society? We need order maintenance and crime control, but to assume these tasks the police sometimes intrude upon interests considered fundamental to free societies.  How should courts and lawmakers respond to these challenges? This seminar examines this basic tension by referring to various topics that may include undercover policing, the use of new technologies, and private policing, as well through an examination of police organization and culture.  Satisfactory completion of the course requires engaged class discussion and two legal memoranda.

Class Limit: 12 students
Prerequisite: 227A Criminal Procedure is recommended.
Final Assessment: Take-home examination

Seminar - 3 hours. This seminar explores the ways political units in different countries attempt to maintain social order and advance criminal justice. Students examine the people, policies, and institutions responsible for adjudicating alleged criminal law violations around the globe. They also learn about how rules of professional responsibility and legal ethics guide the behavior of the institutional actors who participate in these criminal processes. Students will engage in research, practice formal presentation skills before their classmates, and produce a publishable final written project. Criminal Procedure, Evidence, and Professional Responsibility are recommended but are not required.
 

Prerequisite: Law 227A Criminal Procedure, Law 219 Evidence, and Law 258 Professional Responsibility are recommended but are not required
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission

Seminar - 2 hours.  This course looks at key issues in the historical development and the current state of modern American imprisonment, policing structures, and the criminal justice system in relation to race. It will examine historical and contemporary scholarship, juridical shifts and case studies that provide arguments about the connections between race, poverty, and the criminal justice system in the form of imprisonment and policing. More specifically it will provide perspectives to understand how and why acts of police violence, racial disparities of imprisoned populations, questionable court proceedings, and unjust sentencing routinely take place as well as why they are often sanctioned in the justice system. Course readings and class discussions will examine a variety of both historical and contemporary circumstance and events such as (but not only) early US slave codes, state black codes, Jim Crow, settler colonialism, tribal law, racial profiling, police violence/brutality, jury nullification, gang enhancements and indeterminate sentencing.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Response Papers/Short Presentation
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours. In this seminar we explore both the theory and practice of restorative justice; an alternative approach to the retributive justice model of our current criminal law system and many other institutions. Because restorative justice approaches crime and conflict as opportunities for social repair requiring community involvement, offender accountability, and victim participation, we analyze its potential to intervene in the school to prison pipeline and to reduce the mass incarceration of people of color. We will discuss the failures of the current criminal justice system, the impact of the media on criminal justice policy, the history and philosophy of restorative justice, the use of restorative justice models in other countries and cultures, and the application of restorative justice principles to both juvenile and adult criminal justice systems, correctional institutions, schools, and workplaces. We will also examine reparations movements in South Africa and the United States.

Practicum - 2 hours.  Students will learn about restorative justice principles and practices, receive training in restorative justice facilitation, and participate in and lead restorative justice circles in Davis and Sacramento schools, Yolo County Juvenile Hall, and other venues.

Each student is required to enroll for two semesters (Law 210FA Fall & Law 210FB Spring), receiving two units each semester for a total of four units.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory
Final Assessment: Final Reflection
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Practicum - 2 hours. Students will learn about restorative justice principles and practices, receive training in restorative justice facilitation, and participate in and lead restorative justice circles in Davis and Sacramento schools, Yolo County Juvenile Hall, and other venues.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory
Final Assessment: Final Reflection
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Seminar - 2 hours. The Criminal Justice System continues to evolve as perceptions regarding judges, law enforcement officers and criminal attorneys (both prosecution and defense) change.  This class will analyze how our sense of justice is formed and what it looks like in the actual practice of criminal law. The class will discuss the legal standards for arrest, charging, and conviction along with the ethical conduct required of prosecutors and defense attorneys. The goal of the class is to take a global view of the criminal justice system through a focus on policy and practice issues, using actual case specific facts. We will question and discuss the systemic issues in case outcomes, ethical prosecutorial charging and bargaining discretion, and sentencing -- aspects of the criminal process that affect huge volumes of cases and require more thought in global terms.

Prerequisite: Criminal Law and prior or concurrent enrollment in Criminal Procedure
Final Assessment: Take-home exam
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar -2 units. This course focuses on the criminal prosecution and defense of sexual assaults, from reporting to sentencing, through examination of pertinent criminal statutes, evidence code sections, jury instructions, court documents and specific case studies.

Final Assessment: Paper/Skills Exercise
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 units. This course offers an opportunity to learn about how different parts of the criminal justice system work and to consider practical solutions to addressing crime in a context where the emphasis on incarceration is declining.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment:  Short papers, a Final Paper, Class participation.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading.

3 units - Students will work on criminal justice projects for prosecutors' offices, including individual cases involving excessive sentences and miscarriages of justice, and criminal justice policy reforms designed to reduce mass incarceration and advance racial justice.

Prerequisite: Law 227A Criminal Procedure and Law 219 Evidence are recommended.
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Final Assessment: Other.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading.

Practicum - 3 hours. Students in the King Hall Post-Conviction Practicum will learn to effectively represent indigent and incarcerated individuals in the post-conviction process, with an emphasis on direct appeals in the California Court of Appeal and/or the California Supreme Court. The practicum consists of two parts:

First, there is a seminar component, which meets for two hours each week. The seminar component consists of assigned readings, lectures, and classroom discussion regarding (1) the procedural and substantive law that governs the post-conviction process; and (2) appellate and post-conviction practice, e.g., how to review records, spot issues, craft appellate briefs, and present oral arguments.

Second, there is a practicum component, in which students work on real cases with attorneys from the Office of the State Public Defender. In groups of two or three, students will be assigned to one or more cases, visit clients (when possible), review and digest records, identify issues, conduct legal research, draft arguments, and participate in moot oral arguments. Each group will meet with one or more OSPD attorneys (including the instructor) for one hour per week regarding their practicumal work.

Prerequisite: Recommended: Completion or concurrent enrollment in Evidence and Criminal Procedure.
Final Assessment: Paper.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Students who completed one semester of the Criminal Justice Practicum will work on claims of innocence, wrongful conviction, and other miscarriages of justice. Students will draft papers for prosecutors' offices, will make formal internal presentations, and possibly appear in court.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy the Advanced Writing Requirement OR count towards the Professional Skills Requirement, student must choose one.
Final Assessment: Other (Briefs, motions, memoranda)
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 2 hours. This skills course teaches theoretical and empirical approaches to negotiation strategy for the purposes of making deals and resolving disputes. Students participate in simulations to hone their negotiation skills, and write analytical papers. Because most of the learning is experiential, attendance at all classes is mandatory and there is a "no laptop open" policy during class discussions.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy and a no-laptop policy.
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Class limit: 24 students.

This course will be taught as an accelerated course. Class will meet for 9 weeks, starting with the first week of the semester.

Discussion - 3 hours. Before a lawyer can conduct a successful negotiation on behalf of a client, facts must be collected, underlying interests and goals must be understood, and a formal lawyer-client relationship must be established.  The first part of this course will help you to understand the dynamics of this important interviewing and counseling process, and the laws and policies that affect it.  Legal theory, psychological research and practical skills will be emphasized.  The second part of this course is designed to be relevant to a broad spectrum of negotiation problems that are faced by legal professionals.  Successful completion will enable you to recognize, understand, and analyze essential concepts in negotiations and hone your negotiation skills at a more advanced level than the introductory negotiations course provides.  This course will also help you to understand the psychological aspects of negotiations as they are practiced in a variety of settings and to situate negotiations in the context of client representation more broadly.

THIS IS AN APPLICATION COURSE. You must apply for this course and secure professor approval to enroll. This course will involve participating in discussions and a series of simulations.  Your classmates will be counting on you to actively participate and be well prepared for every simulation.   Do not apply to take this course unless you are willing and able to participate fully and can accept constructive feedback.  If you anticipate missing more than 2 class sessions, do not apply to take this course.  

Application required for enrollment.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion - 3 hours. This course is based on experiential learning structured around an extended stimulated negotiation of a business transaction. It is focused on the skills of transactional lawyering and negotiation rather than the substantive law governing international business transactions. The goals are to (i) introduce students to transactional law, (ii) provide negotiation training in the context of transactional practice, and (iii) further students’ practical legal skills. The course allows students to apply their legal and non-legal knowledge in the context of serving as a lawyer negotiating a “real” business transaction within the controlled environment of the classroom. Students become immersed in the thought process of a transactional lawyer as they progress through the negotiation, learn the relevance of the facts of the transaction, explore the interface of business and law, and draw upon their intellectual and emotional resources to solve problems that arise in “real time” during a transaction. The negotiations are serial, building on the preceding negotiation session, enabling students to experience a transaction from beginning to end. Class time focuses on negotiation skills and strategies, legal and business issues relevant to the negotiation, how such matters are addressed in legal documents, issues of cross-cultural and developing economy negotiations, approaches for dealing with impasse and frustration, and the ethics of negotiation. Upon completion of the course, students will have developed facility with actual negotiations, an understanding of transactional practice, and an appreciation of what it means to be a transactional lawyer engaged in a cross-border or domestic transactional negotiation.

The negotiations will take place through written exchanges and live negotiations.

Some Saturday class meetings will be required in lieu of weekday meetings. This course will be taught as an accelerated course. There will be 10 regular weekday classes, with the final class being on March 29.

Prerequisite: Prior or concurrent enrollment in 215 Business Associations required. 211 Negotiations and 270 International Business Transactions recommended.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper.

Class limit: 18 students.

Seminar - 2 hours.  This course enables students to acquire the skills for a successful transactional law practice. Students learn about complex international and U.S. business and legal transactions, negotiation and dispute resolution strategies through simulations and drafting exercises.

Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion - 3 hours. This course will be a semester long negotiation simulation intended to produce a multinational convention on a topic that is timely and meaningfully contributes to real-world discourse on the subject matter.  We will begin by introducing the fundamentals of treaty and international agreement practice under U.S. and international law.  Then students will go through the steps necessary to obtain authorization to initiate negotiations from the Secretary of State.  This will be followed by written and oral simulation exercises for every stage of drafting, negotiating, problem-solving, and finally concluding a multinational convention.  Students will get exposure to, among other things, the careful drafting of treaty provisions, the nuances of negotiation, and the strategic thinking that is essential to achieving conclusion of a complex international instrument.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement. 
Final Assessment: Written exercises, group negotiation simulations, individual oral presentations, and overall class participation.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 2 hours. Recommended: 221 Trusts, Wills, and Decedents' Estates. Fundamentals of federal transfer taxation, including the estate tax, the gift tax, and the generation-skipping transfer tax.

Please note: students who have already taken Estate and Gift Taxation are not eligible to take this course.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course explores workers’ and prospective workers’ choices to move from one place to another, both across and within national borders.  In particular, we will explore how tax policy and broader economic forces shape those choices.  A paper option may be available for those pursuing either the Immigration or Tax Law Certificate.

Law 292 Immigration Law and Procedure is recommended.

Final Assessment: Two 5-Page Response Papers/Exam
Grading Mode: Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May meet Advanced Writing Requirement with the instructor's permission

Discussion - 3 or 4 hours. Students who have previously taken Law 215C Business Associations may not take this course. This course provides a broad survey of the legal rules and concepts applicable to business associations, both public and closely held. Principal attention is given the corporate form of organization, although partnerships and other associational forms are also treated briefly. Topics surveyed include the planning of business transactions, the process of incorporation, the financing of corporations, the roles of management and shareholders, the federal securities laws, and social responsibility.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 hours. This seminar addresses advanced issues in the governance of publicly held corporations. In a public corporation, managers who run the business are distinct from shareholders who are said to own it. This separation of ownership and control is a central concern of corporate governance law. We explore how the law has addressed this issue at the theoretical level and in the context of topics such as the duties of corporate directors, shareholder voting rights, and competition among states to attract corporate charters. Grading is based on active class participation and a research paper to be presented in class.

Seminar- 2 hours. The course explores familiar topics of corporate governance, including, directorial duties, managing agency behavior, corporate transactional practices, from a corporate integrity perspective - especially, of those related corporate social responsibility and anti-bribery/corruption regimes of US, EU and select Asian jurisdictions.

Final Assessment: Take-home exam
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Students who have previously taken Law 215, Business Associations, or who plan to take Business Associations for 4 units may not take this course. The course begins with an introduction to the law of enterprise organization.  It then discusses three basic business structures:  agency, partnership, and corporation.  This overview is followed by consideration of creditor rights.  Focus then shifts to understanding a series of complex restraints on public corporations, including shareholder voting, fiduciary obligations, shareholder litigation, control transactions, and mergers & acquisitions.  The course concludes with an introduction to disclosure and insider trading laws.

Final Assessment: Exam

Lecture - Society’s expectations of companies are changing and companies are responding. Many companies go beyond compliance with the law to address environmental and social issues, from climate change to diversity. This new articulation of corporate purpose raises complex legal, ethical, and business questions. This class uses the case study method to examine this paradigm shift in the business and investment community. Each week we will analyze a particular company or business trend. The companies we will examine include Salesforce, Patagonia, Nike, Uber, Unilever, Amazon, ClifBar, and Clorox, among others. Students will get a “file” for each week which includes lectures, podcasts, and readings. Class time will be used primarily for discussion and debate.

Attendance Policy: This class is very interactive and attendance is mandatory.
Prerequisite: Prior or concurrent enrollment in Law 215 Business Associations
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Final assessment: Take home final will account for 60% of the grade. Other assessments include a brief written assignment (blog post), attendance and participation, and a group presentation. 

Seminar – 3 hours. Climate change is redefining the business and investment community's business norms and transforming traditional corporate law paradigms. This highly interactive seminar will use case studies to explore the current intersection of business law and climate risk. We will discuss and debate the following questions:1) Do corporate boards have a fiduciary duty to oversee climate risk? In all industries or only "high impact" ones?2) Will the evolution of "green" or sustainable investing minimize or exacerbate the impacts of climate change?3) What is the role of national and global securities regulators in the transition to a greener economy?4) How do existing corporate and securities laws enable and constrain the ability of boards and investors from mitigating the climate crisis?5) What corporate law reforms can address existing limitations?6) What is the role of local, national, and global governments in addressing the climate crisis through corporate law reforms?

Prerequisite: Prior or concurrent enrollment in 215 Business Law
Final Assessment: Other – (series of papers and an oral argument)
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours. The primary focus of the course will be federal constitutional law relating to religion - the interpretation and application of the Free Exercise Clause and the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. State constitutional law may also be considered as well as federal and state statutes relating to religion, e.g. federal and state Religious Freedom Protection Acts (RFRA) and the federal Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA).  Students will be expected to write  a paper of 20 pages in length (not including footnotes), to submit a draft of the paper to the instructor for review and feedback, and to present a draft of their paper to the seminar. Final grade is based primarily on the final draft of the paper submitted to the instructor by the end of the exam.

Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement.

Discussion - 2 hours. Students will learn about the role of insurance, the special principles regarding
interpreting insurance policies, the doctrines of good faith and unfair insurance
practices, and regulation of insurance.

Final Assessment: Exam
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 2 hours. Students will learn the basics of the telecommunications industry, the key issues facing policy-makers in designing telecommunications regulatory systems (e.g. licensing, universal service, economic regulation, relationship with antitrust law), the various ways in which different jurisdictions have chosen to address these issues, and the motivations behind those choices. Some trans-national telecommunications elements will also be explored, including the GATS Telecommunications Annex and Reference Paper, and telecommunications chapters in recent free-trade agreements such as the (Comprehensive and Progressive) Trans-Pacific Partnership, as well as the way in which disputes about states' compliance with obligations under these arrangements are raised and resolved.

There are no pre- or co-requisites. However, students interested in this course might usefully consider certain other elective courses, depending on their availability, such as Law 262 Antitrust, Law 262B Regulated Industries, and Law 284 Law and Economics.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 4 hours. This course principally covers the First Amendment and the Equal Protection Clause. The First Amendment materials and discussion involves an examination of freedom of speech and assembly: focusing on how the protection provided speech changes depending on the kind of speech that is regulated, the location where speech occurs, and the nature of the regulation that limits expression. The Equal Protection materials and discussion examine suspect class doctrine, including discrimination on the on the basis of race, gender, alienage and other characteristics, affirmative action, and the problem of invidious motive. State action doctrine will also be discussed.

Students who completed either Law 218(A) Constitutional Law II—Equal Protection or Law 218(B) Constitutional Law II—First Amendment may not take this course.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours. Students who have previously taken Law 218, Constitutional Law II, or who plan to take Constitutional Law II for 4 units may not take this course.  Students are not required to have taken Constitutional Law II- First Amendment to register for this course, although priority will be given to those students.  This course focuses on the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Class materials and discussion will examine, among other things, suspect class doctrine, including the judicial treatment of classifications based of race, gender, alienage, sexual orientation and other characteristics, so-called "affirmative action," the constitutional treatment of laws and policies that have a disparate impact along racial or gender lines, and the related problem of invidious government motive. "State action" doctrine will also likely be discussed.

Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - This discussion-based course will focus on academic articles, mostly drawn from critical race and critical feminist traditions, that examine the theory and doctrine covered in 218A: Constitutional Law II--Equal Protection. The choice and sequence of readings will be tied to those assigned in 218A in order to create dialogue between Equal Protection doctrine and critical perspectives on that doctrine. Topics will include race, gender, and sexual orientation discrimination, affirmative action, disparate impact, and the erasure of Native Americans from the traditional Equal Protection canon.

Prerequisite: Must be taken concurrently with 218A: Constitutional Law II--Equal Protection or, with permission of the instructor, by a student who has previously taken 218 or 218A.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Final Assessment: Other – (class presentations and discussion)

Discussion - 3 hours. Many of the most important developments in California law and politics have been the result of reforms made in 1911 granting voters the power of initiative, referendum, and recall.  This course will explore how these mechanisms work, both in theory and in practice.  We will study some of the most consequential initiatives in California history, focusing on the initiatives themselves, challenges to them, and how they have impacted law, public policy, and politics in California.  We will then turn to the impact of the recall power on executive and judicial branch officials.  Finally, we will take a step back and consider whether these tools of direct democracy have functioned as intended and explore whether they can be improved upon.  

Prerequisite: 205 Constitutional Law I
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper

Seminar - 2 hours. Discrimination in the workplace has taken center stage in the country's legal and political arena. Despite extraordinary progress for women and minorities since the first state and federal anti-discrimination laws were enacted, we have recently seen an uptick in litigation, lawmaking, and government agency enforcement designed to address today's more subtle and nuanced forms of discrimination, including implicit bias. The goal of this course would be to analyze these modern forms of discrimination, evaluate the perspectives of both employers and employees, and explore effective ways to address these issues through the law.

