Faculty Focus is a monthly publication documenting the activities, accomplishments, and honors of the University of Houston Law Center Faculty.

May 2008

Previous Editions of Faculty Focus can be accessed through the Faculty Focus Website 

 

Johnny Rex Buckles’ most recent article, “Does the Constitutional Norm of Separation of Church and State Justify the Denial of Tax Exemption to Churches That Engage in Partisan Political Speech?” has been accepted for publication in the Indiana Law Journal. In April, Professor Buckles participated in a debate sponsored by the Federalist Society and the American Constitution Society at the Lewis and Clark Law School. The topic of the debate was as follows: Is the Teaching of Intelligent Design Theory in Public School Science Courses Necessarily Unconstitutional on the Grounds that Intelligent Design is Inherently Religious? He also presented, “The Constitutionality of the Monkey Wrench: Exploring the Case for Intelligent Design to the Federalist Society at the Washington and Lee University School of Law in April. In February, Professor Buckles presented, Is the Ban on Participation in Political Campaigns by Charities Essential to Their Vitality and Democracy? in the Washington and Lee University School of Law’s Lewis Law Center Faculty Workshop Series.

 

Marcilynn Burke’s latest article will be published this spring. “Green Peace? Protecting our National Treasures While Providing for Our National Security,” 32 Wm. & Mary Envtl. L. &Pol’y. Rev. 803 (2008). Professor Burke has been invited to present her latest work-in-progress, tentatively titled, “The Emperor’s New Clothes: Exposing the Myths Behind Ballot Box Land Use Regulation,” at a property law works-in-progress conference at the University of Colorado Law School in Boulder. Participants in the conference will include many of the country’s leading property law scholars, including Carol Rose (Yale/Arizona), Greg Alexander (Cornell), Jane Baron (Temple), Eric Freyfogle (Illinois), Nicole Garnett (Notre Dame), Michael Heller (Columbia), Jim Krier (Michigan), Tom Merrill (Columbia), Claire Priest (Northwestern) and Henry Smith (Yale).

 

Darren Bush, over the last two months, has testified in two separate congressional hearings. He recently testified in a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy, and Consumer Rights hearing on the Delta-Northwest Merger and he is in the process of responding to additional questions submitted by the subcommittee. In February, he testified in a U.S. House Judiciary Committee Antitrust Task Force hearing on railroad antitrust immunities. He recently responded to addition questions put forth by the Antitrust Task Force. Due to the recent Delta-Northwest deal, he has been quoted and appeared in numerous newspaper and television interviews. He appeared twice on Fox 26 News, twice on Local 2 News, several times in the Houston Chronicle, once on Minnesota Public Radio, and twice in AP wire stories that were reprinted in numerous newspapers throughout the country. His op-ed piece on airline mergers was recently published in the Minneapolis Star Tribune and the Houston Chronicle. In addition, Professor Bush and his coauthors put the final changes on three separate pieces slated for publication. With Jill Sundie and Betsey Gelb, he put the finishing touches on, “Economic Reality Versus Consumer Perceptions of Monopoly,” in the Journal of Public Policy and Marketing ( forthcoming 2008). Along with coauthor John Connor, he submitted the final edits for,” How to Block Cartel Formation and Price Fixing: Using Extraterritorial Application of the Antitrust Laws as a Deterrence Mechanism”, in the Pennsylvania State Law Review (forthcoming 2008).  With coauthor Shubha Ghosh, he completed the final edits for,” Predatory Conduct, Predatory Legislation, and Other Exclusionary Tactics in Airline Markets,” in the Houston Law Review (forthcoming 2008). He also wrote the symposium introduction entitled,” Introduction: Thirty Years of Airline Deregulation,” in the Houston Law Review (forthcoming 2008).

Finally, he and David Spence finished edits on a book chapter titled,” Why ERCOT Only Has One Regulator,” in the Prospect of Electricity Restructuring: The Texas Model(Andrew Kleit and Lynne Kiesling, eds., forthcoming, 2008). Prof. Bush participated in an NYU Law School Roundtable discussing the findings of the Antitrust Modernization Commission. He was quoted in a Competition Law 360 article on Deutsche Telekom’s potential bid for Sprint Nextel (Deutche is the parent company of T-Mobile). Finally, he was invited to speak in July at the Capital Campus Texas Retreat on electricity deregulation in Texas.

 

Barbara Evans was a co-author of the report entitled U.S. Systems of Oversight of Genetic Testing: A Response to the Charge of the Secretary of Health and Human Services, published in April and available at:

http://www4.od.nih.gov/oba/SACGHS/reports/SACGHS_oversight_report.pdf

Earlier in April, she participated in a meeting of Duke University’s Clinical and Translational Sciences External Advisory Committee.

