Course Catalog

An intensive and critical examination of the role of federal courts in maintaining a constitutional order in the United States. Among the topics considered are justiciability, the power of Congress to control the jurisdiction of federal and state courts, Supreme Court review of state court decisions, federal habeas corpus for state prisoners, and suits challenging official action.

• Type: Upper Class

The ability to give and receive quality feedback plays a major role in every lawyer’s career trajectory. Yet few of us are ever taught how to develop this important skill.
“Feedback Loops” is designed to help change that. We’ll learn better ways to deliver feedback, better ways to receive feedback, and better ways to solicit feedback. We’ll also get to practice a crucial and often overlooked kind of feedback: self-feedback.

• Type: Practice Simulation

This course explores financial regulation in the United States in the aftermath of the most systemic financial crisis in the last 70 years. The 2007-2009 financial crisis was followed by a major shift in regulatory design with the enactment of the Dodd-Frank Act. We analyze and compare the current market and regulatory architecture of the U.S. financial sector, from banks, insurance companies, and broker-dealers, to asset managers and complex financial conglomerates. We explore a range of financial activities, from consumer finance and investment to payment systems, securitization, short-term wholesale funding, money markets, and derivatives. We examine a range of regulatory techniques, including supervision, enforcement, and rule-writing, as well as crisis-fighting tools such as resolution and the lender of last resort. We also note the cross-border implications of U.S. rules, and compare, where appropriate, the U.S. framework and policy choices to those in other places around the globe, especially the European Union. We also discuss amendments made to the Dodd-Frank Act in 2018 and ongoing initiatives adopted by the Trump Administration to reverse the course of regulation for parts of the U.S. financial system. We will also scan the horizon for the signs of the next global financial crisis.

• Type: Upper Class

This course examines the law made by The Supreme Court concerning the freedom of speech, and the freedom and establishment of religion.

• Type: Upper Class

From fingerprints to burn marks, shoe prints to bite-marks, and dozens of other disciplines, our courts certainly have a lot of forensic science thrown at them on a daily basis. But how equipped is our legal system to properly handle scientific evidence? And what about individual lawyers and judges: can they be trusted to properly vet, scrutinize—and when necessary, exclude—forensic science disciplines they scarcely understand?
This course will explore the tenuous but necessary relationship between forensic science and the law, which begins with the fundamental difference between ?truth? as defined by science and as defined by law. From that foundation, we will consider how various forensic techniques have come to be accepted, admitted—and in many cases later repudiated—by our judicial system. We will study what goes right, what goes wrong and how we as lawyers can work to improve the system of forensic science in America.

• Type: Seminar

This course examines the early history of the English Common Law and explores various approaches to legal history. We will study both medieval documents and key works of modern historical writing in order to obtain an overall picture of the chronology, processes, and causes of legal development. Following an introduction to the history of the period (no prior study of history is required) and to the use of historical sources, a combination of chronological and thematic approaches will be adopted. Key issues will be the role of royal authority in legal development; the impact of changes in literacy; changes in the nature of legal knowledge and thought; the separation of legal from other social norms; the degree to which legal change works by its own internal logic.

• Type: Upper Class

The Full-Time Externship Program offers an exciting opportunity to augment classroom study with real-world work experience. Students (under the guidance of both a Law School faculty member and a field placement site supervisor) immerse themselves full-time in legal work with local, state, and federal governmental agencies, and with nonprofit organizations located throughout the country and world. The externship is expected the complete the student’s personal agenda of study, complementing courses carefully chosen at the Law School and enabling the student to pursue sophisticated work and research in a particular field beyond our curricular offerings.

Students will receive twelve credits total, eleven for the field work portion and one for the accompanying seminar (Law 941). Since field placement proposals must be approved in advance, EVEN IF A STUDENT DOES NOT HAVE A PLACEMENT FINALIZED, the student must apply for a Full-Time Externship by the deadline, which is April 1 for a Fall Externship, and November 1 for a Winter Externship. If a student’s placement is not secured, the student is welcome, even encouraged, to propose a few potential placements for consideration.

