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This course examines advanced topics in Indian law, that go beyond the focus on tribal sovereignty and jurisdiction that are the focus of the Federal Indian Law course. Topics include the federal laws and regulations that shape Native American religious practice, the protection and regulation of Native American cultural property and human remains, tribal land acquisition and use, environmental protections and regulations, Indian gaming, child welfare, water law, and the unique status of Native Alaskan and Hawaiian peoples. This course does not require expert knowledge of the jurisdictional questions surveyed in Federal Indian Law, although some background, either from that course or a review of William Canby, American Indian Law in a Nutshell, is helpful. Elements used in grading: Attendance, class participation, final exam.

This course will introduce students to the dynamics of content moderation at major internet and social media platforms. Cotaught by the heads of content policy at YouTube and Meta, the course will engage students with real world examples concerning the governance of content at scale for the largest internet and social networks. Topics will include content policies surrounding hate speech, disinformation, obscenity/indecency, child protection, violence, and incitement to illegal conduct. The course will also explore how content policies apply to AI tools, such as chatbots, and how AI is used in content moderation. Classes will include assignments and group activities revolving around real-world situations confronting policy makers inside technology firms, as well as how these decisions interact with government policies and constitutional law. Students will be responsible for small writing project every two weeks plus a final paper. With the consent of the instructor, students can choose to write an independent research paper that meets the criteria for Research (R) credit. After the term begins, students approved to write an R-credit paper may transfer from section (01) into section (02), which meets the R-paper requirement. SPECIAL INSTRUCTIONS: Students on the waitlist for the course will be admitted if spots are available on the basis of priority and degree program. Elements used in grading: Attendance, class participation, written assignments, final paper.

This seminar examines how the law navigates the complex terrain of posthumous interests--the rights, claims, and protections that survive death or emerge after it. Drawing from diverse legal domains including civil procedure, constitutional law, criminal law, property, torts, and historic preservation, we will explore fundamental questions about the boundaries of legal personhood, human dignity, and the reach of the law beyond life. The course investigates core tensions in posthumous rights: When do the dead's expressed wishes control legal outcomes, and when must they yield to competing interests or basic principles of human dignity? Who has standing to speak for the deceased, and what limits constrain such representation? How do courts balance respect for the dead against the needs and rights of the living? Special attention will be given to questions of inequality and subordination after death, exploring how legal protections may vary based on social status, wealth, or marginalized identity. The seminar integrates doctrinal analysis with philosophical inquiry, engaging questions about the nature of posthumous harm, dignity, legacy and respect. Students will grapple with whether and why the dead can be wronged, how the law should mediate between competing claims to posthumous authority, and what our treatment of the dead reveals about the values and limits of legal systems. Elements used in grading: Attendance, class participation, written assignments, final paper.

From the medieval period onward, universities have enjoyed some degree of independence from the state. Focusing on the U.S. example, this course examines, on the one hand, the ways in which universities' mechanisms of self-governance form a kind of constitutionalism. It looks, on the other hand, at how the U.S. Constitution protects as well as impinges on the relative autonomy of universities. Topics to be covered include: the relationship between academic freedom and free speech; unconstitutional conditions on grants to universities; university governance and theories of separation of powers; sex, gender, and race in admissions and beyond; due process rights in the university context; and the boundaries of and limits on universities' interventions in politics. Special Instructions: Students have the option to write a long research paper in lieu of the final exam with consent of the instructor. After the term begins, students can transfer from section (01) into section (02), which meets the R requirement, with consent of the instructor. Students taking the course for R credit can take the course for either 2 or 3 units, depending on the paper length. Elements used in grading: Attendance, class participation, written assignments or final research paper.

