The Supreme Court's New Implied Repeal Doctrine: Expanding Judicial Power to Rewrite Legislation Under the Ballooning Conception of 'Plain Repugnancy'
This article presents a historical, public policy and analytical critique of the United States Supreme Court's revision of the implied repeal doctrine in Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC v. Billing, 551 U.S. 264, 127 S. Ct. 2383 (2007). The article takes a historical perspective to demonstrate the sound public policy rationale for the more traditional approach to this canon of statutory interpretation. The article analyzes the decision against the backdrop of more than 400 years of English and American courts traditional application of this doctrine to avoid judicial intrusion into the legislative prerogative. It is argued that the Court's revision of the implied repeal doctrine ignores the long and steady history of the doctrine; that the Court's new approach is bad law and bad policy; and that the Court should move to restore the traditional doctrine fully and clearly.
A Critical Review of the Current Laws on Secured Transactions in Nigeria
The reason for this chapter is to demonstrate to the reader that contemporary Nigerian secured transactions law is in dire need of reform because it no longer provides easy access to credits, especially to the SMEs, due to its compartmentalized form, which lacks predictability and comprehensiveness. The chapter makes a critical assessment of the existing laws and discovers that a number of deficiencies exist. First, the existing laws provide vague requirements with respect to the creation and registration of security interests in personal property—of which in some cases, registration is not even required, thereby creating the ostensible ownership problems between a secured party and a third party.
Human exposure to methylmercury from crayfish (Procambarus clarkii) in China
Methylmercury (MeHg) accumulation in aquatic food raises global concerns about human exposure to MeHg. Crayfish is the world’s third largest farmed crustacean species and a favorite aquatic food in many countries. However, human health hazard due to MeHg exposure via crayfish consumption is unclear, partly because appropriate survey data are lacking. We report on mercury concentrations and speciation in edible tail muscle of crayfish collected from restaurants in 23 Chinese cities. On average, MeHg constituted 99.1 % of mercury in tail muscle, and MeHg concentrations were comparable with those reported for fish in China. Variation in MeHg concentrations was not attributable to broad geographic region (i.e., provinces) or tail length. For different populations, potential health risk (characterized by hazard quotient or HQ) of MeHg exposure through crayfish consumption depended largely on crayfish consumption rates. In particular, a health hazard (HQ > 1) was found for high-rate consumers (i.e., 95 %ile or higher) in some cities in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River (MLYR), during the peak consumption season. Our results suggest that more attention should be paid to dietary MeHg intake via crayfish consumption in China, particularly for communities with high consumption in MLYR.