Legal Niches

Cases of first impression

Posted on November 24, 2008
I'd like to respond, at least as an initial matter, to Susan Schneider and Anthony Schutz's excellent summaries of agricultural law with a thought experiment.When I first taught agricultural law in spring 1994, I began with National Broiler Marketing Association v...

Thoughts on Teaching Agricultural Law

Posted on November 23, 2008
The American Association of Law Schools (AALS) annual conference will be held in January 2009 in San Diego, and the session presented by the Agricultural Law section will focus on the definition of agricultural law. Our chair, Anthony Schutz has identified two related goals for the session: (1) To consider the pedagogical and scholarly value of agricultural law, and (2) To identify what belongs in the canon of agricultural law...

Teaching Agricultural Law: Paradigm Shift or More of the Same

Posted on November 23, 2008
Susan thoughts are awesome and exactly what this upcoming AALA panel should be about. I am the newest member of the bunch that will be on the panel and I offer my thoughts with all the trepidation of a person with only a bit of experience.To me, agricultural law is the study of a regulated industry...

The agroecological opium of the masses

Posted on November 19, 2008
More than a dozen years after its original publication, this artifact of my rhetorically flamboyant youth has finally made its way to my SSRN page:The Agroecological Opium of the Masses, 10:4 Choices 16 (Winter 1995)A specter is haunting agriculture, the specter of agroecological ideology...

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Nebraska Ag Headlines

Posted on November 18, 2008
November 18th edition here. Highlights include lots of ethanol concerns and credit worries. An interesting story from McCook notes a newspaper advertisement in 1936 for a car that achieved 18 to 24 mpg. 1936.

Nebraska Ag Headlines

Posted on November 14, 2008
November 13 edition here.

Teaching Bailments

Posted on November 14, 2008
At this point in my Agricultural Law course, the students and I wade into warehouse laws and Article 7 of the UCC. Each year I question the utility of this exercise, but each year I am assured by the experience. This year is one good example.Read the rest of this post ...

The Election, Race and the Rural Voter

Posted on November 12, 2008
Arkansas alumnus, Professor Lisa Pruitt at U.C. Davis School of Law has studied and written a good deal about rural culture and livelihoods. This week on her blog, Legal Ruralism she posted on the New York Times article, For South, A Waning Hold on National Politics...

New Report

Posted on November 11, 2008
The Association of State and Interstate Water Pollution Control Administrators (ASIWPCA) has issued a report calling for a warm embrace between EPA and those charged with implementing the CWA in most instances.As the administration changes, one can question how and if agriculture's treatment under the CWA will change...

Nebraska Ag Headlines

Posted on November 07, 2008
November 7 edition is available here.Notable news coverage includes the Obama transition, air emissions regulation, and the ag sector's response to California's proposition 2.

GAO Includes Food Safety on its Urgent List

Posted on November 06, 2008
Following the each presidential election, the GAO prepares transition information to assist the incoming administration. Today GAO announced the creation of its transition website and issued its priority listing of the 13 most urgent issues to be addressed by President-elect Obama...

Nebraska Ag Headlines

Posted on November 04, 2008
The November 4th edition is located here.Notable news items include VeraSun's bankruptcy, food v. fuel, COOL, fertilizer prices, the role of subsidies in food prices, gasoline-ethanol blends, and some interesting litigation (here and here) concerning a sugar cooperative and the obligations the members owe (or not) to the co-op.

The new CAFO rules are here, the new CAFO rules are here!

Posted on November 04, 2008
After a long wait, the final post-Waterkeeper regulations under the Clean Water Act for concentrated animal feeding operations have been promulgated and should appear shortly in the Federal Register. For now, the rule can be found here.A few highlights:As expected, the regulation provides a self-certification measure for CAFOs that will not, or will propose not to, discharge pollutants...

Nebraska Headlines

Posted on November 03, 2008
The Nebraska Department of Agriculture does a decent job of collecting relevant ag related news. Unfortunately, it still sends the information out to a listserve. With their permission, I am posting the information here.

EU Green Paper on Ag Product Quality

Posted on November 03, 2008
Friend and colleague, Erimar Von der Osten provided me with information about the recent Green Paper on agricultural product quality: product standards, farming requirements and quality schemes that was issued by the Commission of the European Communities...

