Law-Review Award

Overview

Since 1987, Scribes has presented an annual award for the best student-written article in a law review or journal. The Scribes Law-Review Award is presented at the Scribes National Conference for Law Review Editors, which is usually held in early April.

The submission window for the 2024 award is now open and accepting nominations through February 1, 2024. Once we receive all the submissions, we send them to law professors for an initial judging. Once that group has selected the top 10 or so articles, they go to the Law-Review-Award committee. They read each article, deliberate, and choose a winner.

The professors and the committee members judge each article on these four criteria:

Quality of writing: The writing should be clean, direct, and engaging. /50
Topic: The topic should be timely and interesting. /20
Research: The research should be thorough, showing a passion for the topic, not just superficial research. /20
Footnotes: The article should have few to no talking footnotes. /10

Professor Joseph Kimble, longtime Scribes member and legal-writing guru, wrote detailed criteria for writing law-review articles that are clear, succinct, and forceful — part of Scribes mission. You may download his criteria here.

To submit an entry, please email scribeslegalwriters@gmail.com for more information and to receive an entry form. The winner is traditionally announced and congratulated at the National Conference of Law Reviews.

Recipients

2023 Co-Winner Seth Montgomery, ICRA’S Exclusionary Rule, 102 B.U. L. Rev. 2101 (2022).

2023 Co-Winner Claire Newfeld, Indian Boarding School Deaths and the Federal Tort Claims Act: A Route to a Remedy.

2022 Mona Alsaidi, Legally White, Effectively Othered: Recognizing and Investing in Arab American Communities, 94 Temple L. Rev. 99 (2021).

2021 Ryan Deal, It’s Five O’Clock Everywhere: A Framework for the Modernization of Time, 98 Wash. U. L. Rev. 911 (2021).

2020 Mary E. Marshall, Miller v. Alabama and the Problem of Prediction, 119 Colum. L. Rev. 1633 (2019).

2019 Joseph DeMott, Rethinking Ashe v. Swenson from an Originalist Perspective, 71 Stan. L. Rev. 411 (2019).

2018 Julie Lynn Rooney, Going Postal: Analyzing the Abuse of Mail Covers Under the Fourth Amendment, 70 Vand. L. Rev. 1627 (2017).

2017 Allen Cook Barr, Guardians of Your Galaxy S7: Encryption Backdoors and the First Amendment, 101 Minn. L. Rev. 301 (2016).

2016 Wesley Sze, Did X Mark the Spot? Brand X and the Scope of Agency Overrides of Judicial Decisions, 68 Stan. L. Rev. 235 (January 2016).

2015 Alexander J. Kasner, National Security Leaks and Constitutional Duty, 67 Stan. L. Rev. 241 (2015).

2014 Nicholas S. Brod, Rethinking a Reinvigorated Right to Assemble, 63 Duke L.J. 155 (2013).

2013 Kyle La Rose, The Injury-in-Fact Barrier to Initiative Proponent Standing: How Article III Might Prevent Federal Courts from Enforcing Direct Democracy, 44 Ariz. St. L.J. 1717 (2012).

2012 Michael Vincent, Computer-Managed Perpetual Trusts, 51 Jurimetrics J. 399 (2011).

2011 D. Cody Huffaker, A New Type of Commandeering: The Bypass Clause of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Stimulus Package), 42 Ariz. St. L.J. 1055 (2010).

2010 Michael Wagner, Warrantless Wiretapping, Retroactive Immunity, and the Fifth Amendment, 78 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 204 (2009).

2009 Michelle Renee Shamblin, Silencing Chicken Little: Options for School Districts After Parents Involved, 69 La. L. Rev. 219 (2008).

2008 Katherine A. Ritts, The Constitutionality of “Let Them Rest in Peace” Bills: Can Governments Say “Not Today, Fred” to Demonstrations at Funeral Ceremonies?, 58 Syracuse L. Rev. 137 (2007).