Law 260 Employment Discrimination and/or Law 260A Employment Law is recommended but not required.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Lecture/Discussion - 3 or 4 hours. This course covers rules regarding the admissibility of testimonial and documentary proof during the trial of civil and criminal cases, including rules governing relevancy, hearsay, the examination and impeachment of witnesses, expert opinion, and constitutional and statutory privileges.

The 3-hour version of the course is a faster-paced course that will cover only the Federal Rules of Evidence, and students intending to do trial work in California are advised to take the 4-hour version.

The 4-hour version of the course covers primarily the Federal Rules of Evidence with some discussion of the California Evidence Code by comparison and reference

Lecture - 2 hours. This course will examine the interplay between the significant e-discovery rules and case law, and the process of electronic discovery, beginning with the duty to preserve electronically stored information (ESI), to the search, identification, collection, review and production of ESI in litigation.

Final Assessment: Exam
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Discussion - 4 hours. There are no prerequisites, although this course is a prerequisite for most other tax courses. This course surveys the federal income tax system, with consideration of the nature of income, when and to whom income is taxable, exclusions from the tax base, deductions and credits, and tax consequences of property ownership and disposition. Our objective will be to explore and critically evaluate the concepts and policies underlying the federal income tax, as well as to learn to interpret the statutory provisions by which these concepts and policies are implemented.

Taxes touch every aspect of our lives, from cradle to grave, from the child tax credit to what the ill-informed call the "death" tax. Taxes raise revenue, to be sure. But they also stimulate and stunt economic growth; redistribute and concentrate wealth; reward and punish families; influence and distort economic and social behavior. Indeed, taxes reflect and reinforce societal norms and values. Thus, while you will be exposed to the elegant and chaotic intricacies of the Internal Revenue Code ("the Code") in this class, you will also be exposed to the peculiarities of U.S. society, economics, politics, culture, and government. This course is geared to the future general practitioner as well as the future tax and business law specialist.

This course is not particularly numbers or math intensive and prior knowledge of accounting is not necessary (if you can add your fingers together, you'll be fine).

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 units. This class will provide a foundation to working with state and local tax systems.  We will begin with a discussion of the main rules from federal constitutional law that govern state and local taxation.  Then, we will discuss the mechanics of the three main state and local taxes (income, sales, and property).  Finally, we will also address non-tax mechanisms for raising revenue, such as assessments and fees.  In working our way through the complex doctrine, we will keep the underlying policy issues in mind.

Final Assessment: Exam.

Discussion - 3 hours. This is an advanced tax course designed to introduce students to issues of tax policy, with particular emphasis on tax distribution (i.e., who or what should pay taxes in society) and tax incidence (i.e., who or what ends up paying taxes in society). The course will begin by examining official measurements of income and wealth distribution, as well as how those measurements comport with the philosophical foundations of various conceptions of justice in taxation, including libertarianism, utilitarianism, and liberal egalitarianism. We will then examine how alternative tax regimes advance or detract from the principal normative objectives of these various schools of thought. We will also examine several controversial issues of federal tax reform, including debates over the progressivity of the income tax, whether/how the government should tax estates/inheritance, whether/how the government should tax wealth, the tax treatment of low-income individuals, how the tax system affects different kinds of families (single-earner, dual-earner, married, single, opposite-sex, same-sex), and proposals for fundamental tax reform such as the adoption of a consumption tax (e.g., flat tax, VAT, retail sales tax). In each of these settings, students will examine how alternative conceptions of distributive justice translate into concrete proposals regarding how the cost of financing public goods should be allocated among members of society.

The class contains a writing requirement that students can satisfy in two ways: (i) prepare five short papers (4-6 pages) on issues covered in class; or (ii) prepare a long research paper (25-30 pages) on a topic that may or may not have been covered in class. Students choosing the second alternative can, if desired, qualify the paper for the law school's upper-level writing requirement.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course focuses on the practical and procedural aspects of tax controversy before federal and state tax authorities. We will provide a mix of theory and practical skills for students wishing to engage in controversy practice before the IRS and the various California tax agencies (FTB, CDTFA, BOE, and OTA). To satisfy the course students must complete one reflection paper after an observation of a US Tax Court and Office of Tax Appeal hearing, and a final paper on tax procedure or controversy topic from the may be used to satisfy the writing requirement for King Hall students.

Prerequisite: None but Law 220 Federal Income Taxation and Law 220A State and Local Taxation are recommended as prerequisites or co-requisites.
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion - 2 hours.  This streamlined version of Trusts, Wills, and Estates is designed for students who are mainly interested in taking the course to prepare for the bar exam. It covers the basics of intestate succession and the creation and interpretation of wills and trusts under the Uniform Probate Code and the California Probate Code. Although it does not delve deeply into these issues, it sets the stage for students to master them during the bar review period.  

Discussion - 3 hours. The general public assumes that all lawyers can do two things: try a case and write a Will. Most lawyers can’t do either. This course is designed to rem­edy that situation in part by introducing students to the basics of estate planning and ad­min­is­tration. It should be taken by most students--if for no other reason than that it is a Bar course. The course will cover: the changing nature of the family; the law of intestate succession; statutory Family Protection schemes; re­stric­tions on Testation; the role, preparation and construction of Wills; the uses, cre­ation, construction and termination of Trusts; rudimentary tax consid­era­tions in the estate planning process; the use of future inter­ests and pow­ers of appointment; the mechanics of Estate Administration (in­clu­ding an examination of Probate and of alter­natives to Probate); the role and responsibil­ities of fiduciaries; the role of the attorney in the Estate Planning process; and the Rules of Profess­ional Respon­sibility as they apply to the estate attorney.

Final Assessment: Exam

Laboratory/Discussion - 3 hours. This hands-on, experiential course is designed to provide the students the practical skills and familiarity needed to practice law in the area of estate planning and probate/trust administration. Through discussion and drafting of documents, the students will learn the basic laws, practices, resources, and techniques commonly utilized today. The class will follow a typical estate planning client from initial client interview through end of life administration, enabling the students to draft actual estate plan documents including wills, trusts, powers of attorney, and transfer documents required to establish funds, and administer the estate plan during the client’s lifetime and then through post-mortem administration of the estate, including drafting formal probate and non-court administration documents. A series of related topics will be explored, including issues of capacity, elder abuse, end of life decision making, non-probate transfers of wealth, and litigation involving will/trust contests, creditor claims, recovery of assets, and accounting disputes.

Discussion - 2 hours. This course examines the relationship between racial power and the law.  Contrary to the dominant legal paradigm which contends that racial subordination is a deviation from the liberal legal ideal, the Critical Race Theory movement views the U.S. legal apparatus as complicit in upholding white supremacy, capitalism and heteropatriarchy.  We will begin the course by focusing on the origins of Critical Race Theory and its relationship to Critical Legal Studies.  Throughout the semester, we will examine CRT's relationship with other radical legal movements, including Feminist Legal Theory and Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL), as well as evaluating critiques of CRT from the right. Course materials will include case law and theory, in addition to some legal history.  As part of the class, students will attend and participate in the Aoki Center Interdisciplinary Research Seminar Series on Tuesdays from 12:00-1:00 PM, where a range of scholars will discuss their research.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion – 2 hours. This course will examine major cases, statutes, and events in the law, both on the books and in action, dealing with nonwhites. The course will include discussion of the situation of African Americans, Asians, Indigenous People, and Latinx People, from the Colonial era to the present. In addition to examining legal doctrine and policy, it will explore how the contemporary United States has been shaped by racial discrimination.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours.  Elective course for Environmental Law Certificate Program.  This course will survey the law’s understanding and treatment of animals by looking at the development of federal and state policies toward wild, captive, farmed, and companion animals. Specific topics may include the historical context of animal law; the legal status of animals as property; the concepts of animal welfare and animal rights; regulation of the use of animals in exhibition, agriculture, and other commercial industries; First Amendment and other constitutional issues raised in cases involving animals, including “ag gag” and consumer protection cases; the protection of animals by anti-cruelty and other laws; and a review of selected other topics and federal statutes. The course will incorporate legal concepts from other fields, encourage critical thought and new approaches to the issues presented, and focus on real-world applications of law in this rapidly-developing field.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Classroom Policies: This course has a participation policy.
Classroom Policies: This course has a phone-laptop policy (use must be related to class work).

Final Assessment: Exam.

Discussion - 2 hours. California bar exam subject.  This course covers the California community property system, including the rights of marital and domestic partners during the ongoing relationship, and upon the end of the relationship by death or divorce.  This course does not address other family law topics such as child custody and support, spousal support, conflicts of law, and so on. The curriculum may include all or part of the following: the use of premarital and marital agreements to bypass the community property system, characterization issues, and management and control issues.

Discussion - 3 hours. This course examines disability law and theory. The course is devoted to the Americans with Disabilities Act (particularly Titles I, II, and III) as it applies to employment, education, public accommodations, and government services and programs. Topics include the statutory definition of disability; the social and medical models of disability; the nature of disability discrimination; the construction of effective remedies; the role of medical expertise in the remedial process; and reasonable accommodations and defenses.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion/Lecture - 3 hours. Students will examine the civil and constitutional bases of mental disability law for people with intellectual, developmental, and psychosocial disabilities in such areas as civil commitment; institutional rights (with specific focus on the right to refuse treatment; scope of habilitation services); and deinstitutionalization, and, to a lesser extent, federal statutory rights. Students will explore all aspects of the role of mental disability in the policing and criminal trial process, including confessions; criminal incompetence; insanity defense; and the death penalty. The course will also address questions of mental and legal capacity in the civil context. Finally, students will also study the history of mental disability law and why and how it has developed as it has as well as questions at the intersection of institutional design, evidence/procedure, and disability. There will be no final exam in this class, rather, students must complete a series of short, research-based essay questions throughout the semester.

Discussion - 3 hours. This course examines the federal constitutional limits on government authority to gather evidence and investigate crime. Topics to be covered include Fourth Amendment limits on search, seizure, and arrest; the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination; and the Sixth Amendment right to counsel. While the course emphasizes current law and the evolution of Supreme Court doctrine, it also considers related policy questions on the role of police in a democratic society.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 4 hours. This course will focus primarily on criminal procedure at and after trial. It examines such topics as charging decisions and the grand jury, the right to counsel, discovery, plea bargaining, jury trials, double jeopardy, sentencing, and appeals. It will concentrate primarily on federal constitutional law with some coverage of state procedure. It is helpful to have taken Evidence but it is not required. The final grade will depend on the individual student’s class participation, a motions exercise, and a final exam. 

Discussion  - 3 hours. This course examines a range of issues, including bail, charging decisions, preliminary hearings, discovery, statute of limitations, venue, joinder and severance, pleas, plea bargaining, assistance of counsel, trial, double jeopardy, sentencing, appeal and collateral remedies. This course will have a short essay assignment, midterm exam, and a final exam.

Final Assessment: Exam

 Discussion. This course introduces students to the various legal and business considerations involved in forming and operating an emerging growth business. The course uses a hypothetical start-up business as well as supplemental readings, sample agreements and class discussions to help students identify and deal effectively with the numerous issues presented to legal counsel in the start up and operation of a growth oriented business, including selecting and forming a business entity, structuring the economic benefits and management control among various owners, protecting intellectual property assets and raising capital.

Please note: students who have already taken Business Planning and Drafting are not eligible to take this course.

Discussion - 3 hours. This course will take a practical approach to mergers and acquisitions, with an in-depth look at the planning, negotiation, documentation and completion of mergers and acquisitions.  Areas explored will include the mechanics of alternative acquisition methods and transaction structures, the application of state corporate laws (focusing on Delaware and California), applicable federal securities laws, and fiduciary duties in both friendly and hostile transactions.

Discussion - 3 hours. Introduction to fundamentals of statistical analysis and how statistical analysis is used in the law and public policy. Course goal is to help students become excellent consumers of statistical information and evidence. No prior background in statistics will be required or assumed. The class will begin by introducing students to the basic tools of statistical analysis (mean, variance, correlation, confidence intervals, hypothesis testing, regression analysis, etc). Thereafter, the course will cover various topics including how statistical evidence is used in legal cases (for example, employment discrimination cases, death penalty cases, antitrust cases) and how statistical evidence is used to make public policy arguments and decisions.

Discussion - 3 hours.  In addition to examining the evidence law governing the admission of scientific testimony, this course considers related procedures as well as trial advocacy in presenting and attacking such testimony. The scope of the course is broadly conceived;  the coverage includes not only instrumental scientific techniques but also soft scientific expert techniques including mental health testimony and social science expertise. Each student is required to both make an oral class presentation and prepare a research paper dealing with a particular forensic technique. Class limit: 20 students.

Prerequisite: 219 Evidence
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Discussion - 3 hours. Elective Course for Environmental Law Certificate Program. Prior course work in environmental law and/or international law is helpful. This course provides an overview of the structure and basic principles of international environmental law and policy. The course considers the challenge of addressing global environmental problems in a system characterized by multiple sovereign governments, the regulatory limitations of U.S. law, and the basic structure and principles of international environmental law, as well as substantive areas such as climate change, biodiversity and wildlife protection, and the intersection of international trade and the environment. The course grade for this class is based primarily on a student paper and also has a significant class participation component.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Seminar - 1 hour. The wine industry is the subject of intense activity in many legal subject areas, including constitutional law, intellectual property, environmental and land use regulation, trade protectionism, and internet commerce. This reading group is designed to serve as an introduction to this complex legal landscape.  We will focus specifically on examining America's complicated relationship with the wine industry.  We will chart the country's early support for wine, the moral and religious fervor that resulted in Prohibition, and the governmental controls that followed Repeal.  We will end the course with an examination of the broader contemporary regulation of alcohol and drugs.  Students will complete a series of written reactions to the weekly readings.  

Final Assessment: None

Seminar - 2 hours. The course will cover the research and practice of what we call "environmental law" to show that it is too narrow in several important respects for the legal profession to adequately address 21st century needs. First, "environmental law" too often emphasizes public governance interventions (e.g. laws and regulations) without addressing additional and important pollution reducing opportunities that lay with private environmental governance (e.g. private certifications, for-benefit enterprises, etc). Second, the course will analyze how the legal profession can accelerate progress in addressing the climate crisis by expanding the study and practice of law from the more narrow "environmental law" into the broader and more applicable "sustainability law".

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

3 units - Seminar. Cases and Places focuses on a four-day trip to world-class teaching locations throughout California. The course approaches the locations from two distinctly different perspectives: law and environmental science. Participants will learn hands-on water, environmental, and public lands law.

Accelerated Schedule/Meets on Saturdays: This course will have two Saturday meetings and four day trip.
Saturday meeting: August 26 (8am-5pm)
4 Day trip: September 28-October 1
Saturday meeting: October 28 (8am-12pm)

Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours. Examines gender and race and how they are constructed, contested, and regulated within legal, legislative, and juridical frameworks. Includes interdisciplinary theoretical perspectives across legal, sociolegal, and feminist studies. Topics include education, criminal justice, political representation, health and reproductive rights, privacy, civil rights.

Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 3 hours. This course will examine the legal and social regulation of sexual orientation and gender identity.  The course will analyze various legal principles, including statutory, constitutional, and public policy doctrines, which might be used to limit the ability of government and other institutions to disadvantage people because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. We will look at how courts have used these doctrines to help - or to harm - lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender individuals in critical aspects of their lives including employment, schools, family relationships, and parenting.

Graduation Requirements: May meet Advanced Writing Requirement with the instructor's permission.

Seminar - 2 hours. When surveyed, Americans consistently report high confidence and trust in the United States Military and service members. This trust and confidence has come from a history of devotion to the defense of the United States, which includes a culture of teamwork and discipline. To this end, the military has developed laws and regulations tailored to the unique mission. As the United States has seen social change, these unique laws and regulations can be at odds with or promote change within our society. This course will look at social change in the areas of race, gender, and LGBTQ identity though the eyes of military law and regulation. The course will explore those area where the military promoted positive change and where it hindered change. Students will have the opportunity to analyze the issues using military law, provide their personal perspective, and discuss ideas for change.
 

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission

Seminar - 3 hours.  This seminar will aim to cover the bedrock legal principles that have informed U.S. asylum and refugee law, policies and practices in the last 50 years. Informed by international norms, the U.S. adopted its domestic legal regime in this area of law in the 1980s. Through significant advocacy and litigation, asylum and refugee protections expanded over decades to cover broader areas such as gender-based violence by private actors. The U.S. also retracted important protections based on national security, fraud, floodgate concerns, and most recently, pandemic. At the same time, ongoing global crisis and unrests continue to push new waves of forced migration adding to a backlog of displaced persons, many of whom fall outside existing asylum and refugee protections. We study the transformation of this area of the law and the strategies and efforts to preserve and even expand protections.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper

This course is a foundation course for the immigration law certificate and may be used to satisfy the writing requirement for the certificate and/or the advanced writing requirement.

Seminar - 2 units. This class compares the Central American and Venezuelan forced migration phenomena in the Americas through the lens of history, politics, law, and morality. The course will consider the push and pull factors of forced migration from each nation and attempt to contextualize these factors within a broader understanding of history and modern politics. The course will examine especially relations between and among Venezuela and the Central American nations and Colombia and the United States and discuss the implications of these dynamics on law and morality and more specifically on the questions of who should bear responsibility for these humanitarian crisis and how.

Recommended pre-or co-requites can include Asylum Law and Immigration Law
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Final Paper and experiential learning project.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

This course satisfies the immigration certificate and may be used to satisfy the writing requirement for the certificate and/or the advanced writing requirement.

Seminar - 2 hours. In this seminar, students will engage with the wide variety of policy and legal issues presented in the area of drug law and policy with a particular focus on one of the fastest-evolving fields in drug policy: marijuana law and policy.

Final Assesment: Paper
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Lecture - 3 hours. Course examines how the U.S. Constitution and the federal Administrative Procedure Act constrain and regulate decision making by government agencies and officials. Topics include administrative due process, separation of powers, delegation of authority to agencies, procedural requirements for agency adjudication and rulemaking, and the extent and limits of judicial review. This course is highly recommended for anyone intending to practice in any public law area or at the intersection of public/private law.

Core course for Environmental Law Certificate Program. 

Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 hours. This course explores the complex challenges that entrepreneurs, businesses, and other organizations face when trying to address legal issues relating to technology. The seminar's approach is both practical and multidisciplinary, and it encourages students to explore the roles of a wide range of stakeholders (including lawyers, policy advocates and policymakers, businesspersons, and technologists) in developing legal and business strategies.

The course draws on a rich set of case studies based on recent legal controversies (including pre-litigation correspondence, pleadings, briefs, and other litigation materials). Students also review, analyze, and critique transactional documents and other legal materials (including contracts and website terms of use and privacy policies), with an eye toward assessing legal and PR risks and protecting client's interests.

Graduation Requirements: Professional Skills Requirement

Final Assessment: Project/Exercise

Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar – 2 hours. Much of our modern federal government relies on administrative agencies exercising authority delegated to them by Congress. Federal courts have traditionally deferred to agencies’ implementation of the statutes they administer, although these courts also set aside (or “vacate”) agency actions they find to be unlawful. In recent years, however, several justices on the U.S. Supreme Court have openly called for revisiting several administrative law doctrines that underlie this system. They have questioned, for example: Congress’s constitutional capacity to delegate regulatory authority to federal agencies, whether courts should defer to agencies’ interpretations of statutes, and whether a district court has the power to strike down unlawful agency actions. Each of these topics may have profound implications for the separation of powers and the practice of law in fields ranging from immigration to financial regulation to the environment and public health. And debates over these topics are playing out, in real time, in the Supreme Court. This course will critically assess each of these topics, exploring the existing doctrines’ origins and seeking to understand arguments both for and against revisiting them.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 3 hours.  Regulation of the distribution of securities under the Securities Act of 1933 and SEC Rules adopted thereunder, registration and reporting provisions of the 1934 Securities Exchange Act. Coverage includes detailed examination of the registration process, definitional problems, exemptions from registration, resale of restricted securities, civil liability, indemnification and contribution.

Prerequisite: 215 Business Associations or instructor consent.
Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours. This course focuses on the Securities Act of 1933.  Topics covered include domestic and international public offerings, registration statements, exemptions from registration, secondary and offerings.  Particular attention is devoted to problems of small issuers of securities.

Prerequisite: 215 Business Associations or instructor consent.
Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.

Discussion - 2 hours. Principal focus is the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and the regulation of securities markets. Topics covered include regulation of securities markets and securities professionals, responsibilities of securities lawyers, continuous reporting, transnational securities fraud, and enforcement of the securities acts.

Prerequisite: 215 Business Associations or instructor consent. 236A Securities Regulation I recommended.
Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.

Discussion - 2 hours.  This course uses history to answer the question, “Why does the United States have the legal system that it does?”  Why do we operate under the common law rather than the civil law?  How have legal rules and institutions changed over time?  The course traces the development of the common law from its origins in medieval England through the twentieth-century.  Topics include the development of substantive doctrine in areas such as property, contract, and torts; the development of civil and criminal procedure; the rise of the jury trial; the role of judges; the history of the legal profession and legal education; and the origins of constitutional government in England.

Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 hours. The history of Athenian democracy is entwined with our own – often as the negative example that our founders wished to avoid in designing our political institutions.  This critical view of Athenian democracy, and particularly its lawlessness, largely derived from the critical views of contemporary elite authors, such as Plato.  More recent analysis of Athenian democracy has demonstrated that in fact the democracy was a success across many dimensions and that it was particularly lawful rather than lawless.  This observation raises a number of important questions that we will address in this class.   The Athenian legal system was very different from our own and in particular was far less formal.  How did it work and why did it work?  More profoundly, why have political and legal theorists misunderstood Athens for so long and what can we learn from that failure?

Final Assessment: Take-home exam

Discussion - 2 hours. Satisfies Professional Skills Requirement. The focus of this interactive course is on attorney representation of clients in mediation. Through reading, discussion, role play, and interaction with local practitioners, students will develop the ability to effectively combine advocacy skills and collaborative problem-solving tools, learning to think and act strategically from the beginning of any dispute.

Mediation has become an integral part of the litigation process.  At both the trial and appellate levels, court-sanctioned mediation programs have become the rule rather than the exception.  In some cases, mediation is strongly encouraged.  In others, participation is ordered by the court.  In still other contexts, wise attorneys may be able to utilize the mediation process to resolve disputes in ways that leave their clients with greater satisfaction than they could have achieved through trial.  As a result, becoming an expert in the use of mediation is essential to effective client representation. The course will examine (1) ethical issues in representing clients in mediation, (2) practical issues in preparing both the case and the client for mediation, and (3) strategies involved in representing clients effectively in a mediation session.Students will be graded on preparation, participation, and several short papers.  Class limit:  24 students.

Discussion - 2 hours. This two-credit, skills-based course will offer students hands-on training in the fundamentals of negotiation and mediation, in the specific context of federal court-sponsored mediation. Although it is hardly news that most of today’s law school graduates will spend far more time negotiating than they will trying cases, the need for ADR training continues to outstrip supply. There is a particular need for trained negotiators and mediators in federal court, where it can take a half-decade for civil litigants to reach the courtroom. Increasingly, federal courts are not only encouraging parties to take advantage of court-sponsored mediation, but are mandating it. And mediation in federal court presents particular, recurring issues, including assigned mediators (i.e., not chosen by parties), mediator-judges, rules set by court order, strict time constraints, sophisticated parties with entrenched positions, and less straightforward confidentiality protections than under state law. This course will begin with fundamental concepts, including an analysis of why negotiated resolutions can make economic sense. We will then use simulations, lectures, and reading assignments to build students’ understanding. Students will have the opportunity to draft, and to receive feedback on, mediation statements. In the later portion of the course, as students’ skills grow, we will consider the role of irrationality and critical perspectives.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Seminar - 2 hours. This seminar will explore the right to vote under the U.S. Constitution and Voting Rights Act of 1965. The course will explore voter eligibility issues that are brought to light by current social movements such as Black Lives Matter and immigrant rights movements.  Students will learn about contemporary voting rights issues including efforts to both expand and suppress the vote; efforts to eliminate noncitizens in the U.S. Census and redistricting processes; and efforts to dilute the vote through redistricting and gerrymandering.  Students in the seminar will learn how apportionment, gerrymandering and redistricting are affected by VRA claims; and how current discussions over voting procedures (e.g., mail-in ballots, voter ID   laws) affect VRA protections. Students will demonstrate their knowledge through activities such as creating redistricting maps; writing activities about specific policies and procedures; and class participation. This course will be held in conjunction with students from Texas A&M Law School, and will concentrate on comparative voting rights issues in Texas and California.

Prerequisites: None

Final Assessment: summative memo, writing assignments throughout the semester, and class participation will make up the grade for the semester.

This course will be taught as an accelerated course. Class will meet for 12 weeks.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course investigates the right to vote as a matter of constitutional and statutory law. It covers the Warren Court cases that established the right to vote as a fundamental right under the Equal Protection clause; the emergence and transformation of the right of racial minorities to an “undiluted” vote under the Equal Protection clause and the federal Voting Rights Act; and the limits of the non-dilution principle, as reflected in partisan gerrymandering cases. If time permits, we may also discuss voting rights under state constitutional law, or under other federal statutes such as the Help America Vote Act.

Prerequisites: None. (This course may be taken before or after “Law 241B Election Law: Campaign Finance, Political Speech, & Rights of Political Association.”)

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Summative memo, reading response papers, and class participation.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course investigates the constitutional and statutory frameworks that channel and regulate the efforts of individuals, corporate and nonprofit entities, and political groups to convey their ideas to the electorate, to mobilize voter turnout, and to get their preferred candidates on the ballot and elected to office. We will examine the legal status of contributions and expenditures of money and other goods—whether directly to candidates, or through intermediary political groups—and the line between political influence and political corruption. We will also consider political groups’ claims to autonomy with respect to their “internal” affairs, to autonomy in the selection of nominees for elective office, and to a place on the ballot for their nominees.

Prerequisites: None. (This course may be taken before or after “Election Law: Voting Rights.”)
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Summative memo, reading response papers, and class participation.

Discussion - A study of how law operates across state and national borders. The topics covered include choice of applicable law in transactions involving multiple jurisdictions, recognition of judgments, and the exercise of jurisdiction.  Particular emphasis will be given to conflicts analysis in transnational cases.  The course deals with problems practitioners frequently encounter in a wide variety of fields, from commercial law to family law to law in cyberspace.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours.  Secured transactions are transactions where a lender takes an interest in the debtor’s property as “collateral,” or security, for repayment of a loan.  This course will cover secured transactions in personal property, such as auto loans and bank loans against business inventory.  Time permitting, the course will give limited coverage to secured transactions in real property such as home mortgages.  Potential subtopics include foreclosure; repossession; replevin; judicial sales; default; acceleration; reinstatement and cure; modification of debt in bankruptcy; the attachment, perfection, and priority of security interests; filing systems; bankruptcy avoiding powers; cross-collateralization; marshaling; and statutory liens.

Lecture/Discussion - 3 Hours.  Even as stock markets break records (and unemployment rates hit historic lows), economic disruption is an abiding feature of American life.  Think, e.g.: growing income disparities; the demise of brick-and-mortar retailers; competition from foreign manufacturers; burgeoning student loan debt; the growing cost of health care, etc.  This course will address the basics of Chapter 7 liquidation, Chapter 11 business-reorganization and Chapter 13 consumer-reorganization; it will emphasize how bankruptcy law interfaces with the practices of commercial, corporate, real property, intellectual property and family law.  This course is both for students concentrating in business law and for those who are not.  It does not assume prior experience with business or bankruptcy law. 

Final Assessment: Exam.

Discussion - 2 hours.  A prior course in bankruptcy is not required.  Concurrent or prior completion of Business Associations would be useful, or prior work experience providing familiarity with the different forms of business entities.

Corporate chapter 11 is one means to restructure the financial and contractual relationships of a struggling business. Federal law drives this restructuring, and this class will spend considerable time discussing the ways in which federal law supersedes or adopts state law. We will first examine the alternatives to chapter 11. We will then examine whether a chapter 11 proceeding is feasible. If so, in what jurisdiction should it be commenced? A chapter 11 triggers the employment of many professionals. How are the professionals engaged and what roles do they serve? What is the source of money used to pay these professionals? What are acceptable outcomes to a corporate chapter 11? A corporation can be reorganized, it can be sold, or it can be broken up and sold in pieces. These alternatives will be discussed. Finally, how a corporate chapter 11 is closed as a legal matter, as a business matter, and as a business development matter.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Classroom Policies: This course has a participation policy.
Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion - 2  hours. This course covers the law of conspiracy, corporate criminal liability, mail and wire fraud, the Hobbs Act, RICO, money laundering, obstruction of justice, and other white collar crimes and their associated defenses.

Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 hours. This course will examine corporate responsibility and (un)ethical leadership through case studies of contemporary corporate and public institution controversies and lawsuits. For example, case studies may include the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy and financial crisis of 2008; Enron and the collapse of Arthur Anderson; breach of privacy issues involving Facebook; and BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill and resulting litigation. We will review business and corporate forms and consider legal and ethical duties owed to employees, shareholders, and the public. Using case studies, we will study laws implicated when a business engages in illegal or unethical conduct, including violations of laws such as fraud and self-dealing, failure to disclose, discrimination and negligence. We will consider public policy and social responsibility issues as well.  The course will explore questions such as: what responsibility, if any, does the corporation have to the public, including customers that purchase products or services, and is there a public trust or duty owed to the public that should guide corporate and institutional behavior.

Prerequisite: Prior or concurrent enrollment in Law 215 Business Associations
Final Assessment: Group projects for all students and, for students satisfying the writing requirement, a final paper.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Seminar - 2 hours. Course offers an overview of the constitutional law governing the death penalty in the United States with an emphasis on Eighth Amendment jurisprudence. After an initial look at the history of capital punishment, the course will consider the following topics: early challenges to the death penalty; different statutory attempts to enact constitutional death penalty schemes; execution of offenders who commit non-homicide crimes and who are felony murder accomplices, juveniles, the intellectually disabled, insane or possibly innocent; jury selection in capital cases; the effect of race on capital sentencing; the roles of the defendant, defense counsel, the prosecutor, and the trial judge; the procedural requisites and evidentiary limits for capital sentencing trials; penalty trial instructions and arguments; and international standards regarding capital punishment. Class attendance is mandatory; preparation for, and participation in class is expected. There will be two short quizzes and a final paper.

This course is for students with knowledge of basic criminal procedure, and are interested in further developing their legal skills while focusing on issues related to white-collar crime. The course will involve a real-world case involving bribery and other financially motivated crimes.  At the initiation of the case, the students will learn how to establish probable cause through cooperative witnesses to utilize the most universal tool in all criminal investigations: the search warrant. Actual search warrants will be analyzed by the class with an eye toward where to look next, including information from internet service providers, and ultimately searches of the suspect's residence and workplace. The students will argue a motion attacking a search warrant or defending it. The course will then examine the utilization of informants, and the limitations and problems that are encountered with their use.  The course will next review suspect proffers and immunity agreements and the problems that arise therefrom.  Following that, the course will examine the use of a grand jury, and examine the two methods to bring charges: an indictment or a complaint.  Finally, the class will review the laws surrounding arrests of suspects, and bail hearings.

Prerequisite: Recommended: Law 227A Criminal Procedure
Final Assessment: Other
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion - 3 hours. A study of the subject-matter jurisdiction of federal courts. The constitutional and statutory grants of authority to federal courts to adjudicate actions arising under federal law or between parties of diverse citizenship are examined in contemporary detail and from the perspectives of history and the Constitution. The course begins with a close examination of the scope and sources of the rules governing the jurisdiction of the federal district courts, and proceeds to develop a general theory of federal jurisdiction that includes federal appellate jurisdiction, writs of habeas corpus, abstention, justiciability, and state sovereign immunity. Fundamentally this course seeks to elaborate the constitutional themes of separation of powers and federalism as guides to critical understanding and evaluation of the Supreme Court's leading cases on the scope of federal jurisdiction.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion- 2 hours. This course involves a practical, hands on approach to learning California Civil Procedure through case studies, drafting common litigation documents, and studying the application of the Code of Civil Procedure to practical case scenarios.  Typical discussion topics will include jurisdiction and venue, parties, claims, analysis of appropriate causes of action for common civil litigation cases such as personal injury, contract disputes, property disputes, and governmental claims, discovery process, settlement strategy, use of CCP Section 998 settlement demands and offers, mediation, pre-trial preparation for both jury trials and bench trials.  Required documents to be drafted include summons, complaint, answer, affirmative defenses, demurrer, case management conference statements, discovery requests (form interrogatories, special interrogatories, requests for production of documents, requests for admission, notice of deposition. We will also study the required documents for a summary judgement motion, general law and motion, and jury instructions and verdict forms.  The documents prepared will include use of mandatory Judicial Counsel Forms applicable to civil litigation, as well as individually drafted documents.

Prerequisite: Civil Procedure
Final Assessment: Other – (Graded assignments and their revisions take place on a weekly basis. The last class will consist of a creative review of the entire semester)
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion - 3 hours. A great number of businesses utilize the partnership structure, including closely-held operating businesses, most investment entities, including private equity, venture capital, real estate and hedge funds, and publicly-traded master limited partnerships.  This course constitutes a study of the federal income tax treatment of partnerships and partners (including entities classified as partnerships). The issues to be addressed include the treatment of contributions to and distributions from partnerships, the manner in which income and loss items can be allocated among the partners, the treatment of transfers of partnership interests, the taxation of carried interests, terminations, sharing of liabilities and special basis adjustments.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hours. This course will introduce students to the international aspects of taxation and how the regime bears on broader social debates. This includes how U.S. tax law generally treats "foreign" income, as well as contemporary and evolving controversies, including how recent federal tax reforms treat global intangible low-taxed income (GILTI).

Core course for Tax Law Certificate Program.

Pre-requisites: Law 220 Federal income taxation is highly recommended though not required.
Final Assessment: Exam

Lecture - 3 hours. This course is an examination of the federal income tax relationship between corporations and their owners. The class will cover the transfer of funds into a corporation on formation and the re-transfer of money and property from the corporation to its shareholders. The course also considers taxable and non-taxable corporate restructuring in the form of sales, mergers, acquisitions, and divisions of corporations. 

Prerequisite: Law 220 Federal Income Taxation
Final Assessment: Exam

Lecture - 4 hours. This class is an introduction to the federal income taxation of business entities including corporations and partnerships. This course will examine the federal income tax relationship between corporations and their owners and will cover the transfer of funds into a corporation on formation and the re-transfer of money and property from the corporation to its shareholders. This course will also examine the federal income tax treatment of partnerships and partners (including entities classified as partnerships), including the treatment of contributions to and distributions from partnerships, the manner in which income and loss items can be allocated among the partners, the treatment of transfers of partnership interests, the taxation of carried interests, terminations, sharing of liabilities and special basis adjustments.

Prerequisite: Law 220 Federal Income Taxation
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hours. This course examines the fundamentals of public international law in the context of contemporary world affairs, and vice versa. Topics covered include sources of international law, international jurisdiction and immunities, recognition of states and governments, treaties, the relationship between national and international law, the obligations of states, international organizations, individuals and transnational corporations under international law, the peaceful settlement of international disputes, the use of force, and international criminal law. We will study how and by whom international law is made, interpreted, and applied; how it constrains (or fails to constrain) the behavior of nation-states and other actors; and how it interacts with domestic law and policy. This course provides an essential foundation for further study or for practice in any area of international law or transnational law. It also teaches important skills, such as working with treaties and other sources, and increases awareness of vital international legal issues which are important in any area of legal practice in our globalized world.

Final Assessment: Exam.
Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Classroom Policies: This course has a no-laptop policy.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading.

Discussion - 2 hours.  This seminar will provide an overview of the theory and practice of human rights law. The course requirements include weekly discussion responses, a seminar paper (which can fulfill the writing requirement), and active class participation.  Topics covered include the major human rights treaties and institutions; the universality of human rights; women’s human rights; human rights and digital technology; and human rights advocacy and enforcement.

