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Workplace Harassment & Gov. Cuomo: Professor Emily Brown Speaks to Syracuse.com

Emily Brown

Cuomo’s no stranger to scandal: Why is this moment different?

(Syracuse.com | Aug. 6, 2021) Gov. Andrew Cuomo is in an unfamiliar situation.

In the past, he’s won battles with unions, won over environmentalists and flatly denied any mistakes made involving Covid-19 deaths and nursing homes. Three years ago, he watched as one of his closest allies went to prison in a pay-to-play scheme.

Then Cuomo won a third term.

Even as women this spring began calling him out for acting inappropriately at work, the governor held his ground and stayed in office …

… At their core, workplace harassment laws consider the impact on the worker, not the intent of the boss, Rusnak said, who works for Bond, Schoeneck & King and also leads workplace harassment training for clients. 

Emily Brown, a Syracuse University law professor and labor lawyer who has represented private and public workers and employers, agrees. “That’s the point,” she said. “Even if he fails to recognize it, it should not absolve him of responsibility.”

In New York, workplace harassment is about what a reasonable person would find more offensive than a petty slight or annoyance, Brown added. That’s a relatively new and lower standard that became law after Cuomo signed updated legislation in 2019 …

Read the full article.

Joe Di Scipio L’95 Gives DCEx Students an Inside Look at Political Advertising Issues

On March 22, 2021, students from the Spring 2021 Washington, DC, Externship Program (DCEx) heard from Joseph Di Scipio L’95, who offered a seminar discussing FCC compliance issues for broadcasting stations. 

Di Scipio is an accomplished legal expert in FCC regulatory compliance who currently serves as Senior Vice President, FCC Legal & Business Affairs and Assistant General Counsel at Fox Corporation. He is responsible for all FCC regulatory matters relating to Fox Corporation’s television stations, including negotiating retransmission consent and other distribution agreements, spectrum issues, M&A activity, and other special projects. 

Also holding an M.P.A .from Syracuse University Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Di Scipio serves on the National Association of Broadcasters Board of Directors and has previously served as the President of the Syracuse University Law Alumni Association. Di Scipio continues to provide support to Syracuse Law students and alums.

In preparation for the seminar, students viewed various political candidate and issue-related advertisements along with substantiation documents which compared claims made in the advertisements to the facts collected from the public record. 

After presenting these recent case studies, Di Scipio led an in-depth analysis and discussion surrounding FCC compliance with respect to political and issue-related advertisements. Di Scipio discussed with students his decision-making process, which includes a step-by-step analysis and risk-balancing test that takes into account the brand’s reputation, candidate rights to air advertisements, and sustaining ad revenues. 

Voice of America Interviews Professor Emily Brown About Amazon Union Drive

Amazon company workers at a warehouse in Bessemer, AL, are trying to organize a union, what many analysts see as a milestone event for the American workforce, while Amazon continues its efforts to disrupt a possible “yes” vote. 

The Voice of America Eurasia Division asked labor law expert Professor Emily Brown for her analysis.

Professor Brown’s segment begins at 47′ 36″. 

Watch the March 9, 2021, segment.

https://www.golosameriki.com/embed/player/0/5807853.html?type=video

Preparedness, Planning, and Leadership: Professor William C. Banks Looks at Lessons Learned in 2020

Professor of Law Emeritus William Banks

Hope jostles with fear in US

(China Daily | Jan. 5. 2021) New leader is on the way, but wounds could take time to heal in a polarized nation

The year 2020 has passed into history with a series of cascading events in the United States ranging from racism protests to a traumatic presidential election－all played out against the backdrop of a deadly pandemic.

The past year will make itself felt in 2021 as a more divided country grapples with twin health and economic crises.

The US casualties from the novel coronavirus, which the nation’s scientists now believe first infected people there in mid-December 2019, had surged past 351,000 on the first days of 2021. That’s roughly one of every 1,000 residents, the most in the world for a single nation.

But the pandemic wasn’t the only event that shaped the year.

William Banks, distinguished professor emeritus at Syracuse University College of Law in New York, summed up 2020 in three phrases: COVID-19, racial justice, and democracy threatened.

The pandemic will mark 2020 as equivalent to 1918 when a similar pandemic killed huge numbers of people, Banks said.

“The lessons learned hopefully are preparedness, planning, and leadership,” he told China Daily. “The US lacked all three this year” …

Read the full article.

Letter to Students from Dean Boise Regarding Events in Washington, DC, Jan. 6, 2021

Dear College of Law Students,

Each of you came to Syracuse to learn the law. You were no doubt driven by various conceptions of what the law means, whether our laws are just—or justly applied—or what a career in the law might look like for you. 

As your faculty, we pride ourselves on our knowledge of the law, and it is our role to help you learn it, interpret it, analyze it, apply it, and—yes—challenge it, even criticize it.

