Commentary 1/9/06

From Cyberlaw

• the act establishing appellate courts was the Evarts Act
• Professor Nesson: is there a link or some other way we can view the Powerpoint slides you showed in class today re: The Confrontation Clause? Thanks. -- -- Yes, on myhls course documents.(crn)
• Oops...also, you used Batson as a burden of proof v. persuasion example for the rule 301 in class, but aren't the 300s in general and 301 in particular dealing with civil cases? thanks again.
  • Yes, but the idea of the burden of going forward as a device for flushing out evidence in appropriate circumstances and the idea of the burden of persuasion remaining on the moving party generalizes.(crn)
• Query: How come the Federal Rules of Evidence do not codify the tesitmonial/non-testimonial distinction that Scalia articulated in Crawford?
  • It takes a while before the rulemakers catch up. (crn)
• If criminal defendants cannot answer the individual items in the indictment because the prosecution wants to build a narrative, then why can civil defendants answer specific allegations? Doesn't the law lord maintain an interest in proving an authoritative narrative?