Final Assessment: Paper
Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Classroom Policies: This course has a no-laptop policy.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

This course provides an introduction to the burgeoning field of business and human rights.  It begins with an introduction to international human rights law that contrasts this body of law with American civil rights law.  It then briefly examines the historical antecedents to the development of the modern business and human rights movement as we know it in the 1990s, before exploring how and when corporations are held legally liable for causing and contributing to human rights abuses in several different legal systems.  It then examines the different roles that the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights assigns to governments and corporations in protecting and respecting human rights, before finally considering how human rights considerations are increasingly incorporated into business decision-making and due diligence processes. Case studies and real-world examples will be explored and examined at every stage of the course.

Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement
Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion - 2-3 hours. This course will give students the opportunity to work in support of the mandate of the United Nations Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights. Students will engage in intensive research and writing in the field of cultural rights. They will learn the workings of the United Nations human rights system, and gain experience working with UN documents, with individual cases in the field and with thematic reports.  They will gain expertise in the field of cultural rights, including artistic and scientific freedom, and the right to education.  They will draft numerous memoranda related to these issues and mechanisms.  Basically, they will have the opportunity to work as junior human rights lawyers under the close supervision of a UN human rights expert.  The work for the course will be comprised of ongoing research and writing and there will be no exam.  The hours will be determined by professor and students based on the needs of the UN mandate.  The workload will be significant and participation in the course requires working to the highest standard and serious commitment to human rights work.  In fall 2020, students will work to assist Professor Bennoune in preparing for a virtual meeting with the UN General Assembly about climate change and cultural rights to be held in October.  There will also be a special emphasis on the impact of COVID-19 on human rights, in preparation for her 2021 report to the UN Human Rights Council about that topic.  Enrollment subject to instructor approval .  Prior international law coursework required.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Seminar - 2-3 hours. This course will give students the opportunity to work in support of the mandate of the United Nations Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights, and to do so on an ongoing basis which would allow them to maximize their learning and contribution to the mandate. Students will engage in intensive research and writing in the field of cultural rights. They build on the knowledge of the workings of the United Nations human rights system which they have gained in Practicum I, and gain further advanced experience working with UN documents, with individual cases in the field and with thematic reports. (With Professor Bennoune’s permission, qualified students may also enroll in Practicum II, without having taken Practicum I.) They will gain expertise in the field of cultural rights, including artistic and scientific freedom, and the right to education. Subject to funding, there may the possibility for one or more students to accompany the Special Rapporteur to Geneva to attend the UN Human Rights Council session. Students will draft numerous memoranda related to these issues and mechanisms. Basically, they will have the opportunity to work as junior human rights lawyers under the close supervision of a UN human rights expert, and in Practicum II to do so at an advanced level. The work for the course will be comprised of ongoing research and writing and there will be no exam. The hours will be determined by professor and students based on the needs of the UN mandate. The workload will be significant and participation in the course requires working to the highest standard and serious commitment to human rights work. Enrollment subject to instructor approval. Prior international law coursework required, and enrollment in Practicum I preferred (this preference may be waived at the discretion of the professor). The course will have limited enrollment between 7-10 students, to be determined by the instructor. Enrollment subject to instructor approval.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion - 2 hours. The course will provide a brief review of basic Spanish and then move into more complicated grammatical structures, all within a legal context, which includes various areas of California law.  The focus of the course is to acquire specialized vocabulary and develop the capacity of students to provide direct legal representation to Spanish-speaking clients. Students will practice both oral and written communication and will learn how to conduct various types of interviews and meetings with clients. The course will also address issues surrounding cultural competency, translation and interpretation, and ethics in the representation of Spanish-speaking clients. Students will be encouraged to develop the vocabulary they will need for their own areas of interest/specialization.

Prerequisite:  Students must speak Spanish proficiently. Native or full fluency not required.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Seminar - 3 units. This course provides an opportunity for students who are first in their family to go to college, or first in their family to go to law school, to reflect on their own educational journeys and to see how their trajectory of formal education is similar to and/or different from the journeys of famous First Gen lawyers, e.g., Barack Obama and Sonia Sotomayor. The principles of memoir writing will be used to guide student writing.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 3 hours. This class will focus on two questions. The first question to be considered is: What is law and, in particular, what is the relationship between law and morality? Topics to be covered include natural law, legal positivism and legal realism. The readings related to this question will be drawn primarily from legal philosophy. The second (related) question to be considered is: What are the main traditions in current American legal thought as to the role of law in society? Topics to be surveyed include law and economics, critical legal studies and formalism. The readings related to this second question will be drawn primarily from legal academics. Coverage of the first question will occupy approximately two-thirds of the class, though the two questions overlap considerably.

Final Assessment: Take-home exam.

Seminar - T he Writing Requirement Workshop is open to 2L and 3L students who have written a course paper or an independent study paper and would like to take it to the next level, producing a work of publishable quality. Students will present and edit their own work over the semester, and also present and edit other people’s work. The group format provides a supportive and rigorous environment with plenty of feedback. All students will also meet individually with the instructor for feedback several times over the semester. This workshop is recommended for students who are or plan to be law journal editors, students interested in an academic career, students who want the opportunity to hone their research and writing skills, and students wishing to complete their writing requirement in a supportive group environment.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Discussion - 3 hours. Survey of the legislative, administrative, and judicial regulation of labor relations under federal law. The course focuses on the historical development of labor law, the scope of national legislation, union organization and recognition, the legality of strikes, picketing, and the negotiation of collective bargaining agreements.

Final Assessment: Exam

Practicum - 2 hours. Students will develop a theoretical and practical understanding of the labor movement, and the ways in which lawyers support and interact with the movement. Students will be placed in labor organizations, labor-related law firms, and non-profits where they will gain experience with different aspects of labor organizing, labor campaigns, and collective bargaining.

Prerequisite: Prior or concurrent enrollment in 251 Labor Law.
Final Assessment: Skills Class Final Assignment (e.g. Trial, Mediation, Brief).
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion - 3 hours. In today’s world, disputes increasingly involve foreign parties, foreign laws, and foreign courts. Such disputes raise questions that go beyond those covered in the first-year course on Civil Procedure. This course explores the resolution of international disputes involving private parties, with a focus on doctrines that apply in U.S. courts. Topics covered include jurisdiction, foreign sovereign immunity, the act of state doctrine, service of process abroad, parallel litigation, the discovery of evidence abroad, choice of law, extraterritoriality, the enforcement of foreign judgments, and international commercial arbitration. Because the course assumes familiarity with the topics covered in Civil Procedure, students who have not taken that course must obtain the permission of the instructor to enroll.

Prerequisite: Civil Procedure or instructor consent.
Final Assessment: Exam

This course utilizes experiential learning techniques to teach advocacy skills during the life of a criminal case and simulates critical stages of the proceedings by conducting mock hearings throughout the semester.

Recommended Co-requisite: Law 219 Evidence and Law 227A Criminal Procedure.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Final Assessment: Other.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours. This course offers an in-depth examination of the legislative process both within the California Legislature and from the advocates’ perspective. Students will have the opportunity to learn from legislative leaders and social justice advocates who have successfully drafted, proposed, and enacted state statutes and regulations. In their selected subject matter areas students will work directly with legislative staffers, agency attorneys, lobbyists, and non-profit organizations to research and develop legislative strategies, draft and track bills, participate in committee hearings, and attend legislative sessions. They will be trained in key policy advocacy skills. Although most classes will be held at King Hall some limited instruction and observation will take place in Sacramento.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion - 3 hours. This course will explore community lawyering through the lens of theory and philosophy as well as that of practice and skill-building. The need for community lawyering and the structural inequalities and privileges that are embedded in our legal system and our society will be analyzed. The ethical issues that are presented by the representation of groups and the challenges that arise from “cause lawyering” will be studied. The various sites in which community lawyering can be practiced- non-profit advocacy groups, legal services organizations, private firms, and government - as well as the diverse models used – litigation, transactional work, policy advocacy, community organizing, and participatory action research – will be considered. Skills necessary for effective community lawyering will be identified and practiced. Students will have the opportunity to learn directly from prominent attorneys who practice community lawyering.

Discussion - 3 hours. International Public Interest Law and Advocacy is a proposed new simulation course to introduce students to the applied legal and policy skills necessary to become effective lawyers and advocates in the international public interest/non-governmental organization community.  The course will use individual and group roleplaying exercises and written assignments that will require students to plan and execute legal and policy campaigns to influence multilateral negotiations, international organizations, individual governments, and the public.  Non-Governmental Organizations are important actors in shaping international law and policy.  Students will participate in several individual and group roleplaying scenarios to guide them in thinking strategically about the most effective ways to affect governments (multilaterally and individually) and public opinion on issues of great international consequence.  The course will consider several approaches to achieving these goals: (1) national and international litigation; (2) national and international lobbying campaigns; (3) mobilization of worldwide public opinion (using traditional media, social media, civil disobedience, etc.).
 

Final Assessment: Other – Simulations/Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading.
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Seminar - 3 hours. This seminar considers rural manifestations of various legal, social and economic issues.   We will survey various subfields of legal study, e.g., criminal justice, poverty, environment and land use, local government, family, constitutional, agricultural, access to justice, as they relate to the rural-urban continuum.  We will debate rurality as an aspect of identity and consider its intersections with race, gender, sexuality, (dis)ability and other identity variables. 
Our multi-disciplinary approach will feature scholarly literature in law, rural sociology, geography, and other fields.  Readings will also include reports from reputable media sources, and we will view and discuss excerpts from movie and television programs depicting rural people and places.  We will consider various aspects of rural-urban difference, along with the challenges of getting law-makers and policy-makers to attend to these differences.  All of these tools will be used to debate current events that have particular implications for rural people and places, e.g., femicide of Native American women, deaths of despair, abortion regulation, work requirements for public benefits, and agricultural trade policy.        

Please note: students who have already taken the White Working Class and the Law Seminar are not eligible to take this course.
Final Assessment:  Students have the option to write a paper that satisfies the Advanced Writing Requirement or a series of blog posts for the Legal Ruralism Blog.  Students are also expected to co-lead class discussion once or twice during the semester, and students are assessed based on class participation, including attendance.  
Graduation Requirements: May meet Advanced Writing Requirement with the instructor's permission.
Classroom Policies: This course has a no-laptop policy.
Grading Mode:  Letter grading.

Seminar - 2 hours. We will study a variety of barriers that impede the access of unrepresented litigants to the courts--including poverty, racial bias, limited English proficiency and the digital divide--and critically examine existing solutions. Students will have an opportunity to develop and propose their own solution to an access barrier.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Discussion - 3 hours. Introduction to federal laws regulating pension plans, employer-sponsored health plans, and other employee benefits, including the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) and certain tax rules under the Internal Revenue Code.  The course will cover a variety of topics, such as the demise of the traditional pension plan and the shift to 401(k) plans, IRAs and Roth IRAs as primary retirement vehicles, the investment of pension plan assets under the ERISA fiduciary rules, benefit denials, enforcement and litigation, federal preemption, and spousal protections in the pension system.  The course will be beneficial to students interested in employment law, health care law, tax law, the financial services industry (note the significance of pension funds as institutional investors), as well as general corporate law and litigation.

Discussion - 2 hours. Local agencies, developers, environmental groups, businesses, and countless others regularly deal with the administrative and legislative applications of California’s wide range of land use planning and development laws. Topics include zoning, general plans, local government land use regulation, tribal interests, and related areas of litigation. In addition, the course focuses extensively on the overarching role of the California Environmental Quality Act.

Discussion - 2 hours. The course covers fundamental elements of the legislative process, including legislative procedure, the legislature as an institution, lobbying, statutory interpretation, legislative-executive relations, and the Legislature’s constitutional powers and limitations.

Final Assessment: Paper

Seminar - 3 units.  This course teaches the theory and practice of statutory interpretation through the body of rapidly evolving California law concerned with locally-erected barriers to the supply of new, higher density housing (a/k/a “exclusionary zoning”). Students will develop a working, practical understanding of the principal theories of statutory interpretation; as well as substantive foundations in land-use law, the relationship between the state and local governments under California’s constitution, and the statutes California has enacted and repeatedly amended over the past forty years to prod local governments to allow more housing—especially affordable housing and high-density housing near transit. The course comes in three modules. Module one concerns the nature of the housing-supply/affordability problem, and the traditional structures of local land-use regulation. Module two is about theories of statutory interpretation. The third module teaches the California housing-framework legislation through a series of statutory interpretation exercises, interspersed with guest lectures from leading land use attorneys, agency officials, and local government lawyers. Grades will be based on class participation and the set of writing assignments. Students who wish to produce a writing-requirement paper building on the course material are encouraged to do so by enrolling in Law 419 (Advanced Writing Project) during the semester after taking this course. 

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 2 hours. Legislative drafting is a particular genre of legal writing. It has been called the most difficult form of legal writing because it often addresses complex, societal problems. This course provides practical experience in researching, analyzing, and drafting legislative measures in the State of California, including bills, resolutions, and constitutional amendments.  This is a skills-based course for students to be trained in drafting and amending legislative measures.  This course will provide insight into the California legislative process and students will develop extensive research and writing skills related to legislative drafting. They will engage in constitutional and statutory research, including federal and state laws, and draft and revise legislative measures. Students will read and study about the theoretical and practical aspects of legislative drafting, how statutory law is created, constitutional limits to lawmaking, and more. This academic work will be combined with a few guest speakers and numerous drafting exercises, with at least one drafting assignment due each week throughout the semester.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion - 3 hours. This course covers the ethical duties of lawyers in a variety of different contexts.  Students will examine topics such as client control over the major decisions in a case, the duty of zealous advocacy, representation of organizations, and the unique role of government attorneys. This course will also cover the American Bar Association’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct and the California Rules of Professional Conduct, which are tested (respectively) on the MPRE and the California Bar Exam. Students who take Law 258A Legal Ethics and Corporate Practice are not eligible to enroll in this course.

Graduation Requirements: Satisfies the Professional Responsibility graduation requirement.
Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hours. The course focuses on corporate practice to explore the ethical responsibilities of lawyers. A large proportion of lawyers practice law in organizations that render advice to business clients. Navigating the landscape of the large law firm or corporate counsel’s office requires awareness of the distinctive experiences and minefields of this work. As such, this course examines the ethical and legal challenges that arise in corporate work, including incorporation, securities and regulatory counseling and compliance, transactions, civil litigation, internal investigations and criminal defense. It also introduces students to various governing standards of practice, both disciplinary and aspirational, including those promulgated by the American Bar Foundation, state bars (particularly California), the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Treasury Department. By the end of the course, students will possess an in-depth understanding of the Rules of Professional Conduct and other law that applies to lawyers who represent corporations. Throughout the course, students will be exposed to the standard topics in the professional responsibility curriculum, including confidentiality, conflicts of interests, and duties to third-parties and tribunals. Students will be evaluated based on in-class participation and a final exam.

Seminar - 2 hours.  This seminar will introduce students to the practice of meditation and connect it with readings about the legal profession at three levels: (1) individual stress reduction and self-care for lawyers and law students; (2) interpersonal relations, particularly lawyer-client relations; and the role of the lawyer, including legal ethics; and (3) trends within the profession, including the “restorative justice” and “therapeutic justice” movements. Although issues of professional responsibility will be discussed, the focus will not be on the rules of professional responsibility.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.

Final Assessment: Paper.

Discussion - 2 units. Using real practice examples, in this discussion/simulation-based course learn how to open and successfully run a small law practice, and hear from guest speakers who opened their own law practices. Included topics: structure and organization, office set-up, billing, fees, time management, client handling, overseeing office staff, trust accounting, and ethical rules.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory
Final Assessment: Attendance and participation.

Seminar - 2 hours.  In addition to oral advocacy, research and writing, and critical thinking, there are a host of other skills that are essential to the success of junior attorneys in their first few years of practice. This course will introduce students to various practical skills, tools, and strategies that will empower them to be “practice ready” and successfully transition from the role of law student to that of a junior attorney.

The course will include a discussion and review of the role of the junior attorney within a law firm/legal department, professional goal-setting, strategies for effective communication and work within teams, delegation and resource management, organization and time management, an introduction to common junior-level assignments and how to complete them efficiently and effectively, building a professional network, and an introduction to business development, among other topics.

Final Assessment: Final Project

Grading Mode:  Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Lecture - 3 units. This course will provide an overview of business concepts for law students.  The first third of the course will cover accounting, including what the major financial statements are and how to read them, as well as basic financial analysis ratios (e.g., return on equity, return on assets).  The second third will cover basic financial concepts, such as risk versus return, the time value of money, and their application to business valuation.  The last third will survey financial instruments (debt and equity), capital markets, and types of transactions (capital raising, M&A, restructuring).

Final Assessment: Final Exam
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Discussion - 2 hours. This course provides an overview of gender justice issues.  Readings cover women's legal history and feminist legal theory, including liberal, radical, cultural, and anti-essentialist feminism, as well as masculinities theory and studies.  After spending the first six weeks of the course discussing various strands of theory, students will consider the relationship between theory and practice by (1) looking at a number of issues that arise at junctures where women's lives encounter law (e.g., pornography, reproductive freedom, sexual harassment, rape, employment, work-life balance) and (2) considering other specific manifestations of gender and gender stereotypes in law.  Students determine the specific intersections/topics they wish to cover for these latter weeks of the course, and each student is required to assign course readings and lead class discussion (solo or as part of a 2-person team) on one of the selected topics.  Students must also participate regularly in the course blog, Feminist Legal Theory.

• This course has an attendance policy.
• This course has a no-laptop policy.

Seminar - 2 hours. Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement. This seminar will provide an overview of the international legal and institutional system for the protection of women’s human rights.  We will look at the material both from an academic perspective and from the point of view of the practitioner.  Particular areas of focus will include the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), violence against women, sexual and reproductive rights, women’s economic rights, and the work of women’s human rights defenders, as well as the impact of religious fundamentalisms and of terrorism and counter-terrorism on women. 

Discussion - 3 hours. Examination of federal laws prohibiting employment discrimination, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Equal Pay Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and section 1981.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hours.  This course provides an overview of employment law, labor law and employment discrimination law and aims to serve as a foundation for understanding the law and policy (statutory and common law) that surround the employer-employee relationship.   Rather than focusing on the various statutes that govern workplace relationships, this course is organized topically around the areas that tend to create tensions between employer and employee interests.   The course will focus on the interests of the parties as much or more than their legal rights as they currently exist in the law.  The questions we focus on in this course include the following:How should law mediate conflicts between employer and employee rights?What is the significance of constructing disputes as individual versus collective? What is the effect of increasing racial, ethnic, and gender diversity in the workplace on law and policy? Is law the most effective way of mediating employer and employee interests?  What is the role of organizing, self-help efforts, and other employee initiatives?

