Birdsong's Law Blog

As many of you know Birdsong teaches immigration law.  He was once a U.S. Department of State Officer who worked at visa sections in a number of our embassies overseas. Birdsong tries to be objective about the ongoing immigration debate in our country.

But Birdsong has a girlfriend, Dee Dee, who is a “knockout” looker who is a hardliner on the immigration debate.  When Dee Dee learned Birdsong had started a blog she just had to get in on it.  She asked that I put up her latest rant on immigration. What can I say…she is my girlfriend? See whether you agree or disagree.

Dee Dee wrote the following to me last night:

               Earlier today (June 26, 2008) the Supreme Court of the United States, in a case styled District of Columbia v. Heller, overturned the ban on handgun ownership in Washington, D.C. that had existed since 1976.

  The Court found that the ban was violative of the 2^nd Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.  Writing for the majority in the 5-4 decision Justice Scalia held that citizens had the right to have handguns in their homes for their own self defense.

Although not a great gun rights person, Birdsong actually believes the Court made the right call. 

            Birdsong just has to remind all of you out there that June has been a good month for justice for African Americans.

            On June 13, 1866, Congress passed the 14th Amendment that extended liberties and rights granted by the Bill of Rights to former slaves.  The major provision of the 14th Amendment was to grant citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States,” thereby granting citizenship to the descendants of Africans brought to America in chains. We truly became African Americans.

            On June 16, 1866, the House Joint Resolution proposing the 14th Amendment to the Constitution was submitted to the states.

A Long Discourse on the Concept of Felony Murder in the United States

By: Birdsong

 Every one of my Criminal Law students I teach must learn the felony murder rule.  It is  a necessary concept to understand in order to pass the Bar exam.  For those of you who may wish to practice criminal law in Florida  you should know that Florida utilizes felony murder its homicide prosecutions more than any other state in the U.S.

The common law felony murder rule provides that if a person kills another in doing or attempting to do an act amounting to a felony, the killing is murder.¹ it does not matter whether the death was intended or the product of a reckless disregard for the risk to human life or criminally negligent behavior. 

 Birdsong commends the following article to his Evidence Law students who seek a better understanding of hearsay law and confrontation…and possibley a better grade in the course! Although written some time ago, it is still very relevant and has been read and cited widely.  Birdsong notes with pride specifically that this article was cited by both the Illinois Supreme Court in People v. Stechy, April 19, 2007, and by the Illinois Appellate Court in People v. Melchor, June 28, 2005.

               THE EXCLUSION OF HEARSAY THROUGH FORFEITURE BY WRONGDOING – OLD WINE IN A NEW BOTTLE – SOLVING THE MYSTERY OF THE CODIFICATION OF THE CONCEPT INTO FEDERAL RULE 804(B)(6)

                                                           By: Leonard Birdsong

                                                                        © 2001

                       I. INTRODUCTION 

                The development of modern rules of evidence has been a process of putting old wine into new bottles. That is, many of the old common law rules and notions of evidence have been codified into modern day state and  federal evidence codes. This article examines one such recent codification of a common law concept, forfeiture by wrongdoing, into the Federal Rules of Evidence and seeks to determine whether such codification was really necessary.

             The Federal Rules of Evidence, used in federal courts and adopted by many states, Puerto Rico, and the military are a codification of years of evidence rules.¹ The rules concerning hearsay have been codified in the