But yesterday’s violent storming of the Capitol by a mob angry with the outcome of the election illustrates more dramatically than any classroom instruction the most important function of the law—to serve as the framework for maintaining a peaceful, orderly, and well-functioning society.  

Acts like those perpetrated on Jan. 6, 2021, not only are unprecedented in our country’s history, they also threaten the very roots of our democracy and chillingly demonstrate its fragility. 

Whatever your political persuasion, we can surely agree that the rule of law must always be paramount, that disagreements are to be resolved through the democratic process, not violence, and that the periodic transfer of power must take place peacefully. A colleague reminded me yesterday of Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson’s statement in his concurring opinion in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer:

… [W]ith all its defects, delays, and inconveniences, men have discovered no technique for long preserving free government except that the Executive be under the law, and that the law be made by parliamentary deliberations. Such institutions may be destined to pass away. But it is the duty of the Court to be last, not first, to give them up.

The events of January 6 remind us of the truths in this statement, that “free government” is not inevitable—it may “pass away”—and that the Courts, and we lawyers, as officers of the Courts, are afforded both the privilege and the profound responsibility of being the last defense against its demise.

Shortly after the outbreak of the Civil War, Frederick Douglass wrote that “nations are taught less by theories than by facts and events.” Take stock of the facts and events that have unfolded before you—yesterday and throughout this election process—and as you prepare to resume your studies this semester, know that you are being offered the most valuable lesson of your legal education.

Most importantly, I urge you to commit yourself in whatever way you are able to work toward preserving the framework of law that has secured the freedom we have for so long enjoyed.

Best regards,

Craig M. Boise
Dean and Professor of Law

College of Law Faculty to Participate in Society of Socio-Economists Annual Meeting

Several College of Law faculty members will be among the participants in the 2021 Society of Socio-Economists (SOS) Annual Meeting. Hosted by the College of Law and titled “Pressing Social Issues,” the meeting will take place via Zoom on Jan. 10, 2021. 

The issues to be discussed include wealth and income distribution; race, gender, and class justice; environmental sustainability; inclusive capitalism; the economics of war and peace; corporate fiduciary duties, social responsibility, and governance; and the ethical dimensions of economic analysis.

Included among the featured participants are Syracuse University College of Law professors Robert Ashford, Christian Day, David Driesen, and Shubha Ghosh. The full program can be found at societyofsocio-economists.com.  

For more information, contact Professor Robert Ashford, Program Co-Chair for the AALS Section on Socio-Economics.

Professor William C. Banks Comments on the Capitol Hill Riot

U Law Professor Saddened, Concerned About Democracy’s Future

(Spectrum News | Jan. 7, 2021) Sadness: That’s how Syracuse University Law Professor Bill Banks felt when he watched a mob rush the Capitol on Wednesday. A group of people took extreme measures to vindicate a president who refuses to accept defeat, he said.

“It’s quite an ironic and disturbing spectacle to have the president of the United States engage in sedition,” said Banks. “That is in violent, illegal attempts to overthrow the government of the United States.”

Capitol police were overwhelmed Wednesday afternoon. The logistics are still unknown.

Law enforcement in Washington, D.C., is unique because the Defense Department usurps the city’s power, said Banks. He says either the police misapprehended where the group was or they were underprepared.

“They simply didn’t have the numbers to stand up to the thousands of violent thugs who were using any means available to them to break into the building,” said Banks …

Read the full article. 

CNY Reactions to Washington D.C. Attack on Congress from Disgust to Anger to Blaming Trump

(WAER | Jan. 7, 2021) Reactions to the storming of the U.S. Capitol building by a large number of President Trump supporters Wednesday sparked some strong reactions from New York’s Congressional delegation and political experts in Central New York …

Syracuse University Professor William Banks, founder of the Institute for Security Policy and Law says the mob and its activities fall short of a coup attempt, though said it was appropriate for police to use force to quell rioting …

Read the full story.

Several College of Law Faculty to Present at AALS Annual Meeting

Eight College of Law faculty members, including Dean Craig M. Boise, will moderate panels and present their research at the Association of American Law Schools Annual Meeting (“The Power of Words“), taking place Jan. 5-10, 2021. Among the topics Syracuse faculty will address are the effects of COVID-19 on legal education, mental health, people with disabilities, and national security; Brexit and European law; the future of the Americans with Disabilities Act; capital acquisition; and climate change law and policy.

Read the full AALS Annual Meeting program here.

College of Law Faculty Presentations

Professor Kristen Barnes (Chair, Section on European Law), “Comparing Data Protection Structures in the European Union and the United States” (Co-Moderator)

January 5 | 1:15 p.m.
Sections on European Law and Defamation and Privacy Joint Program

Professor Kristen Barnes (Chair, European Law Section), “EU Mixed Agreements Under Brexit, Refugee Women, and Gender Equality” (Moderator)

January 6 | 4:15 p.m.
Section on European Law: Works-in-Progress Panel

Professor Nina Kohn, “Intersectionality, Aging, and the Law”

January 6 | 2:45 p.m.
Section on Aging and the Law

Professor Nina Kohn, “Section on Law and Mental Disability” (Moderator)

January 7 | 1:15 p.m.
“This panel will examine the challenges and pitfalls of providing mental health services in the current moment.”