Ag Law Publication

Posted on November 03, 2008
Ross Pifer at the Penn State University, Dickinson School of Law, Agricultural Law Resource & Reference Center, puts together a legal update on agricultural law that you can find at this location. Coverage includes Congress's 10-base-acres delay and a new dog law in Pennsylvania, among other items.

Speculate This: Ethanol?s Impact on Corn Prices

Posted on November 01, 2008
A recent study concludes that ?commodities speculation,? and not ethanol production, was the principal cause of higher corn prices last summer. OxFam, which has argued that biofuels have "dragged 30 million people into poverty," and many other critics have blamed ethanol production for record-high corn prices...

Credit Woes in the Heartland

Posted on October 31, 2008
Ethanol continues its shake out.Also, an interesting drama is being reported from Illinois. Imagine this: Debtor gets into financial trouble. Debtor enlists the locals to help him conceal assets. Some locals defect when the bank starts asking questions...

Iowa Meatpacking

Posted on October 30, 2008
This story from the AP has the latest. $10,000,000 fine!

Agricultural Law / Food Law Opportunity

Posted on October 29, 2008
Issues involving food and agriculture have always been important. Recent concerns about our food system, however, have highlighted critical issues and peaked interest in the study of agricultural law. Consumers seek connections with their food; farmers seek ways to sustainably produce that food...

Recent Publication

Posted on October 28, 2008
If you are interested in agricultural law, you probably receive notice of this publication. But if it misses you, here is a link to the ABA's Agricultural Management Committee's newsletter. The Ag Management Committee is within the Section of Environment, Energy and Resources of the ABA.

AALA Materials

Posted on October 28, 2008
The materials I presented at the AALA conference are included below.The Ag Environmental Law Update slides are here.The Corporate Farming slides are here. In addition, here is a report that David Aiken and I prepared dealing with legislative examples of defining farming...

The 29th Annual American Agricultural Law Association

Posted on October 24, 2008
Today and tomorrow, practitioners, academics, and many interested in agricultural law and policy are gathering in Minneapolis for the 29th annual agricultural law conference. This is my third conference, and I am beginning to fully appreciate the breadth of agricultural law and the diversity of interests at stake in this important sector...

Food Policy for the Future President

Posted on October 20, 2008
From Fresh Aire, on National Public Radio today, Michael Pollan has serious advice for the next President:In a open letter to the next president, author Michael Pollan writes about the waning health of America's food systems ? and warns that "the era of cheap and abundant food appears to be drawing to a close...

The New Farm Bill - ACRE

Posted on October 15, 2008
ACRE: A brief primer on the new payment mechanism.The statutory text is available here, and a complete version (with a few footnotes) is available here. [links will be live when the documents are on the web]If you see any errors or oversights, please let me know...

Urban Farmer Wins MacArthur "Genius Grant"

Posted on October 12, 2008
Need some good news in these difficult times?ABC News tells the amazing story of former professional basketball player Will Allen, CEO of Growing Power, an organization that built a farm in the middle of a Milwaukee residential neighborhood. Their goal: to help feed the community's residents affordably using "urban farming...

NY Times Magazine on Food Issues

Posted on October 11, 2008
This Sunday's New York Times Magazine will be devoted to international/U.S. food policy and the "true costs of cheap food: obesity in the U.S., malnutrition in developing countries and environmental degradation everywhere." Almost the entire issue is devoted to this topic, discussing problems and suggesting solutions...

Cattle Branding and Presidential Politics

Posted on October 09, 2008
This story is just made for the Agricultural Law blog. Cowboys and cattle that evoke images of Texas range land and independent ranchers; and maybe even early animal welfare concerns.It turns out that the term "maverick," the signature image claimed by the Republican candidates McCain and Palin comes from Samuel Augustus Maverick, a Texas Rancher in the 1800s who refused to accept the practice of branding his cattle...

Organic Farmer Wins $1 million Verdict for Pesticide Drift

Posted on October 05, 2008
The Environmental News Service reports that last week a Santa Cruz County, California jury awarded $1 million to Jacob's Farms, organic farming operation whose edible herbs were contaminated by pesticides applied to vegetables on nearby farms. At issue were the pesticides chlorpyrifos, diazinon and dimethoate (organophosphates) applied to the adjoining property...

Aren't We Forgetting Something (Again)?

Posted on October 04, 2008
A recent article informs us that the government program that "test the levels of pesticides in fruits, vegetables and field crops" will cease. The article encompasses a number of dire impacts on the long term studies of pesticides withing related agencies...

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