Robert D. Sloane

Examines the basic principles of substantive criminal law, including the justifications for punishment, the essential elements of offenses, mitigating and exculpating defenses, and different forms of criminal liability.

This course will introduce the framework of constitutional, statutory, and international law that both authorizes and constrains the conduct of U.S. foreign affairs. After studying the constitutional allocation of foreign affairs powers among the branches of the federal government and basic foundations of the government's national security powers, we will turn to discrete topics of contemporary relevance, which may include most or all of the following: the power and limits of judicial authority in foreign affairs; treaties and other international agreements; customary international law's status in the U.S. legal system; foreign affairs powers retained by the several states; the application of the Constitution to persons and incidents abroad; war powers; covert action; the detention, interrogation, and trial of terrorists and other irregular combatants, before courts and military commissions; targeted killing; torture and other coercive interrogation; and the protection of individual liberties and civil rights in wartime. Current events will be woven into the curriculum as relevant. Grading will be based on a 3-hour final exam. RESTRICTION: Students who have previously enrolled in National Security Law (JD890) may not register for this course.

Sloane: This course will offer a survey of contemporary international law. We will consider both the classical law of nations and postwar developments, which have shifted the fulcrum of the international legal system from a relatively exclusive focus on the rights and duties of states inter se (as between themselves) to a broader focus on all of the participants in the contemporary international legal process—not only nation-states. Nation-states remain the chief actor in international law, but since the nineteenth-century, the amount and more frequent resort to law has led to both new substantive norms (doctrinally) and many new institutions and participants that’re also subject to international law, e.g., non-governmental organizations (NGOs), multinational enterprises of all kinds (MNEs), terrorist networks, criminal syndicates, and, above all, individuals, which in turn has led to int’l law’s effort to create and abide by a specific set of human rights. Specific topics may include (1) the history, nature, and sources of international law; (2) the establishment, transformation, and termination of states and other international legal participants; (3) national incorporation of international law, with a focus on core concepts of U.S. foreign relations law; (4) international law’s allocation of jurisdiction to make and apply law, as well as selected immunities conferred by international law; (5) international law’s effort to protect human dignity through fields such as international human rights, the law of war, and international criminal law; (6) control and regulation of the resources of the planet, with a focus on the law of the sea as a prominent example; and (7) the use of force. George: This course will offer a basic survey of contemporary international law. It will teach students about the major issues of public international law and policy that influence current events, with an eye to both legal theory and modern legal practice. Specific topics will include: (i) the history, theory, and nature of international law; (ii) the sources of international law; (iii) the "actors" of international law -- states, international organizations (with emphasis on the U.N. system); (iv) the domestic incorporation of international law, with a focus on key concepts of U.S. foreign relations law; (v) international human rights; (vi) the use of force; and (vii) humanitarian law.

This seminar will critically examine the legal doctrines and ethical principles of the contemporary law of war, including both the law governing recourse to force (jus ad bellum) and the law governing the conduct of hostilities (jus in bello). Topics vary from year to year. But we’ll cover most if not all of the following: the U.N. Charter framework for collective force; the nature and scope of the inherent right to self-defense; challenges to the jus ad bellum framework posed by terrorist networks and other non-state belligerents; humanitarian intervention; the core rules and principles of the law of armed conflict; non-combatant immunity and its converse, the so-called combatant's privilege; military necessity, distinction, and proportionality constraints on hostilities; prohibited weapons; belligerent occupation; the historical role of reciprocity and consequent difficulties posed by asymmetric warfare; artificial intelligence and "autonomous" weapons; and other controversies that characterize warfare in the early twenty-first century. Grading will be based chiefly on a short final paper. LIMITED WRITING OPTION: With the instructor's permission, a limited number of students may satisfy the upper-class writing requirement through their final term papers. ** A student who fails to attend the initial meeting of a seminar, or to obtain permission to be absent from either the instructor or the Registrar, will be administratively dropped from the seminar.