For more information, visit our website at https://michigan.law.umich.edu/academics/experiential-learning/externships or contact [email protected]. We are happy to meet with students to answer questions, give guidance on potential placements, provide information on how to apply, etc. Please note that if students are interested in the Geneva, India, or South Africa Externship Programs, they should visit the websites for each of those programs separately, as their details and deadlines are different.

• Type: Externship

This contemporaneous, one-credit seminar is held every semester as a required companion to the Full-Time Externship (Law 940). For more information, please visit the course description for Law 940.

• Type: Externship

Spend a semester in Geneva working with leading intergovernmental and nongovernmental institutions during the winter term. Students are immersed in the work of these international institutions and closely supervised by their legal staffs to explore how international legal regimes intersect with such diverse fields as trade, human rights, intellectual property, environment, telecommunications, and health. Externs participate in a contemporaneous seminar intended to provide them substantive context for their externships.
Students apply in the Winter before the program begins the following January. For more information, visit our website at https://www.law.umich.edu/curriculum/externshipsandindependentstudy/Pages/default.aspx or contact [email protected]. We are happy to meet with students to answer questions, give guidance on potential placements, provide information on how to apply, etc. Further, every January we hold an informational meeting for all of our international externship programs, so please watch for that announcement.

• Type: Externship

This contemporaneous seminar is intended to provide substantive context for the Geneva Externship field work (Law 947). It provides an environment for students to share their work experiences and reflect on the varying approaches to international problem-solving arising at the organizations where they are placed. In addition, students will attend guest lectures with legal and policy advisors at international and nongovernmental organizations, who will discuss current issues of international law, describe the role of international organizations in various fields of international law, and describe their individual career paths.
Students apply in the Winter before the program begins the following January. For more information, visit our website at https://www.law.umich.edu/curriculum/externshipsandindependentstudy/Pages/default.aspx or contact [email protected]. We are happy to meet with students to answer questions, give guidance on potential placements, provide information on how to apply, etc. Further, every January we hold an informational meeting for all of our international externship programs, so please watch for that announcement.

• Type: Externship

This course will examine the issues and concerns that are unique to well-funded ventures with “unicorn” valuations. The course will consider the pros and cons of different late-stage investment structures, the deal dynamics arising from the ever expanding pool of capital investing in this asset class, and the implications of unit economics for the investment thesis—all against the backdrop of the ever-blurring line between private equity and venture capital.
Students will learn the primary legal mechanics involved in venture capital investing, as well as the incentives and pragmatic considerations underlying these types of transactions.
Students will be expected to participate in a simulated term-sheet negotiation exercise, become familiar with spreadsheet capitalization tables, and learn to evaluate key deal terms against the backdrop of the broader deal dynamics.
Required readings for each session will include model deal documents and case studies.

• Type: Practice Simulation

Through the course, students will explore key laws and legal concepts applicable to American institutions of higher education. Among other issues, the course will focus on how to weigh and balance the sometimes competing rights and responsibilities of institutions, faculty, staff, and students. For instance, the course will explore: the potential clash between the academic freedom rights of faculty and the rights of students to be free from racial and sexual harassment; Title IX and women’s sports; affirmative action in admissions, financial aid, and faculty hiring; and the intellectual property rights of faculty, staff and students. The goal of the course is to introduce the fundamental legal areas affecting higher education so that students can recognize when legal issues and concepts are involved in the higher education context. Additionally, the course gives the opportunity to consider the role of “in house” counsel. The course also aims to use legal issues as a catalyst for a broader discussion of the role and meaning of higher education in today’s society. Furthermore, the course offers the opportunity to consider legal and policy matters in a context in which every student will have had personal, in-depth experience. The course format will include lecture and class discussion. The course is a meet-together with the School of Education and will include both law students and graduate students in education.