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours. The seminar examines a variety of issues concerning the judicial process. The focus is on the judge's role in the legal process, the administration of justice, ethical issues, decision making, bias, and critical examination of the strengths and weaknesses in our current judicial system.

Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion - 3 hours. The principal focus of the course is the federal antitrust laws, concentrating on basic substantive areas of the Sherman and Clayton Acts.  Specific topics include: agreements among competitors (including cartels) to restrict competition; price uniformity and other parallel behavior in the absence of agreement; distribution relationships having collusive and exclusionary effects (resale price maintenance, geographical and other restrictions on resale, exclusive dealing, tying contracts); monopolization; and mergers.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours. This course examines regulation of business in sectors, traditionally described as “common carrier” and “utility” industries, where because of market failures normal competitive mechanisms will not protect consumers from exercises of market power. As a consequence, these industries have traditionally been subject to pervasive regulation of entry, pricing, and other terms of service. The course examines the traditional rationales for such pervasive regulation, and the specific legal and economic principles governing such regulation. It also examines closely the massive reforms that have occurred in this area in recent years, resulting in a very different regulatory landscape than that which prevailed in the post-New Deal era.

Seminar - 1 hour. The course explores the essential elements of the interface between antitrust and IPR legal systems. It critically examines the unique challenges to existing antitrust and IPR doctrines and enforcement presented by a growing number of antitrust cases involving IPR sensitive industries.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission

Discussion - 2 hours. Evening laboratory - 2 hours. An introduction to the preparation and trial of cases, featuring lectures, videotapes, demonstrations, assigned readings, and forensic drills. The emphasis throughout the course is on the formulation and implementation of a trial strategy. The laboratory session is held on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday evening. Attempts are made to assign each student to a laboratory on the evening most convenient for him or her.

Prerequisite: Prior or concurrent enrollment in 219 Evidence.
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode:  Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Lecture - 2 hours. Combining lecture and student presentations, this advanced skills course trains students on the organization and presentation of a complex trial. Pretrial preparation, jury selection, strategy, effective openings, and witness examination, using technology, evidentiary issues, jury instruction preparation, advocacy skills, closing, post-trial, ethics and effective handling of both plaintiff and defense cases through verdict will be covered.

Skills - This course is designed to teach students (1) the law that restricts and supports jury selection in criminal law trials (2) the most effective methods of engaging in jury selection (3) how to think critically and strategically about voir dire questioning and juror challenges.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory
Final Assessment: Other
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion - 3 hours. Property rights in surface waters, including riparian rights, prior appropriation, the public trust doctrine, and public rights; federal, state and local allocation and regulation; environmental constraints; groundwater rights and management; state and federal projects; interstate allocation; federal reserved rights; water supplies and land use planning; water transfers; contemporary challenges.

Seminar - 2 hours. This seminar is devoted to in-depth coverage of various state and federal environmental laws and their relationship to federal constitutional principles that are increasingly invoked by regulated persons and business groups to block, narrow or invalidate the application of those environmental laws. Constitutional principles we’ll be examining in an environmental/natural resources setting include the Supremacy Clause (federal preemption); the Takings Clause (private property rights); the scope of federal authority under the Commerce Clause; Dormant Commerce Clause principles; the Privileges & Immunities Clause; and the Foreign Affairs Doctrine and Treaty Clause. These related seminar topics will include integrated study and analysis of legal, policy, scientific and governance issues affecting the natural resources in question.  Enrolled students are expected to regularly attend class sessions, and oral participation will be factored into students’ final course grades.

Elective course for Environmental Certificate Program.
Prerequisite: 285 Environmental Law or 256 Land Use Planning are recommended but not required.
Final Assessment: Final Paper

Discussion - 3 units. The course presents a survey of the law of commercial transactions under the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC). The course will cover a number of topics under Articles 2, 3 and 9 of the UCC. These topics include attachment and perfection of security interests in personal property and general principles of negotiability. The primary goals of the course are to provide students with foundational knowledge and understanding of several articles of the UCC and improve students problem-solving skills in this area. Accordingly, this course will be taught with an emphasis on solving problems. Cases are used to supplement the problems, but the main focus is on solving problems utilizing the UCC.

Law 202 Contracts is recommended.
Final Assessment: Final exam
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Discussion – 2 hours. This course focuses on litigation under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, the federal civil rights statute which provides the primary vehicle for claims by individuals that their federal rights have been violated by state or local officials.  We will address the substantive legal doctrines that govern § 1983 cases, the doctrines that govern the constitutional claims most frequently arising in the § 1983 context, affirmative defenses, and related civil procedure and practice considerations.  There will  be a single, final exam; class participation counts heavily in grading.

Final Assessment: Exam.

Practicum – (4-7 units) The yearlong practicum (4-7 units/semester) will have (1) weekly two-hour in-class lectures and case review, and (2) student participation in DFEH investigations (fall) and mediations (spring). Students will gain experience analyzing and applying the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA).  For students who are enrolling for more than 4 units, work from the DFEH Elk Grove office during the week is highly encouraged.

Prerequisite: Law 260A Employment Law Recommended.

Application Course:  Enrollment is subject to instructor approval. To be considered for admission to this course, please submit a resume and a cover letter to grace.shim@dfeh.ca.gov , explaining why you would like to participate in this practicum.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Final Assessment:  
Fall semester: Final Investigative Guide.
Spring Semester: Settlement Authority Memo and Mediation Brief.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory.

Seminar - 2 units. A student-led review of blockchain/distributed ledger technology (dlt) and its impact on law and transactions, from the basic functioning of a blockchain to the implication of smart contracts in areas such as cryptocurrencies, decentralized autonomous organizations, and self-sovereign identity.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 2 hours. Students with a non-law basic finance course are not admitted except with instructor's permission. In this course, we study basic techniques of analysis that are part of the core curriculum in a good business school.  The purpose is to give you background necessary for understanding and advising your clients and for understanding other business-related law school courses. Students are welcome to take it in either their second or their third year, but it should be especially helpful to students just beginning their second year who have the bulk of the business curriculum still ahead of them.  It is assumed that students will have taken a high-school algebra class, but will perhaps have forgotten what they learned there.  Weekly problem sheets, a midterm and a final.

Final Assessment: Exam

Lecture - 3 hours. This course examines efforts to ensure a “fair” financial marketplace. These efforts include focusing on the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act and its creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; disclosure requirements; prohibitions on unfair, deceptive, and abusive acts and practices; and other regimes enacted to protect consumers. Students will study salient contemporary markets for consumer credit, residential mortgages, and student lending. The course will also address how the concept of financial “fairness” has evolved and been influenced by social movements. 

Seminar - 3 hours. The course provides students with a high-level overview of several different areas of financial regulation, with an emphasis on banking regulation, issues of supervision and enforcement, including matters related to regulatory failure and financial crime. We strive to understand the nature of regulated financial institutions and markets, the potential risks created by those institutions, and how the regulatory system attempts to address those risks. Throughout, the US financial regulatory system is examined in comparative perspective.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Lecture - 2 hours. This course will explore public finance issues from a theoretical and practical perspective. Initial readings will be theoretical as we consider what the government should do and why. We will then move on to the various bodies of law that govern public finance practice: local government law, federal securities law and federal tax law.

Seminar - 2 hours. The course explores how fintech is disrupting traditional financial services and providing new opportunities and challenges for financial inclusion. Today, the traditional financial sector is failing to provide certain basic services. There is a critical need for access to responsible credit: approximately 40% of American households are liquid asset poor, meaning they do not have enough savings to cover basic expenses for three months if their income was interrupted. Yet, many communities remain excluded from traditional financial services: approximately 22% of Americans are either unbanked or underbanked. Fintech uses technologies to reshape how financial products and services are structured, provisioned, and consumed, thereby providing the opportunity to address the limitations of the traditional financial sector. But is fintech living up to its promise? The course explores the unique opportunities and challenges presented by fintech. The course is structured in four parts. First, we will discuss the latest innovations in fintech and how these are transforming the financial mainstream. Second, we will explore the intersection of fintech with consumer protection and financial inclusion, and evaluate claims that fintech may be reinforcing existing inequalities and diluting consumer protections. Third, we will discuss what lies ahead for fintech if we are to strike the right balance between enabling financial innovation and ensuring consumer protection and financial inclusion. Finally, we will devote the last part of the course to student presentations and discussions on proposed solutions to financial inclusion through fintech.

Prerequisite: Recommended: Law 215 Business Associations
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 2 hours. A consideration of select legal problems arising from international business transactions. Transactions covered include transnational sales, licensing of intellectual property, joint ventures, dispute settlement mechanisms, and the impact of international trade and regional agreements (NAFTA) on international business.

Final Assessment: Take-home exam

Discussion - 3 hours. A consideration of select legal problems arising from international business transactions. Transactions covered include transnational sales, agency and distributorship agreements, licensing of intellectual property, foreign direct investment, mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, concession agreements, and international debt instruments.

Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 hours.  This course will help prepare students for a technology or corporate transactions practice within a law firm or an in-house legal department and if the student decides not to pursue that path, it will still give him or her exposure to the issues in these transactions as well as further sharpen the student's analytical, drafting and presentation skills, which can be used, of course, in other areas of practice.

Final Assessment: Take-home exam.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading.

3 units - Complete complex contracts. Students learn various approaches to completing contracts (from term sheet to final document) and complete exercises and assignments to hone contract skills. Students build a contract skills toolbox with the tools needed for completing and drafting contracts.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Final Assessment: Other 
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Skills - This skills-based course introduces students to practical application of legal concepts in client counseling and drafting of effective business documents. Students will engage with each other in real-life problem solving, drafting, and textual analysis in the context of a multiple rounds of review and redlining. The emphasis is on dynamic commercial negotiations and expectations of lawyers common in the tech industry, but the core skills are transferrable to other areas of practice. Students will also be exposed to other areas of legal doctrine (such as ethics, intellectual property, litigation and torts) that necessarily arise in context of transactions.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Final Assessment: Other – (Skills Class Final Assignment – e.g. Trial, Mediation, Brief)
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Discussion plus document drafting skills - 4 hours. This course is a combination skills class and a lecture course.  Students learn the special legal rules and concepts applicable to nonprofit organizations (particularly IRC 501(c)(3) nonprofits) and then, in a workshop class structure, they apply those rules and concepts to complete drafting assignments regarding the formation of nonprofit organizations under state law and the application for tax-exempt status for nonprofit organizations under Federal tax laws. The first part of the course (approximately 40%) considers nonprofits from the state law perspective: organization, operation and dissolution of nonprofit corporations, charitable trusts and associations including internal governance rules, fiduciary obligations of officers and directors, rights of members, regulation of charitable solicitation, and enforcement powers of the attorney general. The balance of the semester (approximately 60%) is spent examining in detail the extensive federal tax laws applicable to nonprofits, including requirements for attaining tax-exempt status, the inurement and private benefit concepts, intermediate sanctions, limitations on lobbying and political activities, special rules applicable to foundations versus public charities, the unrelated business income tax, and charitable deductions. At the option of the instructor, the course might also cover nonprofit accounting issues, local property tax and other local tax exemptions, and public/private partnerships. Further, the course will definitely include document drafting assignments. The grade for the class, subject to certain minimum attendance requirements to ensure the combination skills/lecture class format detailed at the 1st class, will be based on document drafting assignments only. So do not sign-up for this class if you anticipate not attending/or late attendance to many sessions. Since this is a skills plus new-law-to-learn-substantive class, there must be some minimum attendance requirements. Also do not sign-up for this class simply to just satisfy the advanced writing requirement (AWR) because the total work involved with the drafting assignments are significantly longer in page-length than that required for the AWR so the drafting assignments are likely to require more time than other classes (like seminars)  that are more designed to satisfy the AWR. However, do sign-up for this class if your have a definite interest in learning about nonprofit organizations AND/OR getting some introductory/fundamental business/transactional drafting experience. It will be well-worth the 4 unit commitment.

Prerequisite: Prior or concurrent enrollment in 215 Business Associations or instructor consent.
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy the Advanced Writing Requirement OR count towards the Professional Skills Requirement, student must choose one.
Class limit: 13 students.

Discussion - 2 hours. This is a course in legal issues raised in operating and governing a nonprofit organization, primarily a public charity. We will focus on the appropriate considerations of State corporate and trust law and Federal tax law, as well as some State tax issues and Federal election law.

Discussion - 3 hours. An introduction to the legal regulation of the family. Coverage will include laws and public policies governing marriage and non-marital relationships; the parentage of children born through assisted reproductive technologies; the economic consequences of marital and non-marital dissolutions; child custody and visitation; and interstate jurisdictional issues.

Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 3 hours. This course examines the interaction between policy and the law of various educational themes in K-12 and higher education (primarily K-12 education) and will consider the various state and federal legal efforts to improve K-12 education.  Topics to be discussed include civil rights, inequality and the "right" to an education, bilingual education, school finance litigation, educational access, No Child Left Behind Act, Common Core Standards and charter schools. The course should be of interest to students interested in educational policy in particular and social regulatory policy in general.   Each student will prepare one in-depth research paper on a subject, issue, or problem of his or her choice, related to the class subject matter.

Graduation Requirements: May meet Advanced Writing Requirement with the instructor's permission.

Classroom Policies: This course has a no-laptop policy.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course will provide an introduction to the law of special education including the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act (IDEA), Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, and federal regulations governing special education law. Emphasis will be placed upon understanding the scope and breadth of special education services under IDEA; eligibility; administrative remedies; legal definitions of disability and their relationship to medical diagnoses; and school discipline. Current issues in special education law and policy including recent Supreme Court cases concerning the legal definition of a “free and appropriate public education” and policy debates surrounding inclusive education and the school to prison pipeline will be discussed. Guest speakers will offer invaluable insights into the practice of special education law and the current legal and policy landscape.

Final Assessment: Take-home exam
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Discussion - 3 hours. This course provides a broad survey of intellectual property law.  Areas covered include trade secrets, patents, copyright, and trademark.  We will examine legal doctrine as well as the theories and policies animating the intellectual property system.  In exploring these topics, we will frequently consider the challenges posed by recent technological advances and Internet-based media distribution.  No technical background is required.

Classroom Policies: This course has a participation policy.
Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours. Intellectual property is increasingly a global phenomenon, as creators seek to distribute their work and inventions across borders, while consumers seek access to creative products and innovations, from books to life-saving medicines. The scope of intellectual property rights set out in international treaties and national laws affect innovation and creativity worldwide. Exceptions to intellectual property rights determine rights to critique and learn. At stake in the balance between rights and exceptions are access to medicines and to knowledge. In an age driven by both technology and fashion, intellectual property is central to the global economy. This course will examine international trade law, national customs law, intermediary liability rules, claims for rights in traditional knowledge and genetic resources, protections for geographical indications, technology transfer, and intellectual property piracy. The central question will be: how can international intellectual property law be designed to help the world’s poor?

Lecture - 2 units.  This course focuses on the law of trade secrets, including the Defend Trade Secret Act (DTSA), the Uniform Trade Secret Act (UTSA), restrictive covenants and covenants not to compete, current case law developments, and overlap between trade secret laws and employment laws.  There is also discussion of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and computer forensics. No technical background is required.

Prerequisites: 274 Intellectual Property or instructor consent is required. Prior coursework in Property, Torts, Evidence and Contracts is recommended.

This course will be taught as an accelerated course. Class will meet for 9 weeks, starting with the first week of the semester.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.
Classroom Policies: This course has a participation policy.
Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 units. This course examines controversial topics in intellectual property law and policy across a wide range of issues, from technology, to the arts, to social justice, in their national and international dimensions.

Co-requisite: Law  296 Copyright, or Law 274 Intellectual Property, or Law 274A International Intellectual Property Law.

Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 3 hours. This course examines the international regulation of intellectual property rights and explores the place of the United States in the international IP community. We will discuss international treaties and legal harmonization efforts, legislation and case law from different jurisdictions, and the role of technology.

Pre-requisite: Completed or simultaneously enrolled in Law 274 Intellectual Property, and/or Law 296 Copyright is required.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours. A study of the issues that frequently arise in large complex litigation involving multiple parties and multiple claims. The course will focus on significant trends in modern complex litigation such joinder, class actions, and alternatives to traditional court-based litigation.

Please note: students who have already taken Complex Litigation are not eligible to take this course.

Seminar - 2 hours. Using a case study approach, the course tackles the complex strategic questions facing civil rights litigators, including the various factors at play when determining what kind of lawsuit to file, how to pick the ideal plaintiffs and defendants, and building principled relationships with social movements. Cases we will evaluate include Floyd v. City of New York, the infamous stop-and-frisk case, Dukes v. Wal-Mart, the largest civil rights class action in U.S. history, Reno v. American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, the longest lasting immigration case in the U.S., American Baptist Churches v. Meese, a church sanctuary case, and others. The course will include guest speakers who were both plaintiffs and lawyers in some of these cases. At the end of the course, students will be given the opportunity to conduct a case study of their own, evaluating the strategic successes and errors in a key civil rights case of their choosing and its overall impact on civil rights law in the United States.

Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours. This two unit class provides an overview of the major juvenile delinquency procedural hearings: detention, jurisdiction, disposition and transfer hearings.  The class will discuss the recent United States Supreme Court decisions on life without the possibility of parole for minors and how these decisions are influenced by recent scientific findings on brain development in young adults. The constitutional rights of students while in school will be reviewed in the context of mandatory drug testing and police interrogations and searches of students while on campus. The class will attend a tour of the Yolo Juvenile Hall. A professor from the UC Davis Medical School will lecture the class on the physical and psychological issues surrounding puberty.  While the primary focus of the class will be on juvenile delinquency, the course will have a segment on the constitutional rights of parents to make decisions about parenting their children and when the state can intervene. A professor from the UC Davis Medical School will lecture the class on how investigations are handled when child abuse is alleged. The class is organized around a series of weekly power points that will be provided before class for review. A research paper, a minimum of 12 pages, on a juvenile topic is required.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course focuses on the welfare and legal rights of children, especially the most at-risk in society including those in foster care and victims of crime and civil torts. Students will learn the substantive law of juvenile dependency and the special duties of lawyers representing children in dependency and civil cases, as well as child witnesses in criminal cases. Juvenile dependency law has been historically under-resourced in society. The goal of this class is to prepare the next generation of child advocates and to do our part in closing the resource gap.

