Volume 4, Issue 1, Spring 2025
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Food or Friends? A Critical Look at the Rights of Farm Animals in American Law
By Mikhail Perminov — As the agricultural industry expands, 62 percent of the world’s mammal biomass is made up of animals used for farming, while humans make up 34 percent and wild mammals make up only four.[1] According to the US Department of Agriculture, 9.76 billion land animals in the United States including chickens, turkeys,…
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The (Im)permanent Fund Dividend: Understanding the Law of Alaska’s Universal Basic Income
By Dane Lester — In 1976, voters in Alaska ratified Proposition Two in the state’s general election by over a thirty percent margin, redefining the state’s resource allocation to accommodate the then-lucrative oil development proceeds rapidly flowing into its economy. Through the adoption of this referendum, residents of the State agreed to “establish a constitutional…
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FTO Fallout: The Corporate Risks of Labeling Mexican Cartels as Terrorists
By Daniel Zayas — In February 2025, the war on drugs that the United States has prosecuted since the Nixon administration reached a new degree of fervor with the designation of several Mexican drug cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). President Trump first floated the idea of designating the cartels as such during his previous…
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Are We All Americans?: Elk v. Wilkins and Native American Citizenship Before, During, and After Reconstruction
By Carolina Pardo — When Robert E. Lee went to negotiate his terms of surrender at the Appomattox Courthouse on April 9, 1865, he stopped at the sight of a brown man amongst the Union generals. Everyone held their breath waiting for Lee’s response. The Confederate general extended a hand and said, “I am glad…
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Starlink Spectrum Wars: Examining the FCC’s Role in Regulating the New Space Age
By Hriday Unadkat – January 27, 1967, was a momentous day in Washington, London, and Moscow. Just ten years after the first-ever satellite, the Sputnik spacecraft, was launched into orbit, delegates from the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union met together and signed the first-ever treaty establishing norms in space—the Outer Space…
RECENT FORUM ARTICLES
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Insider Trading in Washington and the “Restore Trust in Congress Act”: The Case to Ban Congressional Stock Trading
By Jason Seo — On February 7, 2020, Senator Richard Burr—the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee at the time—co-authored a Fox News opinion article with Senator Lamar Alexander…
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Who Owns the Future? The Copyright Clash Shaping Generative AI
By Cheick Sy — In the last year alone, OpenAI, Meta, and other AI developers have been hit with a cascade of copyright lawsuits, ranging from The New York Times, to prominent novelists, and even stock-photo companies. These cases have…
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Paid in Full: Restructuring Termination Clauses and Contract Laws for NCAA Coaches
By Danielle Williams — The 2025 college football season’s headlines were dominated by the firing of several prominent head coaches. Power-conference schools owed almost $170 million in buyouts, which are “the liquidated damages stipulated in a coach’s contract if they…
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The Price of Snitching: Holding Informers Liable in Domestic Contexts
By Elaine Gao — An informer network was the modus operandi of totalitarian states in the 20th century, but its legacy presents a legal challenge that remains unresolved. During World War II, the Gestapo relied on more than 100,000 informants…
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The Designation of Cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Its Implications for Immigration Law
By Jaden Yun — In an unprecedented move, the Trump Administration designated a number of cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs), including Tren de Aragua (TdA), MS-13, Cártel de Sinaloa, Cártel de Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG), Cártel del Noreste (CDN),…
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Is being homeless a choice?: Status vs. conduct in Grants Pass v. Johnson?
By Jillian Ascher — During the 2023-2024 Supreme Court cycle, amid a docket full of other high profile court cases, like Loper Bright v. Raimondo and Trump v. United States, a ruling that should’ve been reported on in the news…
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Punishing Recovery: The Legal Contradictions of Relapse in the Americans with Disabilities Act
By Patrick Huaman — The American Medical Association and many other major medical organizations have recognized addiction as a chronic medical condition since 1987, yet many employers still terminate workers for the most predictable symptom of that condition: relapse. A…
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Who Gets the Access? Government Overreach in Accessing Encrypted Communications
By Preston Lieu — Imagine living in a world where your personal information is no longer confidential: a society in which the United States federal government has access to almost everything about you, ranging from your healthcare information to your…
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Predicting Future Criminals: The Due Process Implications of Recidivism Predictions in State v. Loomis
By Radia Lu — In the era of AI and big data, risk assessment algorithms have increasingly informed significant judicial decisions regarding parole, pretrial detention, and sentencing corrections in the American criminal justice system. Reports find that “over 60 jurisdictions…
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Shifting the Battlefield: Exxon’s Attempt to Evade Legal Accountability
By Rida Mian — On Earth Day 2021, the City of New York filed suit against the Exxon Mobil Corporation, ExxonMobil Oil Corporation, Royal Dutch Shell PLC, Shell Oil Company, BP P.L.C, BP America Inc. and the American Petroleum Institute…
About the Princeton Legal Journal
Founded in 2021, the Princeton Legal Journal is Princeton University’s premier student-run law review. The PLJ strives to provide both Princeton University and the wider academic community with impactful and thoughtful contributions to legal discourse. The Journal recruits new students for its Review and Forum ever semester by application. Although the majority of the Journal‘s articles are written by Princeton students, outside submissions are occasionally considered.