• Type: Upper Class

Human trafficking encompasses all forms of compelled labor or services and it occurs around the world. The Human Trafficking Clinic (HTC) works to combat human trafficking by: (1) providing direct representation to survivors of human trafficking; and (2) developing disruptive, systemic solutions to reduce vulnerability to trafficking.
Law students enrolled in the HTC will engage in a combination of legal and systemic reform work. The legal work of HTC is best described as a poverty law practice on behalf of survivors of human trafficking and their families. It includes immigration, post-adjudication criminal relief, access to public benefits, expungement, and victim-witness advocacy. The reform work of the HTC focuses on creating change at policy, service, and industry levels through collaborative partnerships across the nonprofit, corporate, and governmental sectors. HTC students work side-by-side with students enrolled in the Business and Human Rights Lab to develop and execute their projects.
Overall, students in the HTC will learn and practice collaboration, problem solving, fact investigation, legal analysis, counseling, and advocacy skills. Students are responsible, under supervision, for all of the cases and projects within the HTC.
The HTC is a 7 credit course and meets the New York Pro-Bono requirement.

• Type: Clinic

Human trafficking encompasses all forms of compelled labor or services and it occurs around the world. The Human Trafficking Clinic (HTC) works to combat human trafficking by: (1) providing direct representation to survivors of human trafficking; and (2) developing disruptive, systemic solutions to reduce vulnerability to trafficking.
Law students enrolled in the HTC will engage in a combination of legal and systemic reform work. The legal work of HTC is best described as a poverty law practice on behalf of survivors of human trafficking and their families. It includes immigration, post-adjudication criminal relief, access to public benefits, expungement, and victim-witness advocacy. The reform work of the HTC focuses on creating change at policy, service, and industry levels through collaborative partnerships across the nonprofit, corporate, and governmental sectors. HTC students work side-by-side with students enrolled in the Business and Human Rights Lab to develop and execute their projects.
Overall, students in the HTC will learn and practice collaboration, problem solving, fact investigation, legal analysis, counseling, and advocacy skills. Students are responsible, under supervision, for all of the cases and projects within the HTC.
The HTC is a 7 credit course and meets the New York Pro-Bono requirement.

• Type: Clinic

This course will explore the legal, historical and policy perspectives that shape U.S. law governing immigration and citizenship. The course provides a general overview of the constitutional and international law foundations underlying immigration regulation, the history of immigration law in the U.S., the source and scope of congressional and executive branch power in the realm of immigration, and the role of the judiciary in making and interpreting immigration law. The course will closely examine the admission, exclusion, removal and naturalization of noncitizens in the United States.

• Type: Upper Class

The India Externship offers students the chance to spend the Winter semester working for an Indian non-profit, government agency, or court in the city of your choice. Students work with our administration and faculty to find a suitable placement. Given the depth and breadth of work available in India, it should not be difficult to find something that meets your interests. Past students report rich experiences working side-by-side with top-notch Indian lawyers on pressing legal matters and policy issues.

Students apply in the Winter before the program begins the following January. For more information, visit our website at https://michigan.law.umich.edu/resource-center/india-externship or contact [email protected]. We are happy to meet with students to answer questions, give guidance on potential placements, provide information on how to apply, etc. Further, every January we hold an informational meeting for all of our international externship programs, so please watch for that announcement.