 

Victor B. Flatt’s article”Gasping for Breath” was selected as one of the ten best environmental law review articles of 2007 by the Journal of Land Use and Environmental Law. Professor Flatt spoke at the UH Foundation’s CLE on oil and gas law in both Houston and Dallas in May. The EENR Center and Professor Flatt will host the Center for Progressive Reform’s annual meeting at the law center in May.

 

Paul Janicke spoke at the Oregon Patent Law Association’s annual conference in April. On May third, he spoke at the San Francisco Intellectual Property Law Association’s annual seminar.

 

Craig Joyce has joined the ABA Committee on Copyright Legislation at the invitation of the section chair.

 

Joan Krause and Richard Saver submitted the first draft of their co-edited book, Health Law and Bioethics: Cases in Context, to Aspen Publishing. On April 14, Prof. Krause participated in A Panel Discussion on the Gonzales v. Carhart Partial-Birth Abortion Case, sponsored by AWIL and the Federalist Society. On April 9, Prof. Krause led a discussion on, Safe, Effective, and Out of Reach: Patients, Drug Companies, and the FDA, as part of the UH Honor College “Great Conversation” event. On April 2, Prof. Krause spoke to the Houston Chronicle about an unfunded breast cancer trial taking place at M.D.Anderson.

 

Michael A. Olivas published two book chapters and two law review articles: What the War on Terrorism Has Meant for U.S. Colleges and Universities, in R. Ehrenberg, ed., Doctoral Education and the Faculty of the Future (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008); Hernandez v. Texas: Jim Crow, Mexican Americans, and the Anti-Subordination Constitution (with Ian Lopez) chapter 8 in Rachel Moran and Devon Carbado, Race Law Stories (Foundation Press, 2008).  The articles were:” Lawmakers Gone Wild? College Residency and the Response to Professor Kobach”, 61 SMU Law Review 99(2008); and “Immigrants in the Modern Administrative State and the Polity Following Hurricane Katrina,” 45 Houston Law Review 1 (2008), which was the Foreward to the special annual Frankel Lecture issue. He also co-sponsored a book conference (Education Law Stories conference, University of Cincinnati Law School), and gave the keynote address on Hernandez v. Texas to the North Harris Community College (Lone Star College System) Lyceum Series.

 

Jordan Paust’s online essay,” The DOJ and the Geneva Conventions: Getting Rights Wrong” is published at

http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forumy/2008/04/doj-and-geneva-conventions-getting.php

His article, “Medellin, Avena, The Supremacy of Treaties, and Relevant Executive Authority” is published in a symposium issue at 31 Suffolk Transnational Law Review 299 (2008), available at

http://www.law.suffolk.edu/highlights/stuorgs/transnat/symposium.cfm

His article,”In Their Own Words: Affirmations of the Founders, Framers, and Early Judiciary Concerning the Binding Nature of the Customary Law of Nations,” is published at 14 U.C. Davis Journal of International Law and Policy 205(2008).

 

Richard Saver’s article,” In Tepid Defense of Population Health: Physicians and Antibiotic Resistance” will be published in the peer-reviewed American Journal of Law and Medicine. Earlier this spring, Prof. Saver presented Clinical Practice Guidelines and Health Policy: Is There a Role for Cookbook Medicine? to the Harris County Retired Physicians Association.

 

Spencer Simons’ article,” What Interests are Served When Academic Law Library Directors are Tenured Law Faculty? An Analysis and Proposal” was accepted for Publication by the Journal of Legal Education.

 

John Ventura’s latest book, Kiplinger’s Estate Planning, just came out. He won second place in the Texas Bar Journal’s Short Story Contest and his story will appear in the June edition of the Texas Bar Journal.

 

Greg Vetter hosted intellectual property law visitors from Canada under the U.S. State Department’s International Visitor Program. On Tuesday, April 29, in conjunction with Professor Moohr, the visitors met with Professors Moohr and Vetter to discuss cross-border intellectual property law issues, particularly issues related to criminal liability.

 

Jacqueline Weaver spoke on The Future of our Petroleum-Based Economy at the Tulsa Committee of Foreign Relations on April 29 and on the same topic at the Permian Basin Landman’s Association in Midland, Texas on April 16.

 

Stephen Zamora taught a one-week course in April in Bogota, Colombia, on International Litigation in U.S. Courts. The course was part of a graduate-level Specialization Program in Corporations Law at the Universidad Javeriana.

 

 

Helen Ehmann Boyce,

Editor