Final Assessment: Paper

Seminar - 3 hours. Elective course for Environmental Law and Public Service Certificate Programs. The seminar focuses on legal relations between Native tribes and the federal and state governments. The course will consider the basic jurisdictional conflicts that dominate this area of law, including specific areas such as land rights, hunting and fishing rights, water rights, environmental protection, gaming regulation, taxation, and criminal law.  The course will also touch upon constitutional issues pertaining to tribes and questions of federal policy.

Seminar - 2 hours. Tribal Justice will examine the administration of justice within California tribal governments and courts and the efforts of lawyers and other advocates to achieve justice for tribes through litigation, policy advocacy, public education, organizing, and inter-governmental collaboration. The course will use the case study approach to illuminate the varied strategies and campaigns that tribes have employed to retain sovereignty, overcome colonization, and advance justice. Students will learn about the creation and operation of tribal governments and courts and analyze issues of jurisdiction and inter-governmental relations. Tribal efforts to acquire ancestral land, combat destruction of cultural practices, protect the environment, insure tribal family cohesion, and protect tribal members will be explored.

Simulation/discussion - 2 hours.  Students will sharpen lawyering skills basic to pretrial legal practice through readings, discussion, role-playing exercises, videotaped simulations, and related projects.  Client interviewing, witness interviewing and depositions are emphasized; other topics include written discovery and organizing facts.  The class is largely experiential, so class attendance is mandatory and preparation for, and participation in class is expected.  Students will be graded on participation, several short written assignments, and performance during recorded simulations of a client interview, taking a deposition, and defending a deposition.  Some practice simulations and all graded simulations will be conducted with partners outside of the scheduled class sessions.  Students need to provide an adult volunteer from outside of the class to play the witness in one 30-minute deposition.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Final Assessment: Deposition Simulation Project.
Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance and participation policy.
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading.
Class limit: 20 students.

Discussion - 2 hours. 2L’s only. This course will focus on skills critical to law school success, and ultimately, bar exam success. The skills include effective case reading, briefing, outlining, and exam writing. Selected subjects from the first year curriculum, specifically remedies-based issues in Contracts, Torts, and Property, will be used as a substantive context for the class. By using these first year subjects as a basis for the course, students will have the opportunity to revisit core law school principles that are always tested on the multiple choice portion of the bar exam and frequently tested on the essay portion. Students will receive individualized feedback on each of their written assignments.

PLEASE NOTE: 2L students who would benefit from assistance with exam writing and law school study skill development are encouraged to enroll in this course.

Attendance and Laptop policies: Students must attend all classes and submit all assignments.  Limited-laptop use policy. 
Enrollment: Limited to 20 students.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Discussion -2 hours. 3L’s only. This course will help students develop the skill of essay writing typically employed on the bar examination. Students will receive substantial feedback on their written work, and learn analytical and persuasive writing skills transferable to the bar exam and legal practice. Each student will complete 4-6 as outside homework and in class under timed exam conditions. Grading is satisfactory/unsatisfactory but students may be withdrawn from the course or given an unsatisfactory grade for having more than one unexcused absence or failing to complete an assignment.

Attendance and Laptop policies: Students must attend all classes and submit all assignments.  Limited-laptop use policy. 
Enrollment: Limited to 25 students.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Discussion - 2 hours. 3L’s only. A skills course focused on the development of analytical and organizational methods essential to successful completion of the Performance Test [PT] and MBE (multiple choice) components of the California Bar Exam. It will include PT writing assignments such as legal correspondence, different styles of office memoranda, trial briefs, and pleadings and motions. Students will receive individualized feedback on each of their written assignments. The course will also assign and review MBE questions in various substantive law areas, such as Torts and Criminal Law.

Attendance and Laptop policies: Students must attend all classes and submit all assignments.  Limited-laptop use policy. 
Enrollment: Limited to 25 students.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Discussion - 3 hours There are roughly 80,000 local government entities in the United States which provide essential services and spend billions of dollars. This course takes a broad approach to state and local government law, both practically and theoretically. Topics to be covered include: federalism, relations between states and localities, governmental liability, zoning, educational equity, and public finance. Readings will be drawn not only from case law and statues, but from history, theory and public policy.

Final Assessment: Exam

2 hours. This course explores the history, law, and public policy of energy regulation in the United States, emphasizing economic and environmental regulation. Competitive restructuring of the natural gas and electric utility industries is emphasized. The basic regulatory schemes for other energy sources—hydroelectric power, coal, oil, and nuclear power—are explored depending on class interest. This seminar is recommended to anyone interested in the energy sector, various models of economic regulation, or regulated industries.

Final Assessment: Take-home exam

Elective course for Environmental Law Certificate Program.

Seminar - 2 hours. This seminar will provide a broad overview of renewable energy law and policy with a particular focus on the California policy and institutional context. The course will begin with an overview of climate and energy policy at the state and national levels, highlighting the divergence between policies that California is implementing and the current state of national energy policy. The role of renewable energy and its relationship to energy efficiency, fuel economy, cap and trade, and other related policies would be discussed within this broader context. The course will also explore constraints on California’s ability to shape its energy future due to dormant commerce clause, federal preemption, international trade law, and other issues related to California’s renewable portfolio standard and renewable fuel policies. The course will proceed to focus on renewable electricity, including an overview of technologies and a survey of some of the common mechanisms to promote renewable electricity development, the rationale for these policies, and criticisms and concerns that have been raised about them. Then we will turn to the implementation of California’s renewable portfolio standard, including an overview of state agencies responsible for implementing different aspects of this law and a review of legal requirements and areas of contention in RPS implementation, including eligibility, procurement, transmission permitting and interconnection, renewable energy permitting, enforcement. The question of whether and how to plan for renewable energy given California’s existing market and institutional structure would also be addressed.  After covering these different aspects of the renewable portfolio standard, the course would review some of the fundamentals of project development from a developer’s perspective. The course will conclude by addressing renewable transportation fuels, including a review of technologies, an overview of state and national policy in this area, and analysis of how state policy is shaped and constrained by considerations of federal and international law.

Discussion - 3 hours. The emphasis of this course is to provide real world civil litigation experience and prepare students for a remedies bar exam question. The course provides an overview of the most important legal and equitable remedies available in both private and public law contexts.  The topics covered include money damages, punitive damages, equitable remedies such as injunctions, contempt, restitution, and specific performance.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hours. This course introduces students to the economic analysis of law. Students will learn to use the tools of economic analysis (marginal cost and benefit, supply and demand, opportunity cost, etc.) to illuminate and critique familiar areas of law, including property, contracts, torts, and criminal law. Throughout the course, students will consider how economic analysis complements and conflicts with other concerns of the legal system, including fairness and efficiency.  The course does not require any background in economics.

Discussion - 4 hours. An introduction to environmental law, focusing primarily on federal law.  Includes coverage of the historical development of environmental law, including the transition from common law to statutory law; the role of courts, the legislature, and the executive branch in the development and implementation of environmental policy; allocation of authority among different levels of government; the role of market forces in environmental decisions; and the major regulatory strategies that have been applied to control environmental harm. Major statutes considered include the National Environmental Policy Act, Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, and Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 hours. May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with professor's permission. The "nation-state" of California has for many years been a national and global leader in environmental law and policy. This seminar course will provide a survey of key California environmental law and policy issues. Those issues include the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA); coastal planning and regulation; renewable energy law and policy; California's leadership role regarding the law of global warming/climate change; property rights and the environment; the ecosystem crisis affecting the California Delta; Proposition 65 (the Safe Drinking Water & Toxic Enforcement Act); the public trust doctrine; and environmental federalism (i.e., the respective California and federal roles in environmental regulation). A special feature of this course will be a number of guest speakers on the above topics, including practicing environmental attorneys, judges, policymakers and non-legal experts (e.g., scientists and economists). The course grade for this class will be based primarily on a student paper, in lieu of a final exam. The course will likely include a field trip to UC Davis’ Tahoe Environmental Research Center at Lake Tahoe to bring students into direct contact with some of the resources and issues being studied.

Classroom Policies: This course has an attendance policy.

Discussion - 3 hours.  Core course for Environmental Law Certificate Program.  This class examines underlying theory and practice in securing compliance with our major environmental laws.  After exploring basic principles of enforcement, we look at current issues arising in implementing environmental law in civil prosecutions, criminal prosecutions, and citizen suits.  These include environmental federalism, deterrence-based and cooperation-based theories of enforcement, penalty policies, supplemental environmental projects, mens rea requirements for criminal violations, and standing and other prerequisites for citizen enforcement.  In addition to statutory, regulatory, and case materials, the class includes case studies, role plays, and extensive policy discussion.

Prerequisite: Prior enrollment in 285 Environmental Law is recommended, but not required. 
Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 units.  Trade tariffs, fecal water pollution, and migrant workers’ rights: these are all issues that have been in the news this year.  A common thread: these issues all affect, and are affected by, aspects of our food system and the laws surrounding this system.  This course explores the various legal structures surrounding the governance of our food system; we will cover environmental regulation (or lack thereof), food safety laws, trade laws, and labor laws.  Indeed, the structure of our food system is especially in flux during this administration, given the upcoming passage of the Farm Bill, as well as the enactment of various tariffs.  We will discuss all of these issues in a structured reading-group fashion, and learn from each other through presentations on your own research projects as well.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Discussion -- 2 hours. Course will provide an overview of California and federal laws impacting farmworkers and how such laws have been applied to regulate working conditions in agriculture. This class will discuss the challenges faced in advocating for improvement of workplace and housing conditions in the agricultural industry. Topics covered will include: wage and hour laws, health and safety regulations, pesticides, farm labor contractors and sharecropping, administrative agency enforcement, anti-retaliation and concerted activity protections, farmworker housing, discrimination and harassment, guest workers and various immigration issues.

Discussion - 3 hours. This course addresses the legal and public policy dimensions of climate change, perhaps the most important environmental issue of our time. Climate change law and policy represent a rapidly developing field, with important changes taking place internationally, at the federal level and within the State of California. While the primary emphasis of the class will be on climate initiatives in the United States and its political subdivisions, international climate change treaties and negotiations will also be discussed. This course utilizes an integrated, interdisciplinary approach, bringing together air pollution, water supply, coastal planning, land use, ocean and fisheries and energy issues. A complete examination of climate change law and policy requires some foundational understanding of climate science and resource economics; accordingly, the course will briefly address these latter topics. Both greenhouse gas mitigation policies and climate change adaptation strategies will be featured in the course. The class will feature some guest speakers, but will primary utilize a discussion format.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 2 Hours. Introduction to the field of environmental justice. We will cover the origins and history of the Environmental Justice movement; Environmental Justice’s distinctive approach to lawyering, with an emphasis on building power rather than winning cases; and an introduction to important topics in environmental justice, including siting of locally unwanted land uses; community-based research; the connections between Environmental Justice and the planning and public health professions; and global climate change. Guest speakers will be invited when available and appropriate.

Seminar - 2 hours. Emerging technologies such as genetic engineering, nanotechnology, synthetic biology, and geoengineering have the potential to transform lives, economic systems, and entire societies. The health and environmental risks and uncertainties associated with these technologies also pose novel and fascinating challenges for regulators. Existing laws, domestic and international, in some instances offer a starting point for managing risk and uncertainty, but often constitute an imperfect fit. Emerging technologies present new and unanticipated circumstances, and their rapid development frequently outpaces the ability of legislators and regulators to respond. This course will examine legal regimes that might apply to various emerging technologies and consider governance mechanisms and reforms that might enable more foresighted and participatory development and management of technology. Students will do extensive reading of cases, statutes, treaties, and scholarly analyses. Each student will write a 25-page research paper on a topic of emerging technology regulation.

Skills - 2 hours. Drafting a Solar Farm Bill is a practicum in which the class acts as an advisory law firm for its client, a solar farm bill solution and its facilitator, the educational non-profit Climate Solutions Advocacy Institute (CSAI). The class objective is to provide the client with a white paper that can advise CSAI in its development of a massive solar farm bill, financed by green bonds. Students in this class will work together like attorneys providing advice to a client by acting as investigator, organizer and evaluator of the key modular elements needed for a solar farm bill: green bond financing, regulatory oversight, power purchase agreements and land leasing. Students will investigate other renewable energy projects in the USA and abroad, as well as business agreements between solar farm operators, utilities, and land owners. They will consult with legislators & legislative experts, and incorporate feedback from various stakeholders, advancing their knowledge of legal investigation, collaboration and memo drafting. Professor recommends LAW 285 Environmental Law as a pre- or co-requisite.

Final Assessment: Other – (e.g. Trial, Mediation, Brief)
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Seminar - This course will cover the law of biodiversity, with a focus on the laws of the United States. We will review the science of biodiversity and biodiversity loss, and then examine laws addressing biodiversity at the federal, state, and local levels. We will cover biodiversity law, ecosystem management, and emerging challenges like climate change and renewable energy development. The course will be graded based on short response papers and participation in class discussions.

Law 285 Environmental Law is recommended
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion - 3 hours.  The course addresses law and policy issues in health care financing and access to health care.  Course materials and discussion will draw from current events as well as case law, statutes and regulations.  Likely topics include the Affordable Care Act and challenges to it, alternative health care payer systems, including single-payer proposals, and role of civil rights law in leveraging access to health care, and the implications of religious freedom protections on health care access.

Final Assessment: Exam.

Seminar - 2 hrs. Public health law, seen broadly, is the government's power and responsibility to ensure the conditions for the population's health. The use of this power results in a series of trade-offs between the collective good of public health and the individual's interests in liberty and property. We will look at the debate over paternalism, as well as issues raised by methods such as surveillance, health education campaigns, immunization and testing, quarantine, and criminal prosecution. We will do case studies of specific topics, including issues related to the response of government and public health officials to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hours.  This course examines the ethical, legal, and social issues that arise from research on and use of biomedical technologies.  The course introduces and critically evaluates the dominant principlist approach to Western bioethics. It uses interdisciplinary methods, including critical theory and science and technology studies to consider the role of law on issues arising from biotechnology and science-based knowledge systems that implicate social norms and personal values. The curriculum may include issues arising from human subject research, end-of-life care, assisted reproductive technologies, genetic and regenerative medicine research, human cell and tissue use, and emerging biotechnologies. Completion of the course requires a substantial research paper. There is no final exam.

Seminar - 3 units. This course uses both reproductive rights and reproductive justice frameworks. It also incorporates critical race and feminist theory to examine a wide range of laws and practices that impact reproductive rights in the United States. The course syllabus focuses on domestic law and policy, but research projects on international topics is encouraged.  Discussion topics may include abortion, contraception, sterilization, religious restrictions in sectarian hospitals, refusal clauses, assisted reproductive and genetic technology use, public and private funding restrictions, medical standards, and emerging issues.  Completion of the course requires a substantial research paper. 

Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course explores current topics at the crossroads of neuroscience and the law.  The course introduces foundational bioethics and some basics of cognitive science.  It examines the relationship between social science and the law, notably how empirical research findings are used to design legal institutions.  It considers the role of scientific models of human cognition and motivation in the context of legal policy creation or sentencing decisions. It covers topics that include neuroscience evidence at sentencing, brain-based lie detection, tort liability for brain injuries, brain-based enhancement and the boundaries between life and death.
 

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Seminar - 2 hours. Biotechnology and Pharmaceuticals are two of the fastest growing industries in the U.S., and the legal issues that arise in connection with representing them are complex and evolving. This seminar will focus on the transactional, intellectual property, and regulatory legal issues that challenge lawyers working with clients in these industries.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion - "Public lands" refers to national parks, national forests, national wildlife refuges, and other lands owned and managed by the federal government.  These lands comprise approximately half of the land in California and the western U.S.  Various natural resources are found on public lands: timber, water, hard-rock minerals, oil and natural gas, renewable energy resources, wildlife, and wilderness.  This course covers the legal aspects of managing these lands and their resources, including the history of public land law, the scope of federal and state authority over the federal lands, and the allocation of public land resources among competing uses, including consumption, recreation, and preservation. The course grade will be based primarily on a final exam.

Elective course for Environmental Law Certificate Program.
Prerequisite: prior enrollment in 285 Environmental Law is recommended, but not required.
Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 hours. May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with professor's approval. This seminar will explore the theory and practice of law pertaining to the enactment and enforcement of laws regulating or aiding the poor.    The course will examine the history and philosophy underpinning social/legal concepts of "poverty," "welfare" and "entitlement," and will look at some specific examples of significant legislative programs in these areas (e.g., Social Security/Supplemental Security Income; Aid to Families with Dependent Children/Temporary Assistance to Needy Families; Nutrition programs; Medicare/Medicaid; Unemployment Insurance; and the National Housing Act programs).   The course will specifically address administration of public benefits programs for poor and other disadvantaged persons in our society and the use of law to create opportunity for disadvantaged groups.  The focus will be not so much upon the specific content of such programs, but upon issues confronting attorneys who practice in these public interest/poverty law subjects.  The course, therefore, will incorporate various aspects of administrative, constitutional, and poverty law practice. Evaluation is based on class participation and a written project.  Class limit 18 students.

Seminar - 2 hours.   This course provides an overview of various intersections between sociology and law in the United States, from the origins of the country through current debates. Substantive topics may include how race, gender, class, or sexual orientation affect immigration and citizenship, education, housing and residence, or criminal justice. We will examine these issues through social science articles, case law, the U.S. Constitution and other laws, as well as media output (film and newsprint). In addition to these resources, student experiences and perspectives will inform class discussions.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours.  Explores the Constitutional powers of the President in Article II and how they intersect with Congressional power. Emphasis on executive and legislative power, executive orders, appointment and removal powers, executive privilege and immunity, pardons, impeachment, Congressional investigations, independent and special counsels, and the 25th Amendment.

Prerequisite: 205 Constitutional Law I. This pre-requisite will not be waived.
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Seminar - 3 hours. In this course, students will take on the role of Justices of, and advocates before, the Supreme Court of the United States.
The 16 students in the course will be divided up into two panels of 8 Associate Justices (with the instructor to serve as the Chief for both panels). The course will begin with a short unit on the certiorari process, the crucial procedure through which the Supreme Court decides the cases it will hear. Each panel will review the materials for a case pending before the Court at the certiorari stage and debate whether to grant review.
The course will then transition to our primary undertaking: a series of between four and eight oral arguments involving actual cases before the Supreme Court during OT2017. The cases will involve a mix of statutory and constitutional issues, as well as criminal and civil issues. Between two and four students will argue each case to the panel of Justices on which they do not sit. Arguments will be based on the briefs that have already been filed in the Court as well at least one class session previewing and preparing students for the substance of each case. After argument, the panels of Justices will meet to vote on argued cases, with the instructor assigning majority and dissenting opinions for each case. The written opinions will represent the final work product for the class, and constitute the primary portion of each student’s grade.

