The concepts of animal rights and animal welfare are often used interchangeably, but it is important to recognize their distinctions when conceptualizing an argument about animal welfare laws. The animal rights approach is the more radical, as its advocates advance the belief that humans should not use any products from of created by animals. On the other hand, animal welfare advocates set out to improve the legal structure that protects animals from suffering and push for more humane treatment. It is important to the movement to have laws that clearly define cruel acts and impose punishments to deter people from violating these laws. In order to make the laws better, we must examine where and how the laws are deficient before we can understand how to improve them. This paper will analyze why humans have an obligation to protect all animals from unjust and harmful cruelties inflicted, with a specific focus on Phoenix and Arizona's legal framework of anti-cruelty laws. The evaluation of these laws and how they are enforced exposes a disparity in our accountability to animals and our approach to their ultimate protection.

What we think people can be said to deserve has far-reaching implications. Desert presents some challenging questions about the institution of punishment (retributive justice) and the structures in society regulating distributions of scarce goods (distributive justice). For the distributive side, questions include: Can people be said to deserve the wealth they earn? Do people deserve the talents that give them advantages within the market? And for the retributive side: What punishments do criminals deserve? What justifies the decision to punish someone who commits a crime? These questions and more arise when philosophers write on desert in relation to distributive and retributive justice. John Rawls presents us with a view of distributive desert that some find problematic when it is applied to retributive justice. As a result, additional questions arise about whether desert can be treated differently in distributive and retributive justice. Section I of my paper sketches the tension within Rawls's views on distributive and retributive justice. Since this tension is best framed in terms of desert, the remaining sections heavily focus on that concept. Section II presents Samuel Scheffler's solution to the tension in Rawls's views. Section III covers Jeffrey Moriarty's criticisms of the arguments Scheffler advances. Section IV discusses Jake Greenblum's criticisms of Scheffler's assessment of Rawls. In Section V, I evaluate the philosophers' positions and offer my conclusions on desert's proper role within distributive and retributive justice.

It is not necessarily concerning that it is harder for some to conform to the law until it brings up the issue of insanity. The insanity defense, though controversial, is inherently retributive in that punishing the mentally ill is not blameworthy. As ill-suited subjects for blame, mentally ill persons lack the cognitive reasoning skills necessary to be held legally accountable. Exculpating the mentally ill is not only retributive, but also deeply intuitive, evidenced by how many mentally ill persons seem "odd or crazy" to the average person. Finally, of all the tests used to determined insanity, the Federal Test of 1984 most successfully renders the insanity defense narrow enough to minimize abuse, allows for expert testimony, and calls for a cognitive interpretation of insanity.

Bad Samaritans are bystanders who omit from preventing some foreseeable harm when doing so could have been accomplished with little risk. Although failing to intervene to prevent a harm often renders Bad Samaritans morally culpable, under current common law in the United States they could not be held criminally liable for any harm that resulted to the victims of that harm. In this paper I argue for the criminalization of individuals who fall under this label; I argue for the adoption of Bad Samaritan laws. To accomplish this, I first argue for the conclusion that omissions can causally contribute to harm. From here I am able to reach three further conclusions relative to Bad Samaritan legislation. These three conclusions are that Bad Samaritan laws are justified, that the punishment for the violation of a Bad Samaritan law should be proportional to the degree culpability for the harm caused, and that if "commission by omission" statutes are justified, then so too are Bad Samaritan laws.

Through a brief analysis of punishment theory as well as the history of punishment in the United States, this work will focus on the current state of the punishment system that is characterized by a recent era of mass incarceration. The policies of mass incarceration coupled with economic downturns, has led to the emergence of an extremely profitable private prison industry. The prominence of this industry raises questions of legitimacy as well as questions of the interests that are being represented through apparent legislative manipulation via a powerful lobby. As with past eras of punishment, this current era that is characterized by policies of mass incarceration will presumably end in the future as the economic, political and social sensibilities shift. This project concludes with an analysis of possible strategies of reform and decarceration that may characterize the future of the punishment system in the United States.

Certain laws relating to self-defense were created known as "Stand Your Ground" laws. The public has interpreted these laws in ways that expand them beyond their original scope. To gain an understanding of self-defense laws, a look at the origins of self-defense is needed. Following the historical background, several cases will be examined that illustrate how the public has interpreted "Stand Your Ground" laws, and how these interpretations clash with elements of self-defense. Several philosophical principles including natural rights, the social contract, and some form of utilitarianism, will be discussed in relation to "Stand Your Ground" laws. A possible conclusion can be drawn that by misinterpreting "Stand Your Ground" laws, people compromise the philosophical ideals they hold, and infringe on other people's natural rights, break the social contract, and create societal unhappiness. Finally, some people are calling for reform of "Stand Your Ground" laws. These reforms focus on correcting public perception of "Stand Your Ground" laws.

This dissertation explores the discursive construction of work and family identities in the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) regulatory rulemaking process. It uses dramatism and public sphere theory along with the critical legal rhetoric perspective to analyze official FMLA legal texts as well as over 4,600 public comments submitted in response to the United States Department of Labor's 2008 notice of proposed rulemaking that ultimately amended the existing FMLA administrative regulations. The analysis in this dissertation concludes that when official and vernacular discourses intersect in a rulemaking process facilitated by the state, the facilitated public that emerges in that discourse is bounded by official discourses and appropriated language. But individuals in the process are able to convey and contest a range of work and family identities that include characteristics of public, private, abuse, accountability, sacrifice, and struggle. It further demonstrates that different circumferences for crafting work and family identities exist in the regulatory rulemaking process, including national, international, and time-bounded circumferences. Because the law is a discourse that has far-reaching rhetorical implications and the intersect between vernacular discourses and legal discourses is an underexplored area in both communication and legal studies, this dissertation offers a contribution to the ongoing work of scholars thinking about work and family identities, the material consequences of the intersect of work and family, and the rhetorical implications of legal discourse.