• Type: Externship

The INHR Geneva Student Legal Advisor Program is an externship opportunity in public international law for selected LLM and JD students, with a possible “Spring Break” visit to Geneva Switzerland for the February/March UN Human Rights Council. Selected students will work with a Michigan law grad and former U.S. diplomat to serve as virtual interns for a member state to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. Students will be paired with a small UN member state that lacks resources to have legal support for their delegation to the UN Human Rights Council. The students will provide legal, policy and administrative support to that government to facilitate its participation in the UN Human Rights Council and possible other UN agencies in Geneva.
During the fall semester, students will be required to join a weekly 90-minute online class with students from other law schools. The live online course will provide an overview of relevant UN and international human rights law and procedures; tradecraft skills in drafting, research and negotiation; and otherwise lay the foundation to prepare students to serve in their virtual internship. In the winter term, students will be expected to review draft resolutions, conduct research and produce interventions for their employer/member state UN delegation to use and deliver during the January Universal Periodic Review and March UN Human Rights Council (HRC) sessions and related meetings. Further details on the INHR Virtual Internship Program expectations, and the type of developing country delegations whom students may work for is available at https://inhr.org/student-legal-advisors.
Past students have traveled to Geneva for a week-long, self-funded, first-hand glimpse at providing diplomatic and legal work at the UN Human Rights Council. The HRC session each March usually aligns with Michigan Law’s spring break and the HRC Universal Periodic Review session in May often occurs immediately after Michigan Law’s exam period. Travel to Geneva and living expenses are not funded by INHR and travel cannot be guaranteed given past challenges provided by COVID-19, issues regarding receipt of a visa to Switzerland and demands of the employing delegation. Applicants interested in the Spring Break or May visit MUST be eligible for visa-free entry to Switzerland.
How to Apply:
To apply for the two-semester student legal advisor program, please complete this form (https://forms.gle/HsK79eKe8XBj2mSf7) by July 10th, 2023. Your application should include a copy of your transcript, resume, passport cover page, and a cover letter explaining your interest. Students selected for an interview will be contacted during the week of July 24th by Alissa Cammarata ([email protected]) Administrative Assistant for Experiential Education to set up a Zoom interview with INHR program director Eric Richardson for late July or early August. If you have any questions about the application process please contact Alissa ([email protected]).
Those who pass the interview will be notified of their acceptance into the program by August 14, 2023. Delegations will be assigned around the end of October and student interests in particular regions, issues, and language skills are taken into account in pairing with an employer-delegation but cannot be guaranteed.
How Credits Will Be Determined:
Student participants are enrolling in a two-semester class/externship combined experience and are expected to participate for the entire school year. One credit will be given each semester, which will cover class time and preparation/assignments for the class (including practice research projects, sample interventions, negotiations and a final project of up to 10 pages that deploys the student’s negotiation and resolution drafting skills).
Because the amount of work facing students in the second semester may vary depending on the demands of the particular delegation/Ambassador, an additional one or two credits may be authorized in the winter semester. Students seeking additional credit units will be evaluated based on a timesheet logging hours spent on behalf of their delegation to track hours over and above a baseline expectation that all students will provide at least 20 hours of work requested by their delegations in the second semester. Under the ABA standard for externships, if more than 42.5 additional hours are requested and logged (total of 62.5 hours including the baseline 20 hours), the student may receive a third credit and if more than 85 additional hours are logged (total of 105 hours), a fourth credit may be awarded (four credits is the maximum possible). Because the volume of work requested by an Ambassador/delegation depends on a range of factors and is impossible to predict, students should not count on receiving more than the baseline total of two credits for the combined two-semester seminar/virtual externship experience.

• Type: Externship

This class will be comprised of different tracks that will allow students to explore ways to work in various innovation fields. The weekly class component will examine various legal and business principles related to innovation and support the students’ field work, with the fall term focused on the intricacies of venture capital and the winter term focused on the role of institutional capital. The students will spend significant time working on their projects in the field.
Track 1 — Social Venture Fund (SVF): Students will work as a law student advisor to the Ross School of Business’s Social Venture Fund. Students will be required to attend the weekly SVF meeting (typically on Sunday afternoons) and actively participate in SVF. Once the fund selects potential companies in which to invest, students will join at least one due diligence team and be responsible for the legal due diligence on potential investments. For companies in which SVF votes to invest students will review the financing deal documents. This track is a year-long track, so students will be required to take this course both semesters.
Track 2 — Michigan Climate Venture (MCV): Students will work as law advisors to Michigan Climate Venture, a University-wide initiative. Students will be required to attend the weekly meetings and actively participate in all educational activities. Once MCV selects potential companies in which to invest, students will join at least one due diligence team and be responsible for the legal due diligence on potential investments. For companies in which MCV votes to invest, law students will review the financing deal documents. This track is a year-long track, so students will be required to take both semesters.
Track 3 — Innovation Partnerships: Students will provide legal research support to the Innovation Partnerships team. Students will immerse themselves in the legal and regulatory issues related to innovation partnerships. Enrollment in this Track is allowed only with the permission of Bryce Pilz ([email protected]), the Executive Director of Licensing & Strategic Alliances.
Track 4 — Startup or Venture Capital Immersion: Students may arrange to work for a startup company or venture capital fund and participate in this course. While some opportunities to work with startups may be announced through Professor Ohmer, students may also arrange their own startup work and propose the arrangement to Professor Ohmer.
Note: Because participating students will work with proprietary information related to their field work, as a condition of participating in this program, all students may be required to sign Non-Disclosure Agreements particular to their tracks.
Enrollment in this class is allowed only with permission of Professor Adrian Ohmer.