Graduation Requirements: May meet Advanced Writing Requirement with the instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper.
Classroom Policies: This course has a no-laptop policy.

Lecture - 2 hours. This course explores the what and how of national security. Specifically, what does national security mean and how does it play out institutionally, jurisprudentially, and policy-wise in the United States? Combining historical, legal, and normative perspectives, this seminar explores how the meaning of national security has shifted and expanded over time. Rather than being exclusively limited to notions of war and foreign policy, the concept of national security also intersects with a wide-range of domestic legal and policy issues, from civil rights and immigration, to private law, business, and environmental and economic issues. Instead of presenting a rigid notion of national security, this course aims to chart the term’s complexity, malleability, and capacity to serve ends that are both corrosive and supportive of the public good. 

Prerequisites: Constitutional Law. A prior law course or background in Public International Law is recommended
Classroom Policies: This course has a participation policy
Final Assessment: Simulation exercises and written assignments
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar - 2 hours. While there is no fixed definition of privacy, most experts would agree that technology now makes it easier than ever for private and public actors to exploit it.  Our personal information can be found in massive databases as well as in multiple places on the Internet. Not only do advertisers, creditors, and employers want this information, so do law enforcement agencies.  This course examines several topics that arise in field of information privacy law, with a special emphasis on government access to this information.

Discussion – 3 hours. This course surveys approaches to privacy regulation around the globe, including a comparison of regulatory frameworks and different policy solutions. The course also introduces the major international privacy regulatory and enforcement institutions. Core lecturing will focus on the European General Data Protection Regulation and how it compares with US law. Core concepts include controller/processor, personal data/personal information, data subject/consumer, cross-border transfers and processing which will be approached through lecture from a comparative perspective.

Final Assessment: Take-home exam
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Discussion - 3 hours. China has become factory to the world, India its back office, and the United States its information intermediary. Our lives are increasingly intertwined with international trade. Trade law affects what goods we can buy, the safety of the foods we consume, and the conditions under which our clothes are produced. This course will review the existing landscape of trade regulation from the World Trade Organization to regional organizations such as NAFTA. The course will consider the implications of international trade law for developing economies and analyze both the strengths and weaknesses of the current international trade order.

Final Assessment: Exam

Seminar - 2 hours. We will focus on treaty law as reflected in regional trade agreements such as NAFTA and bilateral investment treaties (BITs), as well as on customary international law that protects investors from expropriation, denials of fair and equitable treatment, and discrimination on the basis of nationality.  We will examine the actual mechanisms for investor-State dispute settlement under arbitral facilities such as the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes as well as under ad hoc rules.  We will also address the environmental and social issues surrounding international legal protection of foreign investment and proposals for modifying or even eliminating agreements due to concerns about regulatory “chill”.

Seminar - 2 hours. Arbitration has emerged as the principal method for resolving international disputes arising from cross-border commercial transactions and private foreign investment. This seminar offers an opportunity to study international arbitration involving States, individuals, and corporations; it covers both international commercial arbitration and investment treaty arbitration. It will focus on international law, principles, and practices, and students will learn about the interaction between international and domestic legal sources governing the operation of international arbitration. Broadly, the seminar will cover the following areas: the parties; the agreement to arbitrate; the arbitrators; the arbitral proceeding; and, the arbitral award.

Discussion - 3 hours. This course covers U.S. laws, policies and practices pertaining to migrants including the regulation of their exclusion, admission and removal from the United States, and, as to some, their naturalization as U.S. citizens. These topics will be covered historically and to the present from various perspectives, including constitutional law, administrative law, ethics and morality, national security, economics, and human rights. You will engage in constitutional and statutory written analysis as part of your grade. 

Final Assessment: Two take-home writing assignments
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

This course satisfies the immigration certificate.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course conducts a closer examination of various topics and subject matters that relate to immigration and citizenship law, with a particular focus on how these laws affect the civil, political and social rights of immigrants, including those who are undocumented. In particular, the course will explore various litigation, advocacy and community organizing efforts and projects that have been used to advocate on behalf of immigrants and other non-citizens. Topics related to immigration will vary each semester but may include: presidential executive actions (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), the differences in rights and privileges of citizens and non-citizens, the meaning of formal and substantive citizenship in places regarded “outside” of the borders of the U.S., the enforcement of immigration law by states and local governments, sanctuary cities, federal enforcement programs in the interior and exterior of the United States, and the intersection of immigration law and criminal law. Topics on citizenship law will also vary each semester but may include: how citizenship may be acquired, how citizenship may be lost or revoked, and proposed constitutional amendments to birthright citizenship.

Seminar - 2 hours. This course examines the history of immigration-related prosecutions, explores how they are currently conducted, and looks at the streamlined proceedings that happen in districts along the southern border.

Prerequisite: Law 206 Criminal Law. Law 292 Immigration Law is recommended.
Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement..
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Practicum - 2 hours. This practicum will focus on student's investigation, research, interviewing and client counseling skills. The course is an outgrowth of the UC Davis Humanizing Deportation Project, an interdisciplinary storytelling project that has catalogued over 200 stories of deported individuals throughout Mexico. Students will review the stories in the archive, research possible forms of immigration relief for deported individuals, and identify possible candidates for legal screening. After an in-depth training, students will travel to Tijuana, Mexico to provide legal consultations to either deported individuals or transit migrants to identify whether any of them have any possibility of returning or entering the U.S. Travel and lodging for students will be subsidized through the Humanizing Deportation Project and the UC Davis Public Impact Research Initiative. Funding restrictions require capping enrollment at four. Up to 8 students may enroll if more funding, including self-funding by students, becomes available.

Students who participate in the practicum will be asked to meet once a month on Wednesdays from noon to 2pm on the following dates to prepare for the trip to the border substantively and logistically: January 19; February 9, and March 9.  Travel to Tijuana will tentatively occur over two days (Friday and Saturday or Saturday to Sunday) either toward the end of Spring Break (Week of March 21) or toward the end of the following week (Week of March 28). Following, the trip to Tijuana, we will convene again once a month from noon to 2pm on Wednesdays on the following dates to debrief and complete any research or pending tasks based on our visit to the border: April 6 and April 20.  Please consider your availability carefully before signing up. If dates change, you will be notified immediately. Students will be asked to produce a legal memorandum with an assessment of the legal claims, if any, of the clients they meet and a brief reflection essay about the experience as they relate to lawyering and immigration law and policy.  
 

Final Assessment: Other
Prerequisite: Application
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Seminar - 2 hours. Evaluation is based on class participation and a written project that may satisfy the advanced legal writing requirement. This class will examine the issues and problems associated with providing civil legal services to persons and interests in American society that typically have been unable to afford or otherwise obtain representation from the private bar. Students will discuss selected readings on topics such as the definition, history and development of  public interest law; current trends in public interest advocacy; the role and/or obligation of the private bar (and law schools) in contributing to public interest law; special issues faced by public interest attorneys with respect to client relationships and legal ethics; and public interest law strategies. In the second part of the course, we will concentrate on some particular issues in contemporary public interest practice (civil rights, health care access, land use, etc.). Some of these sessions will be led by practicing public interest lawyers.

Lecture - 1 hour. This is a one-unit class aimed at exposing students (who already have a working knowledge of spoken Spanish) to Spanish-language legal concepts, terminology, settings, and topics and will emphasize speaking and listening comprehension. The materials and topics will be based on law and procedure in such areas as employment, immigration, housing, and personal injury law. The class will also cover materials to strengthen cultural awareness and emotional intelligence as tools that are necessary to effectively represent Spanish-Speaking clients. Depending on availability, we may have 1-2 guest speakers. Classroom presentations, activities, simulations, discussions, and readings will be in Spanish, with limited exceptions. Students will have the opportunity to practice their Spanish, with a view toward being comfortable communicating with clients who are monolingual or dominant in Spanish.

Prerequisite: Spanish proficiency
Classroom Policies: This course has a participation policy
Final Assessment: Oral presentation in Spanish
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

 This course meets every other week.

Seminar - 2 hours.  This class will address video game-related intellectual property doctrine and theory, the video game industry and transactions, ways in which video games and the video game industry shape law and society, and other current legal issues surrounding video games.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: Satisfies Advanced Writing Requirement

Seminar - 2 hours. The business of professional sports has evolved significantly over the past decade, driven by both urban development trends, along with an explosion in technology, and social change. These forces, along with others, have dramatically influenced the economic shape and arc of professional sports teams, which in turn impacts all aspects of professional sports. This course focuses on providing the students with a basic understanding of (1) how sports teams are legally structured, (2) the diversification of business lines (e.g., real estate, hospitality, non-profits, venture capital, marketing), (3) the role, structure, and importance of the arena/facility as the modern community campfire,  (4) legal areas of focus (e.g., contracts, intellectual property, finance, legislation, and risk management), and (5) the cutting edge legal issues on the sports landscape today (e.g., music license rights and sports betting).

Law 215 Business Associations is recommended
Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Discussion - 2 hours. We will take an intensive look at important issues in Trademark Law, including the nature of trademarks, the acquisition and loss of trademark rights,  trademark registration, trademark infringement, federal aspects of unfair competition law,  defenses to infringement, and expressive uses of trademarks.  We will also explore the legal frameworks surrounding actions for false advertising, false endorsement, and rights of publicity.

Seminar - 3 hours.  The rise of brands marks a fundamental shift in the law and business practice of trademarks. Where trademarks have long protected marks that signal the source of a good or service to consumers, today customers value logos such as the Nike Swoosh in and of themselves. In the new “experience economy” corporations sell identity and community, authenticity and auras, not products. Starbucks is “everything but the coffee;” it is an experience, an identity, and a place to connect with others. Furthermore, branding is ubiquitous. Every charity, organization, and university seeks to brand itself, that is, to cultivate and trade off its distinct identity. This seminar explores the challenges brands pose to traditional trademark law. Traditional trademark protects consumers against fraud and confusion. Brand creation, management, and licensing involve distinct concerns, less focused on consumer confusion and more akin to copyright law’s concerns for story-telling and expressive control. This seminar takes a close, interdisciplinary look at branding, preparing students to understand modern branding strategies and the challenges such strategies may pose to traditional trademark law and policy. Topics covered include merchandising rights, unfair competition, and counterfeits.

Graduation requirements: May meet Advanced Writing Requirement with the instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Paper

Discussion - 3 hours. We will thoroughly examine the law of copyright, including its application to literature, music, films, fashion, architecture, television, art, computer programs, and the Internet. Issues addressed include: what works are eligible for copyright protection, the copyright owner's rights, the term of protection, copyright ownership and transfer, infringement, and defenses to infringement.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hrs. This course looks at the many ways that the law shapes and regulates the arts, whether through the First Amendment, public funding, tax law, rights of publicity, intellectual property regimes like copyright, trademark, and VARA, as well as the government's own art-making and unmaking, particularly in regard to public art, architecture, and monuments. Assignments may include judicial opinions, briefs, philosophical and legal scholarship, case studies of particular artworks, and in-class oral arguments.

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.
Final Assessment: Other 

Lecture - This course examines the law surrounding art and cultural heritage. The focus will be on copyright, cultural property, and cultural heritage laws. Students will have the opportunity to consider U.S. law, international regulation, and the laws of other countries in order to broaden their perspectives on the issues, explore what the United States and other countries can learn from each other to improve the status of art and culture, and grapple with the cross-border dimensions of problems such as art forgery, theft or illicit export of cultural property, and the restoration of artworks confiscated during World War II. The class will also explore interdisciplinary perspectives, considering the issues involved for artists, cultural institutions such as museums, and the local, national, and international public. Finally, it will consider the implications of technology, including digitization and the advent of innovations such as 3D printing, for this area.

Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Final Assessment: Take-home exam

Discussion - 2 units. This class will explore the many facets of Entertainment Law. We will study the application of intangible rights (publicity, copyright, trademark, moral rights) to the industry, the various sub-industries within the general category of the Entertainment Industry (TV, motion picture, music, digital media, gaming, publicity, etc.) and the various laws that apply to each.

Final Assessment: Exam

Discussion - 3 hours. This course will introduce students to a wide variety of alternative dispute resolution procedures, with an emphasis on negotiation, mediation, and arbitration. Although basic skills and effective strategies for each procedure will be discussed, the course will focus primarily on the laws and policies that affect how the procedures are structured and conducted. Successful completion of the course will prepare students for the widespread availability and growing popularity of ADR in almost every area of modern legal practice.

Seminar - 2 hours.  In 1925, Congress passed the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) to allow merchants to settle disputes outside of the court system.  In the past three decades, the United States Supreme Court has expanded the FAA dramatically, spurring heated debate.  This class will trace the development of commercial arbitration law, with a special emphasis on hot-button contemporary issues like consumer and employment arbitration, the separability doctrine, preemption of state law, and the arbitrability of statutory claims. 

Discussion - 2 hours. This course will provide students with an introduction to the theory and practice of international arbitration--the preferred method of dispute-resolution in international business. We will start by developing a sound working knowledge of the principal international treaties and national laws that undergird the international arbitral system and will analyze the elements of an international arbitration clause, including the relevance of the stipulated arbitration rules, the significance of the agreed-upon place of arbitration, and contractual options concerning number of arbitrators and the method of their selection. As the term advances, students will gain a practical, in-depth understanding of each of the principal stages of the international arbitral process, including: enforcement of the arbitration agreement; initiation of arbitral proceedings; pursuit of provisional remedies; and conduct of the arbitration itself – from the pleading stage, through the exchange of written submissions, to the handling of the merits hearing. Having learned the fundamentals of the international arbitral process, we will spend several sessions exploring how that process typically plays out in the context of investor-state arbitration, where public international law provides the substantive rules of decision in claims between private parties and sovereign states. We will conclude by examining procedures for enforcing and challenging arbitral awards and will evaluate certain contemporary critiques of the international arbitral system.

Law 202 Contracts is recommended.
Final Assessment: Exam
Grading Mode: Letter Grading

Discussion - 2 hours. This course will help prepare students for responsible leadership and service in the many roles that lawyers perform both in and out of legal practice, and in their roles as social change agents.  Lawyers are frequently asked to take on leadership roles in law firms, government, non-profit and business settings, and political, social and educational organizations.  Yet many of our law students graduate from law school without studying methods of effective leadership or assessing their own leadership traits and capabilities.  This course allows students to study and apply methods of leadership, conflict resolution and ethical decision-making to their current work at King Hall and in their future practice areas in the law and government.  Students are introduced to the basic principles of leadership, conflict resolution and ethics in the legal profession and explore leadership methods more generally.  Students will assess their own leadership skills and abilities and critically examine the leadership traits, styles and decision-making processes of prominent leaders who are lawyers.   Fall 2021 course taught by Senior Assistant Dean Emily Scivoletto.

Accelerated Schedule/Meets on Saturday: This course will have one Saturday meeting on October 16, 2021.  Last class will be held on Tuesday (Thursday classes meet), November 9, 2021.

Final Assessment: Paper

Seminar - 2 hours. Recent developments in neuroscience and psychology support the contention that we live in a world impacted by trauma. But lawyers are not often trained in recognizing how trauma affects our work. Trauma-informed lawyering is an approach to the practice of law that equips students with the knowledge and skills to navigate these difficult environments. We will discuss what lawyers need to know about the science behind traumatic experiences; the various forms of trauma, including vicarious trauma, which can afflict those who are exposed to the stories of trauma that others have endured; and how our own trauma may be triggered or amplified in the experiences we encounter as legal professionals. We will learn evidence-based approaches to identifying trauma, whether in our clients, opposing counsel, employers or ourselves. We will further develop strategies for working with trauma, including recognizing our own limitations and scope of work (lawyers are not therapists), and adapting communication, advocacy, and legal strategies when dealing with victims of trauma. Most importantly, we will construct a toolkit for safeguarding our own mental health from the effects of vicarious trauma.
 

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading

Seminar – 2 hours. An increasingly popular trend in legal scholarship is the use of data (quantitative, qualitative, and, most recently, geospatial) to inform legal theories and socio-political debates. Indeed, it is rare today to come across a law review article or Supreme Court opinion that does not reference or rely upon some analysis of data to make a legal argument. Therefore, being able to be a critical consumer of empirical legal analysis is a skill that every lawyer should have. In this class you will learn about the three types of data analysis (quantitative, qualitative, and geospatial) commonly used in Empirical Legal Studies. Then, you will read scholarly papers that utilize these analyses to get a firm understanding of which techniques are most (and least) persuasive in making legal arguments, and how this can change depending on the subject matter and audience. To fortify your understanding of how to apply data analysis in legal arguments, you will choose one article to present to the class, explaining and critiquing the author's methods. Finally, you will submit a research prospectus on a topic of your choosing and also provide substantive feedback on one other student's prospectus. The research prospectus should include a literature review of the available empirical legal studies in your area as well as two or three *original* tables, charts or graphs that rely on publicly-available data and advance your argument. All students will present their research prospectuses to the class.

Final Assessment: Paper
Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Seminar/Clinical - 3 hours. The purpose of this seminar is to train law students to educate the community about basic legal rights and responsibilities. Students attend an initial four-hour orientation, followed by weekly seminars that prepare them to teach in a local high school at least two times per week. Students must prepare a paper or journal, as determined by the instructor.

Enrollment: Limited to 15 students.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Basic appellate practice and procedure. Beginning instruction in oral advocacy skills and an opportunity to practice these skills in front of a moot court. Students compete in four rounds of oral arguments which, combined with the second semester of the program, determine the rankings for selecting participants in the annual Neumiller Competition and other interschool competition teams and for membership on the Moot Court Board. Both courses 410A and 410B must be taken in order to qualify for most interschool competitions.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

This course is a continuation of Course 410A. Focuses on the development of effective appellate brief writing skills and the refinement of oral advocacy skills.Participants research and write two appellate briefs and argue the cases before a moot court. The first appellate brief and arguments are judged for selection of interschool competition teams, participants in the annual Neumiller Competition, and membership on the Moot Court Board. The second appellate brief, requiring independent individual research, is written and edited under the supervision of the professor, and may satisfy the writing requirement.  

