St. John's University Law Faculty Blog

The Lexis/Nexis-owned Law360 quoted Professor Jeff Sovern in an article headlined NY’s Use Of Dodd-Frank Will Inspire Other State Regulators. The article explained that the Dodd-Frank Act authorized state regulators to bring actions to enforce the statute’s prohibition on unfair, deceptive, and abusive acts or practices (so-called UDAAP statutes).  According to the article:

While the extension of UDAAP authority to the states gives companies another potential foe to consider now, it could also serve as a backstop for consumer protection efforts in the future, said Jeff Sovern, a professor at St. John’s University School of Law.

Sovern, an advocate for consumer financial protection efforts, said that the granting of such rights to state regulators would be a check against moves like the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s George W. Bush-era declaration that state anti-predatory lending laws were inapplicable to national banks.

“If the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is ever captured by the financial industry, and so stops enforcing the Dodd-Frank Act, the states will be able to pick up the slack,” Sovern said.

Elayne E. Greenberg, Assistant Dean for Dispute Resolution Programs, Professor of Legal Practice, and Director of the Hugh L. Carey Center for Dispute Resolution, has won the prestigious ABI Service Award. The ABI’s highest membership award, the Service Award, is presented at its annual spring meeting to the ABI member whose contributions over the previous year have been extraordinary, as determined by ABI’s Advisory Board of past presidents.

Mark Movsesian, the Frederick A. Whitney Professor of Contract Law and the Director of the Center for Law and Religion at St. John’s University School of Law, has written an essay about the Islamist practice of dhimma which “allows Christian communities to reside in Muslim society in exchange for payment of a poll tax called the jizya and submission to social and legal restrictions.”   An Islamist group in the Syrian opposition recently resurrected this practice in connection with the capture of the town of Raqqa. Here’s an excerpt of the essay, which is titled Mideast Christians, Dhimmis Once More?: An Abandoned Institution Makes A Comeback and appears on the blog First Things:

The rise of political Islam in recent decades has reopened questions about the status of non-Muslims. As Ann Elizabeth Mayer, a human rights scholar at the University of Pennsylvania, has explained, Islamists often seem evasive on the subject. Typically, they are careful not to call for formal reinstatement of the dhimma, since to do so would offend many Muslims. Indeed, Islamists often say they support religious freedom for Christians. But Islamists also make clear that all rules, including rules about religious freedom, must be subject to the requirements of Islamic law—and the dhimma was very much a part of classical Islamic law. Islamists thus leave the door open for reinstatement of dhimmi restrictions, even as they avow a commitment to religious freedom.

Mark Movsesian

Tomorrow, Professor Jeremy Sheff will be presenting on two different panels at the 22nd Annual Intellectual Property Law & Policy Conference at Fordham University School of Law (FordhamIP Conference).  He will be presenting his paper, “Dilution at the PTO”, in a session titled: “Trademark Law: U.S. Recent Developments”.  He will also be a panelist for the session titled: “Opposition Practice Before the U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Board”.  A full agenda for the conference is here.

Jeremy Sheff