• Type: Practice Simulation

This course provides an introduction to the international legal regime for the regulation of foreign investment and the resolution of disputes between foreign investors and states before international arbitral tribunals. Investor-state arbitration is an ever-evolving and politically charged field, often involving high-stakes, complex, multi-million-dollar disputes. International investment law is comprised of thousands of bilateral and regional investment treaties, which typically provide investors with similar substantive protections and procedural rights to compel host states into binding international arbitration. This course will include an examination of: the history, objectives, and structure of the investment treaty regime, including the main institutional rules for dispute settlement; jurisdictional requirements of investment treaties; the main substantive investment treaty protections (including guarantees against expropriation without compensation, fair and equitable treatment (FET), non-discrimination, and others); the assessment of damages; and challenges to and enforcement of arbitral awards. This course will also consider the interactions between international investment law and other areas of international law, including human rights.
Completion of International Law or an equivalent course prior to (or concurrently with) taking this course is recommended but not required.

• Type: Upper Class

Interdisciplinary Problem Solving is a course offered at the Law School through the Problem Solving Initiative (PSI). (https://michigan.law.umich.edu/problem-solving-initiative) Through a team-based, experiential, and interdisciplinary learning model, small groups of U-M graduate and professional students work with faculty to explore and offer solutions to emerging, complex problems.

• Type: Problem Solving Initiative

This two-credit seminar will focus on the law, policy, and practice of internal investigations. Students primarily will read and do a close study of prominent internal investigation reports, including, among others, those involving Enron, Penn State, General Motors, the University of Rochester, and Ohio State. The course will depend on active and substantive class participation and discussion. Students will prepare a number of short papers; and grades will be based on the quality of papers and class participation.

• Type: Seminar

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights proclaims that “[a]ll human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.” This course provides an overview of the international legal and institutional systems to protect these rights. We will examine the material both from an academic perspective and from the point of view of the human rights practitioner, tackling difficult theoretical issues in the field as well as assessing the practical strengths and weaknesses of human rights law and implementation mechanisms. Topics covered include civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights, the universality of human rights, norm regression, reservations to human rights treaties, the application of human rights norms during a global pandemic, and the United Nations system for the protection of human rights.

• Type: Upper Class

This class offers a general introduction to the international legal system. We will explore how international law is made through treaties, custom, and other processes; the roles of different actors (e.g., states, NGOs, international organizations, and corporations) in making and applying international law; how violations of international law are identified and remedied by international institutions or actors; and how international law intersects with domestic legal systems, like the one in the United States. The class will cover a range of substantive areas of law, including human rights, the use of force, economic relations, and regulation of the global commons (with some variations across sections). Each topic will be discussed through examination of a real ongoing or recent incident, controversy, or conflict. Students will be encouraged to think about how law can be made, enforced, and interpreted in an environment lacking a single legislature, executive, or judiciary. This course will prove highly useful to preparing students for more specialized courses in international law.

• Type: Upper Class

This workshop will engage with cutting edge scholarship in the field of international law, focusing in particular on current challenges to the international legal order. About half of the workshop sessions will feature a leading international legal scholar presenting a work-in-progress. For the other sessions, participants will read cases, scholarship, and other sources addressing the subject of the upcoming papers and will discuss these materials in a standard seminar format. Students will be expected to write response papers over the course of the semester and to participate actively in discussion each week. Sessions with visiting speakers will be open to the broader academic community.

• Type: Seminar

This course will address the major issues of international litigation, including jurisdiction (under domestic American law, foreign law, and international conventions), choice of law (from an American and foreign, particularly European, perspective), taking evidence abroad (under American and international rules), and enforcement of judgments (foreign judgements in the U.S. and American judgments abroad). Time permitting, it will also cover the basic issues of international arbitration and foreign sovereign immunity.