Prerequisite: Law 410A Appellate Advocacy I.
Graduation Requirements: May satisfy the Advanced Writing Requirement OR count towards the Professional Skills Requirement, student must choose one.
Enrollment: Limited to 40 students.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

The UC Davis Journal of International Law and Policy publishes semi-annually and strives to contribute pertinent and interesting scholarly works to the field of international law. The following student positions comprise the enrollment of this journal:

• Editor in Chief: 1 position, 2 units per semester . Position may be held by the same person for both semesters, or a different person each semester. If there are two Editors in Chief, they have to decide who takes the units in the fall and who takes the units in the spring. They cannot be split each semester.
• Managing Editor: 3 positions, 1 unit per semester
• Senior Articles Editor : 4 positions, 1 unit per year (will perform work both semesters, but receive credit only one semester)

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

The Journal of Juvenile Law & Policy is a biannual publication of the UC Davis School of Law that addresses the unique concerns of youth in the American legal system.  The following student positions comprise the enrollment of this journal:

• Editor in Chief: 1 position, 2 units per semester. Position may be held by the same person for both semesters, or a different person each semester. If there are two Editors in Chief, they have to decide who takes the units in the fall and who takes the units in the spring. They cannot be split each semester.
• Managing Sections Editor: 1 position, 1 unit per semester
• Managing Articles Editor: 1 position, 1 unit per semester
• Senior Articles Editors: 3 positions, 1 unit per semester

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

• Editor in Chief: 1 position, 2 units per semester. Position may be held by the same person for both semesters, or a different person each semester. If there are two Editors in Chief, they have to decide who takes the units in the fall and who takes the units in the spring. They cannot be split each semester.
• Managing Editor: 1 position, 1 unit per semester
• Senior Articles Editor: 4 positions, 1 unit per year (will perform work both semesters, but receive credit only one semester)
• Executive Editor : 4 positions, 1 unit per year (will perform work both semesters, but receive credit only one semester)

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

The Immigration and Nationality Law Review (INLR) is in part a reprint journal and serves as an anthology of seminal articles in immigration, nationality, and citizenship law.  The INLR also creates space for student Notes.  The following student positions comprise the enrollment of this journal:

• Editor in Chief: 1 position, 2 units per semester. Position may be held by the same person for both semesters, or a different person each semester. If there are two Editors in Chief, they have to decide who takes the units in the fall and who takes the units in the spring. They cannot be split each semester.
• Managing Editors: 2 positions, 1 unit per semester
• Executive Editors: 3 positions, 1 unit per semester

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Graduation Requirements: May satisfy Advanced Writing Requirement with instructor's permission.

Named after the late Justice Frances Carr. Students participate in mock trials presided over by judges and critiqued by experienced litigators. A preliminary round is followed by quarter-finals, semi-finals, and a final round. Competition is open to second and third year students.

Enrollment: Limited to 40 students.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Participation in interschool moot court and lawyering skills competitions. Enrollment is limited to students actually representing the school in the interschool competitions. Competition must be authorized by the appropriate faculty advisor. The faculty advisor may condition the award of academic credit for any particular competition on the performance of such additional work as may be reasonable to justify the credit.

Prerequisite: Permission of the faculty advisor.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Members of the Moot Court Board assist in the administration of the School of Law’s Moot Court Program by performing a variety of tasks under the supervision of the course instructor. Members receive one credit for each semester of service on the board, up to a maximum of two. Credit is awarded only after approval by the instructor. Students must sign up to take both semesters.

Prerequisite: 410A and 410B Appellate Advocacy.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Members of the King Hall Negotiations Board assist in the administration of the King Hall Negotiation Team by performing a variety of tasks under the supervision of the course instructor. Members receive one credit for each semester of service on the board, up to a maximum of two per academic year. Credit is awarded only after approval by the instructor.

Enrollment by instructor permission.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Members of the Trial Practice Honors Board administer the Frances Carr Intraschool Trial Advocacy Competition. Members are nominated by their individual Trial Practice I adjuncts. Students receive one credit for service on the board. Credit is awarded upon approval of faculty advisor.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Completion of a law review writing project under the editorial supervision of editors of the UC Davis Law Review, and under the active and regular supervision of a faculty member if satisfying the Advanced Writing Requirement. Members must perform substantial support of production of the UC Davis Law Review (including but not limited to Bluebooking and cite-checking upcoming articles). In the spring semester, credit is obtained only upon making substantial progress towards completing the writing project and satisfactory production work. Credit for both semesters is awarded only after certification by the Editor in Chief and approval of the law review faculty advisor(s). 

Application through the UC Davis Law Review Write-On required for enrollment.
Graduation Requirements: May meet Advanced Writing Requirement with the instructor's permission.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Editors of the UC Davis Law Review are nominated after successful completion of 416 Law Review Member, and may receive four credits over two semesters for service as an editor. Credits are awarded on a deferred basis upon completion of both semesters. Editors must perform editorial duties requiring a substantial time commitment. Credit is awarded only after certification by the Editor in Chief and approval of the law review faculty advisor(s).

Editorship nomination through the UC Davis Law Review required for enrollment.
Prerequisites: 416 Law Review Member must be completed prior to enrolling in this course.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Environs is a biannual environmental law and policy journal which supports an open forum for the discussion of current environmental issues. Articles explore environmental issues, particularly those pertaining to the state of California. The editor in chief of Environs receives two unit of credit for each semester of service. Managing editors receive 1 unit of credit.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Environs is a biannual environmental law and policy journal that provides an open forum for the discussion of current environmental issues, particularly those pertaining to the state of California. Grading is on a Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory basis. The following student positions comprise the enrollment of this journal:

• Editor in Chief: 1 position, 2 units per semester. Position may be held by the same person for both semesters, or a different person each semester. If there are two Editors in Chief, they have to decide who takes the units in the fall and who takes the units in the spring. They cannot be split each semester.
• Managing Editor: 2 positions, 1 unit per year (will perform work both semesters, but receive credit only one semester)
• Executive Editor: 8 positions, 1 unit per semester

The completion of a writing project under the active and regular supervision of a faculty member in satisfaction of the legal writing requirement. The writing project must be an individually authored work of rigorous intellectual effort of at least 20 typewritten, double spaced pages, excluding footnotes. The project may take any of several forms; for example, a paper, a brief, a memorandum of law, a proposed statute, a statutory scheme or set of administrative regulations (with explanatory comments), or a will or agreement (with explanatory comments). The advanced writing project may also be undertaken in connection with another course or seminar to satisfy the advanced legal writing requirement. The number of units for the writing project is approved by the faculty supervisor and depends on the scope of the writing effort.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory (Law 419)

*Unless a request for letter grading is made in advance (Law 419A).

 This clinic provides practical experience in providing legal services to indigent clients who have filed civil rights actions in state and federal trial and appellate courts. Students work on clinic cases under the supervision of the clinic director. Students are required to follow the clinic office procedures and to employ skills such as interviewing, counseling, research, writing, negotiating, taking and defending depositions, and possibly oral and trial advocacy. Students are certified to appear in court. Each unit of clinic credit assumes four hours of work per week. In any one semester, a minimum of two units (eight hours) of clinic work is required; this clinic work is required in addition to any credit received in the skills component of this program.

2-6 units. King Hall’s Corporate Counsel Externship Program allows students to earn academic credit in the fall and spring semesters in in pre-vetted and approved corporate counsel offices for-profit and non-profit companies. Approved placements may be remote, hybrid or in-person. Field supervisors oversee assignments and feedback for students to build their legal skills and knowledge in this important legal sector. Students will learn how in-house attorneys collaborate and communicate with the company client, and how they incorporate the client’s unique mission, business, and industry context into their legal advice. 

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory.

Seminar - 1 hour. This course is for those enrolled in an externship only. Students will be enrolled in this course by the Registrar’s office.  Students create strategic goals for their placement, focus on professionalism and professional identity issues in seminar meetings and with their small section coaches, and engage in reflection on what they are learning through discussion and written assignments.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

All King Hall externships have two components. Students perform substantive legal work at a field placement, and under the supervision of a faculty advisor, complete professional development assignments. See the externship website for more information. Students may enroll for part-time or full-time placements. Externs work in state and federal chambers, such as the California Supreme Court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, as well as all trial courts. Students may also work in administrative hearing offices. Students research legal issues, evaluate legal arguments, write judicial memoranda, draft opinions and orders and observe courtroom activity including motions, hearings and trials. As appropriate, students will take part in meetings and discussions in chambers.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

All King Hall externships have two components. Students perform substantive legal work at a field placement, and under the supervision of a faculty advisor, complete professional development assignments. Each externship class has a syllabus outlining those requirements. See the Externship website for more information. Student externs work with the Internal Revenue Service or other governmental tax agency, such as the California Franchise Tax Board and the California Office of Tax Appeals. Assignments include legal research, analysis and writing, and observation of administrative appeals hearings when possible.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Each student is required to enroll for two semesters, receiving four units each semester for total of eight units. Students represent low-income persons in family law and related matters arising out of situations involving family violence. Students are supervised by the staff attorney at the clinic's office. The clinic begins with an intensive 3-day seminar during one of the first weekends of fall semester, eight hours each day on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, focusing on domestic violence and office procedures. Subsequent two-hour seminars are held throughout the year, with approximately 12 seminars being held fall semester and 3 spring semester. Clinical component: Each student performs 10 hours of clinical work per week during the fall semester and 12 hours per week during the spring semester. Under the supervision of the staff attorney, each student represents clients in seeking restraining orders , child custody and visitation, child support, dissolution, and property division. Students also assist clients in obtaining health care services, housing, and public benefits.

The Immigration Law Clinic (ILC) provides legal representation to indigent non-citizens in removal proceedings before U.S. Immigration Courts, the Board of Immigration Appeals, and federal courts,including the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The ILC provides this necessary service to Northern California's immigrant communities, offering education and legal services to low-income immigrants facing deportation while enabling students to gain practical, real-world experience. ILC students take on all major aspects of litigation, including interviewing clients and witnesses, preparing legal briefs, drafting pleadings and motions, and arguing complex legal issues. ILC students regularly conduct naturalization and other legal workshops in the community, engage in broader advocacy projects related to the detention & deportation of immigrants, and provide know your rights presentations in local ICE detention centers.  Responding to the increased collaboration between criminal and immigration enforcement agencies, the ILC has also been at the forefront of indigent detention and deportation defense.

Each student is required to enroll for two semesters, receiving four units each semester for total of eight units. 

Recommended: Law 292 Immigration Law and Procedure and Law 219 Evidence are recommended. 
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.

Clinic - 3 to 5 hours. The Aoki Water Justice Clinic partners with residents, community organizations, and drinking water providers to address of the need for safe, clean, and affordable drinking water. Through weekly lecture, case rounds, and practical experience, students will gain an understanding of state and federal water governance and regulation, local government mechanisms for delivering drinking water, and the legal and financial barriers to implementing safe drinking water projects. Under the supervision of the clinic director and a graduate fellow, students will work together in teams to advise clients on potential governance structures (entity choice), funding options and rate policies; design and present community education trainings; draft local government consolidation proposals, land contracts, and agreements between water users, water systems and local governments; research and draft comment letters to administrative and local governments on issues affecting drinking water; develop and implement media strategies on issues affecting drinking water; and provide technical assistance to communities that seek state funding for water system and capital improvement projects. Students participating in the Clinic are required to attend a full day orientation on August 20, as well as all clinic seminars, case rounds, and supervision meetings.

Clinic - 3 to 5 hours. Students who have successfully completed one semester with the Water Justice Clinic may enroll in the Advanced Water Justice Clinic. Students must attend all case round and supervision meetings, complete at least 9 hours of clinical work per week, and undertake a significant research project. Depending on the nature of the project, students may also be able to satisfy the Advanced Writing Requirement.

All King Hall externships have two components. Students perform substantive legal work at a field placement, and under the supervision of a faculty advisor, complete professional development assignments. Each externship class has a syllabus outlining those requirements. This program is designed to provide students with hands-on lawyering experience in a legislative office, with a legislative committee, or with a government or nonprofit office engaged in legislative and policy work. The underlying purpose of the program is to enable students to become familiar with governance and policymaking in California, including how laws are made, and the role of attorneys in their interpretation and enforcement.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Seminar - 1 hour. Required for students enrolled for 4 or more Capital Law Scholars Externship units (Law 446). Recommended for students enrolled in 2 or 3 Capital Law Scholars Externship units. This course will cover issues related to lawyering in California’s state capital, and help students maximize their educational and professional experience in their externship placements. Topics covered may include legislative and policy research, ethical considerations particular to government or policy work, strategies for policy advocacy, and issues in government lawyering. Students will be assigned appropriate reading and will be required to submit reflective journals based on their externship experience and the topics covered in each seminar session.

All King Hall externships have two components. Students perform substantive legal work at a field placement, and under the supervision of a faculty advisor, complete professional development assignments. See the Externship website for more information. Students gain hands-on experience with a variety of environmental law settings. Past placements have included a large number of California state agencies such as the Department of Water Resources, the state EPA, the CA Governor’s Office, Earthjustice and the Sierra Club.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

All King Hall externships have two components. Students perform substantive legal work at a field placement, and under the supervision of a faculty advisor, complete professional development assignments. See the Externship website for more information. Students gain practical experience in employment relations, including employment discrimination and public sector labor law. Students work under the direct supervision of a lawyer and may join in in a range of activities, with emphasis on observation and participation in actual investigation, interviewing, drafting pleadings, and attendance at hearings. Past placements have included the EEOC, the Legal Aid Society’s Employment Law Center and various CA Attorney General Divisions.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

All King Hall externships have two components. Students perform substantive legal work at a field placement, and under the supervision of a faculty advisor, complete professional development assignments. See the externship website for more information. Students work with and under supervision of practitioners in a wide range of settings in the non-profit sector including advocacy groups, legal aid offices, and federal, state, county and city government offices. Assignments include client interviewing and counseling, research and writing, observation of administrative and judicial proceedings, attendance at client meetings, etc. Past placements have included Legal Services of Northern California, California Lawyers for the Arts, the ACLU, the US Department of Justice, California Attorney General and Agency offices, and civil placements with the US Attorney General.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

All King Hall externships have two components. Students perform substantive legal work at a field placement, and under the supervision of a faculty advisor, complete professional development assignments. See the externship website for more information. Intellectual property externs work for government, academic, and nonprofit entities. Assignments relate to evaluating, obtaining, and licensing intellectual property. Such activities may include assisting in patent prosecution, prior art searches, freedom to operate analyses, license drafting, and license negotiations. Prior placements have included the UC Davis Innovation Access office, the UC Davis PIPRA office in the Department of Plant Sciences and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

All King Hall externships have two components. At the field placement, students handle legal assignments under supervision of an attorney. Under the supervision of a faculty advisor, students complete professional development assignments. See the Externship website for more information. Students gain practical experience working full or part time in a District Attorney's or Public Defender's office or another appropriate placement in one of several surrounding counties or in a federal Public Defender or US Attorney's office.  Students participate in the office’s many activities: observation, interviewing, research, writing, counseling, motion practice, and trials under State Bar rules. There is a cap of 15 students so you should apply early. Students wishing to practice must qualify for certification by the relevant state or federal jurisdiction.

Prerequisite: Completion of or concurrent enrollment in 219 Evidence. 
Recommended course: 263A Trial Practice I
Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Graduation Requirements: Counts towards Professional Skills Requirement.
Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

This seminar is the companion seminar to the Washington UC-DC Externship and is designed to enhance the externship experience in three principal ways:

1. Teach students about the process of federal lawmaking directly from leading government lawyers, lobbyists, public interest advocates, and journalists.
2. Allow students to explore new career opportunities unique to the lawyering in Washington as they enhance their skill sets for success in any career path.
3. Have students investigate the unique roles of lawyers in making and changing federal law and policy.
   Class sessions generally include guest speakers and class discussion based on students' questions submitted in advance. Part of each session will be devoted to a "grand rounds"-style exchange to facilitate peer-to-peer learning about lawyering at the broad range of externship sites. Each student will write a final paper, typically on a legal topic selected in consultation with the instructor and the externship supervisor for educational value and salience to the office. The final classes of the term will be devoted to presentation of papers in progress. Each student will make detailed written comments on one fellow student's draft paper, and where possible will share those comments as a discussant when that paper is presented in class. A sample syllabus for the seminar is available.

Seminar - Companion seminar to a remote/part-time Externship where the organization or the supervisor is based in Washington DC. Designed to enhance a part-time/remote Washington D.C. experience. Taught in via Zoom with instructor in Washington, D.C.

Grading Mode:  Letter Grading
Final Assessment: None

Participants assist in instructing the Legal Research and Writing programs for first-year students under the direction of the Legal Research and Writing instructors. Approval of the Legal Research and Writing instructors is required for enrollment. Legal Research and Writing instructor determines whether student earns 1 or 2 units.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Participants assist in the Lawyering Process course for first-year students under the direction of the Lawyering Process instructors. Approval of the Lawyering Process instructors is required for enrollment in Law 495LS credits. Counts as Co-Curricular Units.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

Groups of students (not fewer than four and not more than 10) with a common interest in studying a stated legal problem may plan and conduct their own research and seminar program, subject to the following six regulations: (1) the program extends over no more than two semesters; (2) the program plan and the list of group members are submitted to the dean’s office at least four weeks prior to the opening of the semester in which the program is to begin; (3) a three member faculty board is appointed for each group with the authority to approve or disapprove the program and the amount of credit sought; (4) any changes in the program or in the group’s membership is approved by the faculty board (normally, these changes are only approved prior to the semester in which the program begins); (5) the members of the group conduct a weekly seminar session at a time and place to be arranged by them; and (6) each member of the group submits an individual paper or an approved alternative based on the seminar subject to the faculty board.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory

*Unless the entire group asks in advance for letter grades.

Students may receive credit for individual projects, subject to the following five regulations: (1) the project extends over no more than two semesters; (2) each project is supervised by a faculty member; (3) an outline of the project is approved by the supervising faculty member; (4) normally, no faculty member is permitted to supervise more than five students working on individual programs during any semester; and (5) each student submits an individual paper or approved alternative to the supervising faculty member.

Grading Mode: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory (Law 499)

*Unless a request for letter grading is made in advance (Law 499A)