Law According To A King

Today marks one year since my very first blog post on Boris Johnson's decision to prorogue Parliament. My predictions and legal judgment, in that case, missed the mark entirely, leading to a later post in which I analysed the Supreme Court's decision that unanimously held the prorogation of Parliament wasn't just unlawful, but null and void entirely.  I started this blog to help deepen my understanding of the legal world, improve my exam grades at law school, and explore new topics that my course didn't cover. I have achieved all three of these. The past year has seen me write posts on the liability of Willy Wonka, the Black Lives Matter movement and the US Constitution's Commerce Clause. I have covered the laws of property, tort, contract, constitutions, and intellectual property, and improved my exam average by a solid 1%! This blog, which I initially only shared with close friends and family, has surpassed all of my expectations, from 1 view per post to over 100 ...

"You've chosen to be the president's lawyer," declared Hawaii Senator Mazie Hirono to Bill Barr in the Senate Judiciary Committee when the Attorney General testified on his handling of the Mueller Report. Since his appointment in 2019 after the firing of Jeff Sessions, Barr has led the US Department of Justice and acted as the nation's top law enforcement official for his second time, after a two-year tenure under George H W Bush. His expansive view of executive powers and his apparent partisan actions have drawn a great deal of criticism, particularly in his last congressional hearing two days ago on the current unrest across the US following the murder of George Floyd earlier in the year. Barr's direction to federal officers to use chemical weapons, including tear gas and pepper bombs, and violent tactics against protestors, most infamously to move demonstrators away from Lafayette Park to allow for the President's photo op, drew particular ire from Rep....

In Tennessee Williams's play 'A Streetcar Named Desire' the protagonist Blanche DuBois finds herself living with her sister and brother-in-law after she loses her house and livelihood. Blanche, throughout the play, slowly descends into madness, as she is abused by her sister's husband and haunted by the death of her former lover. At the end, when she is taken away to a mental institution, Blanche softly says to the doctor "I have always depended on the kindness of strangers." As a woman who has spent her life hounded by the stark injustices of her situation, Blanche has depended on the kindness of strangers to offer her comfort where there is none, a home when she has lost her own, a job when she has been dismissed, and love where she cannot find some, but it is this same dependence that allows Blanche to be inherently vulnerable to those she depends on: the lover who kills himself, breaking her heart; the sister who gives her away to a hospital; the brother-i...

With any civil rights movement, there are necessarily two branches that work hand-in-hand: the activist, and the legal. In most, if not all, cases, the activist will precede any changes to the law - gay marriage was legalised long after the majority of Americans thought it acceptable, for example - and so it is often frustrating for a civil rights activist to sit back and wait for the law to catch up to a milestone they have already achieved. This post will take a look at the most consequential LGBTQ+ legal events of the past year, and consider what might come next.  Gay Marriage in Northern Ireland  As a result of the Good Friday Agreement, and the Northern Ireland Act of 1998, devolution was formally re-established in the country, and on December 2nd, 1999, devolved powers were officially granted to the legislature, known as the Northern Ireland Assembly. This followed the establishment of the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly after 1997 referendums in each of these...

What is the rule of law? In my opinion, it does not exist. It simply cannot exist. There are too many contradictions, too many gaps, and too many criteria that even the most utopian society could not declare itself subject to the rule of law. But to disregard it, we must first understand what it claims to be. Nick Barber wrote that the rule of law “asks what it means to be governed by law, rather than men.” The first societies decided their own unofficial laws based on the ideas of their leaders, whereas the first civilisations decided their laws based on the ideas of their people, with the advent of agriculture 10,000 years ago. For a period of about 2 million years, hominid groups (primarily hunter-gatherers) appeared to have distributed justice based on the views of a council of elders, or often a simple individual Their laws were likely based on superstition, natural ideas of justice, and the hocus-pocus of the leaders themselves. When civilisations were developed, while brutalis...

We all know the plot of the first Shrek  movie: Lord Farquaad rounds up the land's fairytale creatures and dumps them in Shrek's swamp, leading the ogre to rescue a princess to get his land back, but what if there was an easier way than enduring blistering winds and scorching deserts, climbing to the highest room of the tallest tower, fighting a dragon, and trekking across the country with a talking donkey and a were-ogre princess in tow? What if, for argument's sake, Shrek visited his local lawyer? In England, where we shall assume the plot takes place (thanks to the accent of Lord Farquaad), all land is legally owned by the Crown, but it is safe to assume that Shrek owns his land in a freehold - technically a 'fee simple absolute in possession'. What does this mean exactly? 'Fee' means that the swamp is inheritable, 'simple' means it can be possessed by anyone, not just lineal descendants, 'absolute' means that there are no conditions on ...