2007 Kevin Trowel, Divided by Design: Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, Intelligent Design, and Civic Education, 93 Geo. L.J. 855 (2007).

2006 Amanda L. Morgan, U.S. Officials’ Vulnerability to “Global Justice”: Will Universal Jurisdiction over War Crimes Make Traveling for Pleasure Less Pleasurable?, 57 Hastings L.J. 423 (2005).

2005 Jeremiah Kelman, E-Nuisance: Unsolicited Bulk E-Mail at the Boundaries of Common Law Property Rights, 78 S. Cal. L. Rev. 363 (2004).

2004 Catherine Carroll, Section Five Overbreadth: The Facial Approach to Adjudicating Challenges Under Section Five of the Fourteenth Amendment, 101 Mich. L. Rev. 1026 (2003).

2003 Janet Dean Gertz, The Purloined Personality: Consumer Profiling in Financial Services, 39 San Diego L. Rev. 943 (2002).

2002 Michael E. Horwin, “War on Cancer”: Why Does the FDA Deny Access to Alternative Cancer Treatments?, 38 Cal. W. L. Rev. 189 (2001).

2001 John Cocchi Day, Retelling the Story of Affirmative Action: Reflections on a Decade of Federal Jurisprudence in the Public Workplace, 89 Cal. L. Rev. 59 (2001).

2000 Stephan J. Schlegelmilch, Ghost of the Holocaust: Holocaust Victim Fine Arts Litigation and a Statutory Application of the Discovery Rule, 50 Case W. Res. L. Rev. 87 (1999).

1999 Michael J. Mazza, Should Clergy Hold the Priest-Penitent Privilege?, 82 Marq. L. Rev. 171 (1998).

1998 Mary M. Sheridan, In re Fauziya Kasinga: The United States Has Opened Its Doors to Victims of Female Genital Mutilation, 71 St. John’s L. Rev. 433 (1997).

1997 Peter D. Blumberg, From “Publish or Perish” to “Profit or Perish”: Revenues from University Technology Transfer and the § 501(c)(3) Tax Exemption, 145 U. Pa. L. Rev. 89 (1996).

1996 Igor Kirman, Standing Apart to Be a Part: The Precedential Value of Supreme Court Concurring Opinions, 95 Colum. L. Rev. 2083 (1995).

1995 Edith L. Pacillo, Getting a Feminist Foot in the Courtroom Door: Media Liability for Personal Injury Caused by Pornography, 28 Suffolk U.L. Rev. 123 (1994).

1994 Dierdre M. Smith, Confronting Silence: The Constitution, Deaf Criminal Defendants, and the Right to Interpretation During Trial, 46 Me. L. Rev. 87 (1994).

1993 Matthew Pawa, When the Supreme Court Restricts Constitutional Rights, Can Congress Save Us? An Examination of Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, 141 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1029 (1993).

1992 Brendan Linehan Shannon, The Federal Magistrates Act: A New Article III Analysis for a New Breed of Judicial Officer, 33 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 253 (1991).

1991 Allison Hartwell Eid, Private Party Immunities to Section 1983 Suits, 57 U. Chi. L. Rev. 1323 (1990).

1990 Beverly Ray Burlingame, Commercialization in Fetal-Tissue Transplantation: Steering Medical Progress to Ethical Cures, 68 Tex. L. Rev. 213 (1989).

1989 David J. Gerber, Rethinking the Monopolist’s Duty to Deal: A Legal and Economic Critique of the Doctrine of “Essential Facilities,” 74 Va. L. Rev. 1069 (1988).

1988 Donald M. Levy, Jr. & Debra Jean Duncan, Judicial Review of Administrative Rulemaking and Enforcement Discretion: The Effect of a Presumption of Unreviewability, 55 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 596 (1987).

1987 Paul R.Q. Wolfson, Is a Presidential Item Veto Constitutional?, 96 Yale L.J. 838 (1987).