• Type: Upper Class

The seminar provides an overview and analysis of the technique of project financing in an international environment, particularly in emerging markets. The focus is on the perspectives of the various parties to the project, including output purchasers, providers of goods and services, equity holders, and especially commercial banks, international financial institutions and other lenders and will cover the following topics: (1) basic concepts of project finance and the role of the lawyer in an international project financing; (2) legal issues that typically arise at each stage of an international project finance transaction; (3) techniques that are used to structure and finance major projects, (4) renegotiation, restructuring, and dispute settlement in connection with international projects, and (5) the application of project finance techniques to the funding of infrastructure projects in various sectors, including power generation, ports, toll roads, etc.

• Type: Seminar

This foundational course provides a comprehensive analysis of the definition of refugee status set by the UN Refugee Convention, adopted by the United States and 146 other states. Drawing on comparative jurisprudence, the course situates U.S. refugee law in its global context and equips students to undertake both sophisticated policy analysis and complex litigation in the field. The course promotes an understanding of refugee law as a mode of human rights protection, the viability of which requires striking a balance between the needs of the victims of human rights abuse and the legitimate aspirations of the countries to which they flee.

• Type: Upper Class

This course is a comprehensive introduction to the international legal framework for the regulation of international trade in goods and services. This course will include: an introduction to the economics and politics of trade; an examination of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its dispute settlement machinery, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the General Agreement on Trade in Services GATS); the Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures, and related instruments; and discussions of trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights, conflicts between trade policy and other concerns (such as human rights, environment and development), and the recent proliferation of bilaterial and regional trade agreements.

• Type: Upper Class

The International Transactions Clinic (ITC) does good by doing deals. The ITC concentrates on teaching students skills that are critically important to their professional development as they enter into practice areas that involve international transactions. The transactional work of the ITC is focused on negotiating and documenting cross-border deals, particularly in emerging markets. This includes developing drafting and negotiation skills as applied to cross-border transactions, exposure to ethical issues that arise in the international commercial context, structuring and documenting investments in enterprises that primarily work in emerging markets, and an understanding of international economic and financial policy. The ITC is a full-year clinic with four credits in the Fall semester and four credits in the Winter semester. Both terms are letter graded.
Students are strongly encouraged to participate in the ITC for at least two semesters so as to allow them to provide legal support in the negotiation and documentation of multiple international transactions. To the greatest extent possible, students will have significant client exposure in the course of working on transactions, although in some cases due to the international context of these transactions such client exposure may be “virtual” making use of email, skype, and other means of electronic communication. The ITC also makes use of practicing attorneys to help supervise the work of its student clinicians. These practicing attorneys also may be physically remote from the students.
The ITC clientele is very diverse. It ranges from not-for-profit organizations to for-profit organizations, from start-ups to well-established businesses, and from social enterprises to impact investors. What all of the ITC clients hold in common, however, is an international focus and a passion to change the world for the better. This diversity also means, however, that not every project of the ITC will meet the New York bar pro bono requirement. Students wanting to satisfy that requirement through their participation in the ITC should make that preference known to the ITC Director before first client assignments are made in the fall.
The Clinic fulfills the Law School’s professional responsibility requirement for graduation, but does not fulfill the New York State Bar ethics requirement.
The Clinic can either fulfill the Law School’s professional responsibility requirement for graduation or the credits can count toward the Experiential Learning requirement, but not both.
The Clinic fulfills the International or Comparative Law Distribution Requirement for graduation.

