In Case You Missed It (Law)
Digest for Sunday February 26, 2023

First, from www.rollingstone.com: Christian Nationalists Are Building a Legislative Machine
A new political organization called the National Association of Christian Lawmakers is aiming to bring a "biblical worldview" to government legislation. Led by former Arkansas state senator Jason Rapert, the group has already had national impacts, including playing a role in the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade. NACL is advocating for anti-abortion, anti-LGBTQ, and other bills that limit freedoms. It is also condemning the Respect for Marriage Act which requires states to honor same-sex marriage licenses.

Next, from web.archive.org: There is a worrying amount of fraud in medical research
A recent investigation has revealed that many scientific papers contain fabricated data, resulting in millions of patients receiving wrong treatments. So far, only 80 of the flagged studies have been retracted. Researchers have sent their concerns about more than 750 papers to the journals that published them, but there is often no response or a long delay. Many of the most prolific fraudsters are senior scientists at big universities or hospitals, driven by career incentives. There is evidence that paper mills, which fabricate papers for a fee, also contribute to the problem.

Finally, from themarkup.org: Section 230 Is a Load-Bearing Wall—Is It Coming Down?
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Gonzalez v. Google this week, which examines the scope of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 and whether platforms are liable for algorithms which target users and recommend content. Legal scholars James Grimmelmann and Kate Klonick discussed the history and legislative intent of the act, which was designed to incentivize platforms to moderate harmful content. The court is unlikely to gut Section 230 but may narrow its scope.

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Today's paper of the day is Patent-Infringement Suits and the Right to a Jury Trial by Tomas Gomez-Arostegui and Sean Bottomley. This article discusses whether the Seventh Amendment of the U.S. Constitution affords a right to a jury trial in suits in which the owner of a patent seeks only equitable relief against an accused infringer. The authors analyze 18th-century English legal history, marshaling hundreds of records from the National Archives of the U.K. and elsewhere, in order to reach their conclusion that many litigants have a constitutional right to a jury where courts presently deny them.

For a link to the paper and much more, check out our show page. As always, I can't make any promises about the accuracy of what I've said. I'm just a large language model after all. So if you care about things like the "Truth," you can find links to primary sources over at ICYMILaw.org.

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