Professor Mark Nevitt, “Is Climate Change a National Emergency”

January 7 | 4:45 p.m.
Section on Environmental Law

Professor Arlene Kanter, “Times are Changing: The Right to Remote Work Under the Americans with Disabilities Act”

January 8 | 2:45 p.m.
AALS Hot Topic Program: “Disability and COVID-19: Lessons from Disability, Lessons from the Pandemic” (Moderated by Professor Doron Dorfman)

Professor Robert Ashford, “Ameliorating Wealth Concentration by Broadening Capital Acquisition with the Earnings of Capital”

January 8 | 1:15 p.m.
Section on Socio-Economics: “For Whose Benefit the Corporation? Perspectives on Shareholder and Stakeholder Primacy”

Dean Craig M. Boise, “The Future of Legal Education: Online Teaching Post-COVID-19”

January 8 | TBD
Dean’s Forum

The Hon. James E. Baker, “National Security Implications of COVID-19”

January 9 | 11 a.m.
Addressing topics in the Journal of National Security Law & Policy special COVID-19 issue.

Professor Mark Nevitt, “Is Climate Change a National Emergency”

January 9 | 4:45 p.m.
Section on National Security Law

College of Law and Queen’s University Belfast to Co-host New Transatlantic Negotiation Competition in March 2021

The Transatlantic Negotiation Competition (TANC), a new mock trial competition created and hosted by Syracuse University College of Law and Queen’s University Belfast, will be held virtually on March 19-20, 2021. The unique competition will feature an even number of American and European law schools competing against each other in a contest that simulates legal negotiations. Applications are now open for interested law schools.

Competition Details:

• Applications are due Jan. 8, 2021

• At least eight teams will be selected to compete. Competitors will be notified by Jan. 15, 2021

• The completion will take place on March 19-20, 2021 

• The competition will be in English

• Each round will be one hour in duration

• Teams may consist of four persons, but only two persons from each team are eligible to compete in each round 

“The competition gives law students on both sides of the Atlantic an opportunity to hone their negotiation and communication skills in a transnational setting, with particular emphasis on the importance of cross-cultural negotiation and communication in resolving disputes and facilitating client agreements,” says Professor Todd Berger, Director of Advocacy Programs at Syracuse University College of Law. 

“In each round of the competition, one team from the United States and one from Europe will face each other to resolve a series of problems presented in a particular factual scenario,” says Alexys Santos, President, and Kevin Marshall, Vice President, of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Society at Queen’s University Belfast School of Law. “The scenarios are not dependent on the law of a particular country and are the type commonly encountered in international business, trade, and political disputes.” 

Each simulation consists of a common set of facts known by all participants as well as confidential information known only to the participants representing a particular side. Teams may consist of four persons, but only two persons from each team are eligible to compete in each round. Each panel of evaluators will consist of three judges, with at least one judge from either Europe or the United States. 

To apply, please complete the application by Jan. 8, 2021. Teams selected for the competition will be notified by Jan.15, 2021. If selected, the participation fee is $100 or €85.00. 

USA Today Interviews Professor Nina Kohn About Voters with Disabilities

Professor Nina Kohn

How the pandemic has affected voters with disabilities – roughly one-sixth of the US electorate

(USA Today | Oct. 29, 2020) Penny Shaw, 77, who lives in a long-term care facility in Braintree, Massachusetts, normally votes at a polling place she can get to easily in her electric wheelchair. This year, Shaw had to come up with a new plan.

Braintree officials changed polling place locations because of the pandemic, and Shaw worried that her severe muscle weakness from Guillain-Barre syndrome would prevent her from getting to the nearest site. She couldn’t get election officials on the phone to confirm the new location, and she has trouble using a computer. So, she requested an absentee ballot and took it to a post office six blocks away.

“Better to be safe than sorry,” she said. “I don’t want to not vote.”

Shaw’s situation is emblematic of the new difficulties the pandemic has created for voters with disabilities – even as many of them are benefitting from the relaxation of rules regarding who can cast an absentee ballot …

Nina A. Kohn, law professor at Syracuse University and a distinguished scholar in elder law at Yale Law School, said in a phone interview that while laws like the Voting Rights Act and directives like the one from CMS may outline how voters with disabilities must be accommodated, there are often impediments.

“As a practical matter, how do they obtain that assistance?” she said. “With COVID, many individuals don’t have access to family members and friends who would provide that assistance. In congregate care settings, how do they obtain a mail-in ballot? In many states, they have to request a ballot. How do they obtain that request? Not all have access to the internet. Or they may have muscular problems that make it hard to maneuver around a computer” …

Read the full article.