This course will consider two principles that have shaped American higher education, and, in turn, American society: meritocracy and diversity. The ideal of diversity has shaped higher education at least since the Supreme Court's 1978 decision in Bakke v. University of California Regents. More recently, the Supreme Court has prohibited the use of race-based affirmative action in pursuit of diversity. And the Trump Administration has advocated for ideological diversity, while condemning the idea of racial diversity and approaches such as disparate impact and DEI, with which it is associated. The ideal of meritocracy is also embattled. As a pivotal feature of the development of modern society, meritocracy has also suffused academic institutions, providing a basis for the evaluation of student work, of research, and of applicants. In recent years, the idea of meritocracy has itself become subject to criticism. Some commentators allege that universities have failed to live up to meritocratic ideals, either in the admissions process or in the campus culture. Other commentators cite the fulfillment of the meritocratic ideal as the problem. As with diversity, meritocracy is subject to multiple meanings, which we will probe. The central inquiry of the course concerns the extent to which the ideals of diversity and meritocracy are intertwined with current controversies in higher education, from admissions criteria, to cost, student debt, and social mobility, to research, institutional orthodoxy, academic freedom, and free speech. Course Materials: The course materials will be varied and will include not only judicial opinions and law review articles, but also books, magazine articles, social science research, and podcasts. We will also read my book manuscript, The Miseducation of America, which addresses many of the issues we will discuss. Course Culture: This course will be conducted as a seminar, in which your active participation is essential. My hope is that we can ask hard questions and develop a dialogue that is simultaneously critical and constructive. My vision of success: that by the end of the term, we emerge changed people, transformed by our interactions with the ideas and each other. To have any hope of reaching this goal, we must each be open to a wide array of arguments and views. I want this course to be pervaded by a spirit of inquiry, humility, curiosity, and a willingness to learn from each other. To promote this culture of inquiry, I ask that you please observe Chatham House rules; you may share with others the substance of our discussions, but you may not identify any of the student speakers. Elements of Grading: There will be three elements of grading, weighted as indicated. 1: Two 2-3 page reflection papers responding either to the reading or to a prior discussion. (25%) Your aspiration should be to stake out a position that you believe to be true, but with which you expect most of your classmates would disagree. Alternatively, you could identify a question or line of inquiry that you believe is important, yet which most of your classmates would dismiss. (25% of grade.) 2: Class attendance and participation. (25%) During class, we want to identify interesting or controversial aspects of the readings, to highlight perspectives or interpretations that were not reflected in the readings, and to consider the implications of the issues raised. I am especially keen to hear about what you found particularly interesting, confusing, contradictory, irritating, or inspiring. (25% of grade.) 3: A final paper. (50%) There are two options for the paper: the short paper or the research paper. The short paper can be 4000-5000 words (roughly 12-15 pages) and can be completed with minimal, if any, research beyond the course materials and discussion. The short paper may incorporate and extend the discussion in your reflection papers. The paper can be completed on your own, or you can work with a partner (or two); sharing ideas or thinking through an issue together is fine. (Of course, if you submit the same paper, you will receive the same grade on the paper.) Alternatively, you may choose to write a longer, more research intensive paper for R credit. If you choose the R paper option, we will workshop an outline or rough draft of your paper during one of the final class sessions. Those students writing R papers may wish to consult the book, Academic Legal Writing: Law Review Articles, Students Notes and Seminar Papers, by Eugene Volokh. After the term begins, students enrolled in the course can transfer from section (01) into section (02), which meets the R requirement, with consent of the instructor. Students taking the course for R credit can take the course for either 2 or 3 units of credit, depending on the paper length. CONSENT APPLICATION: To apply for this course, students must complete a Consent Application Form available at SLS Registrar https://registrar.law.stanford.edu/. Cross-listed with Education ( EDUC 309W).

Federal and state prosecutors spent nearly four years trying to hold to account those who aimed to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. This class describes the legal tools that prosecutors used, how their work was interpreted by the courts, and the body of "insurrection law" they developed. But more than just being a look back, this class will be a look forward: how will politicians and parties try to overthrow future elections, and what tools do lawyers--and citizens--have to stop them? This class aims to prepare students for any potential insurrection that lies ahead, and empowers them to help protect the rule of law. This course is open to Stanford non-law students by consent of the instructor. Non-law student registration information is available at https://law.stanford.edu/education/courses/non-law-students/. Elements used in grading: Attendance, class participation, final paper.

When the US Supreme Court overruled 50 years of federal constitutional protection for abortion rights in its 2022 Dobbs ruling, the legal strategies to protect abortion rights changed dramatically. This course will explore the landscape in state and federal courts of lawsuits post-Dobbs that are rebuilding those legal rights and fighting to maintain access in a variety of circumstances, including in both protective and restrictive States and in marginalized communities of color and the socioeconomically disadvantaged. We will begin with analysis of the doctrinal evolution of the federal constitutional right, and the post-Dobbs shift to protections for abortion under new state constitutional amendments and preexisting state precedent, along with related protections such as the right to interstate travel. We will look at the range of stakeholders critical to litigation to protect abortion access and consider some of the practicalities of the lawsuits in which they are involved, including pregnant individuals, abortion care providers, clinics, emergency rooms, reproductive justice organizations, other public interest organizations, and manufacturers and suppliers of abortion medication. We will analyze litigation strategy concerns common to social justice movements, weighing long-term goals and short-term needs. The role of the federal and state governments will also be examined. We will study the government tools that are used both to protect and to undermine abortion rights through statutory developments, regulatory change, and criminal law. Students will write three short papers on selected topics. Elements used in grading: Attendance, class participation, written assignments.

This seminar will examine the history of the weaponization of the presidency from the 1790s to contemporary times. We will examine how the growth of the state and of executive power more generally fostered weaponization; how weaponization was constrained in various periods in American history, especially in post-Watergate reforms; the analytical foundations of contemporary weaponization, especially in the unitary executive; how contemporary weaponization compares to past weaponization; and how if at all presidential weaponization can and should be reformed. Grades will be based on attendance, class participation and 5000 words of writing that can be allocated either among three reaction papers (one for each session) or one 5000 word non-research paper at the end based on class readings.

This course explores the role of independent and special counsels in the investigation and prosecution of potential violations of federal criminal law by executive branch officials. Topics will include the legal scheme governing the appointment of special counsels; the evolution of the role from Watergate to the Jack Smith investigation; appointment and removal of special counsels; and the justifications for and criticisms of the special counsel role. The course will consider these issues from a diversity of perspectives, including those of guest speakers Robert Hur, Special Counsel in the Biden classified documents investigation; Aaron Zebley, Deputy Special Counsel in the Trump Russian election interference investigation; and Andrew Goldstein, Senior Assistant Special Counsel in the Trump Russian election interference investigation. Elements used in grading: Attendance, class participation, written assignments.