• Type: Clinic

Legal concepts relating to outer space have a long history, are robust and continue to develop. Even when space exploration and operations were exclusively the domain of nation states, a multitude of international treaties, conventions and other agreements governed activities in space. As the private sector increasingly plays supporting and, in some cases, leading roles in the development of space, the applicability and interpretation of those international treaties are under review and stress. National security and economic considerations are now increasingly emphasized over peaceful exploration for scientific purposes, resulting increasing geopolitical dynamics in space. This seminar provides an introduction and overview of space law, international and domestic, and examines the laws and policies governing the growth of the private sector in space. After reviewing what “space” means physically and legally, we proceed to examine the origins and development of international space law in international treaties and agreements and the purported underlying policy consensus relating to peaceful exploration for the benefit of all humankind. Part of the remainder of the class focuses on the evolution and development of space law and policy prior to the current private-sector era followed by the fast-developing changes in national laws relating to national security and private-sector activity in space. Critical legal and policy issues are considered relating to space-based natural resources extraction and ownership on the Moon, planets and asteroids, human settlements, in-space manufacturing, space debris and other environmental concerns. At the end of the semester, we will discuss the growing market for “space lawyers.” We expect to have sector-leading guest speakers, either in-person or online, on several subjects. Being a seminar, each class will include class-wide discussions and group-based exercises. Each student will be required to prepare several short (less than one page) position or advocacy papers on some of the topics discussed in class and an end-of-class research paper on a topic of the student?s choice.

• Type: Seminar

This course introduces the student to certain fundamental cases in Constitutional law, to the questions they raise, and to the modes of thought and criticism appropriate to this field. There is necessarily a large historical component to the work, for the Constitution has acquired its meaning over time. Major questions include: What is the justification for judicial review? What are appropriate occasions and standards for the exercise of this power? How has the power actually been used throughout our history? These questions are considered in the context of doctrinal fields chosen for variety of issues and to allow consideration of historical development over the full life of the Constitution. These fields include: the scope of federal powers; preemption; state regulation of interstate commerce (in some sections); powers of the President; relations between branches of the federal government; basic principles of racial equal protection; Congressional enforcement power under the Reconstruction Amendments; and justiciability.

• Type: First Year Required

Course description coming soon …

• Type: Seminar

The course deals with jurisdictional issues generally, as well as the special problems arising in cases involving more than one jurisdiction (state or nation), i.e. cross-boundary disputes. More specifically, it addresses three major areas. The first is the question of jurisdiction, i. e. the power of the courts to hear and decide a case; this question arises both among the several states and between state and federal courts. The second area is choice of law, i.e. the question which law should apply; this is, again, an issue both among states or nations and between state and federal law. Finally, the course covers the recognition of judgments rendered by one sovereign (state, federal, or foreign court) in the courts of another sovereign. In most law schools, some of these issues (especially jurisdiction) are covered in first-year civil procedure. At Michigan, we believe that they are better understood as part of the package described above and in an upper class setting.

• Type: Upper Class

In the Juvenile Justice Clinic, students will represent minors charged with violations of the criminal law and status offenses in Michigan’s family courts. While primarily a litigation clinic, students may from time-to-time handle appellate matters and may be involved in public policy issues such as analyzing proposed legislation.
In the course of clinic, students will develop litigation skills including case investigation, trial preparation, and presenting evidence and argument in the courtroom. Casework, which is supervised by a clinical professor, may involve client interviewing and counseling, legal research and motion drafting, negotiation with prosecuting authorities, and courtroom presentation of the case. In addition to trial advocacy and casework, classroom sessions will also focus on legal ethics, the basics of child development and other topics. The Juvenile Justice Clinic meets the New York Pro-Bono requirement. JJC is a 7 credit course of which all credits are graded.
The Clinic seminar fulfills the Law School’s professional responsibility requirement for graduation, but does not fulfill the New York State Bar ethics requirement.

• Type: Clinic

In the Juvenile Justice Clinic, students will represent minors charged with violations of the criminal law and status offenses in Michigan’s family courts. While primarily a litigation clinic, students may from time-to-time handle appellate matters and may be involved in public policy issues such as analyzing proposed legislation.
In the course of clinic, students will develop litigation skills including case investigation, trial preparation, and presenting evidence and argument in the courtroom. Casework, which is supervised by a clinical professor, may involve client interviewing and counseling, legal research and motion drafting, negotiation with prosecuting authorities, and courtroom presentation of the case. In addition to trial advocacy and casework, classroom sessions will also focus on legal ethics, the basics of child development and other topics. The Juvenile Justice Clinic meets the New York Pro-Bono requirement. JJC is a 7 credit course of which all credits are graded.
The Clinic seminar fulfills the Law School’s professional responsibility requirement for graduation, but does not fulfill the New York State Bar ethics requirement.

• Type: Clinic