M.A. in Law

(1) The philosophical and theological sources and nature of American law and justice; (2) the role of lawyers in the American justice system; and (3) jurisprudential thinking about what lawyers do, including select substantive legal issues.

Discussion of problems related to minority status, including jurisdiction of the state, detention, responsibility for the crime, rights and responsibilities of the parents, and the constitutional, statutory and case law parameters of the juvenile law system.

Considers principles of risk and insurance, income taxation and business use of insurance, analyzes and evaluates risk exposures and insurance needs, and the selection of insurance company and policy; finally, examines the following forms of individual insurance; life, long-term care, disability income, health insurance, and annuities.

Fundamental areas of estate planning, which include methods of property transfer at death, characteristics and consequences of property titling, incapacity and elder law, powers of appointment, fiduciaries, sources of estate liquidity, use of life insurance in estate planning, estate planning documents (including wills and trusts, and planning for non-traditional relationships), IRAs and retirement plans, income in respect of a decedent, the types, features, and taxation of trusts, qualified interest trusts, charitable gifts/transfers and gifting strategies, marital deduction, intra-family and business transfer techniques, deferring and minimizing estate taxes, generation-skipping transfer tax, federal estate and gift tax compliance and tax calculation, and postmortem estate planning techniques.  Prerequisites:  FNCE 652, MLAW 542, MLAW 543, and MLAW 670.

American legal system and the skills necessary to succeed in that system, including reading cases and statutes, analyzing legal issues, and researching selected topics of American law.

The law and techniques of contract formation and drafting. Provides experience in the imaginative thinking that a lawyer must pursue in integrating the expressed and implied agreements of the parties to a contract. Provides opportunities to learn to create legal documents that express the agreement not only clearly, but also in a manner that defies any contrary interpretation.

Nature of private property (both real and personal); landlord-tenant law; easements; covenants and servitudes; transfers of interests in real property; merchantable title; deeds; legal descriptions; conveyancing; recording systems; adverse possession; and land use controls.

Citizenship, acquisition and maintenance of major immigrant and non-immigrant classifications; admission into and exclusion or deportation from the U.S.; and structure and procedures of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Board of Immigration Appeals, Department of State and Department of Labor.

The procedures and policies for adherence to laws, regulations, guidelines, and specifications.

The functions, powers, and processes of both legislative bodies and administrative agencies.  Includes issues of representative theory, legislative organization and procedure, and interaction of the legislature with other branches of government plus the constitutional limitations and roles of administrative agencies.

Examines the history of the Constitution, the structure, power and limitations of each of the 3 branches of the federal government, the power and rights of the states, and the authority of local governments (counties and cities). Cross-listed with GOV 619.

Focus on the foundations and common law doctrines of criminal law and modern statutory provisions.

This seminar provides students an analysis of national security topics. Among the topics which may be covered are national security and the role of law, theoretical approaches to national security and world order, development of the international law of conflict management, the use of force in international relations, the laws of wars and neutrality, war crimes, the international law of intelligence collection, the control of international terrorism, American security doctrine and nuclear weapons.  Cross-listed with GOV 640.

Addresses cyberspace and cyber security terms and issues.  Focuses on laws and regulations concerning crimes, rights, and duties related to cyber security offenses.  Considers how the law does and should respond to new technologies.  Cross-listed with LAW 610.

Develop legal negotiation skills through participation in simulated negotiations. Negotiation exercises are video-taped for review and faculty critique and evaluation. Classroom discussion is devoted to examining and applying theoretical and practical strategies of negotiation.  Cross-listed with GOV 631.

Discussion of balancing the government’s responsibility to defend the body politic and its parallel duty to safeguard the rights of individuals. Exploration of the tensions of achieving security and freedom from Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus to Bush’s detention of terrorist combatants.

Addresses the questions of the universality of human rights, including the right of life, the right to death, rights of the child, women’s rights, religious freedoms, the rights of third-world countries and the export of Western values to Eastern societies.