In Friday's federal courts roundup, the US First Circuit Court of Appeals approved a revised redistricting map for voting districts in Boston, Massachusetts. The same three judge panel had earlier rejected a proposed map, but felt that the new map adequately reflects the racial mix of the city. AP has the full story.

In Friday's rights and liberties news, security officials at Boston's Logan Airport have begun a new program to recognize possible terrorist threats in airports, a move that has rights groups wary. Air marshals, passenger screeners, and state police have been trained to look for certain behaviors that could indicate a terrorist plot. These behaviors, the totality of which could lead to being questioned, include wearing warm clothing on a warm day, loitering without luggage, observing security methods, or even gesturing with hand signals. Privacy advocates, including the ACLU, fear this will lead to unlawful searches and seizures and become a pretext for racial profiling. AP has more.

In other news, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports on gay rights demonstrations held near Seattle post offices yesterday, tax day, that focused on the discrimination faced by same-sex couples who are forced to file singly compared to the exemptions and tax breaks married couples receive. Holding signs that read "No marriage, no taxation," the demonstrators spoke of the tax on health benefits, the more frustrating method of itemizing personal property, and the loss of the married tax deduction.... AP reports that a South Carolina House of Representatives subcommittee has approved a bill that would vest constitutional rights in fetuses at fertilization. While many feel that the bill is unconstitutional, especially under Roe v. Wade, supporters believe the new federal Unborn Victims of Violence Act gives cause to pass the bill. Read the bill here.

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AP reports that American Airlines owes its pilots union $23.2 million, according to arbitrator Stephen B. Goldberg. The airline incurred the penalty, the latest in a troubled relationship with its unions, by overusing regional commuter carriers such as American Eagle in violation of union agreements. According to the decision, American Airlines changed code numbers associated with its regional carriers in an attempt to disguise the frequency of their use. The airline apparently intended to save money through the use of the smaller carriers' less expensive pilots, allowing the airline to lay off some of its own more highly paid pilots. In a related decision, Goldberg said American Airlines also inflated the number of commercial flights on its schedule after September 11, 2001, as that number could not be increased once layoffs began. The penalty, which the union may decline to seek in cash, comes a day after the US Department of Transportation granted the airline antitrust immunity in an arrangement to coordinate more closely with Belgium's SN Brussels Airlines.

Reuters reports today that European Union lawmakers may seek a court challenge to an anti-terrorism plan [PDF] that would give the US government personal information belonging to European travelers. Although the plan was rejected last month by the EU parliament, that vote did not bind the European Commission, which wants to move ahead with the deal negotiated with the US. Many European lawmakers have expressed privacy and accuracy concerns over the dissemination of the personal information, which would include travelers' credit card numbers.

President Bush said Friday in a joint press briefing with visiting British Prime Minister Tony Blair that he supports a plan for a United Nations "caretaker government" to assume control of Iraq following the President's self-imposed June 30 deadline to transfer sovereignty to Iraqis. The new plan, still in its formative stages, is largely the work of Lakhdar Brahimi, UN special envoy to Iraq. It would require that the Iraqi governing council assembled by the US be relieved of power in favor of a new temporary body chosen by the UN in conjunction with the US and current members of the governing council. The newly created entity would govern until such time as elections can be held. Read a White House transcript of the briefing here. The Washington Post has more. Meanwhile at the UN itself, US ambassador John Negroponte expressed the administration's desire to work with Brahimi in crafting a plan for the transfer of power. In a Security Council meeting (video here), Negroponte urged a "expansive, robust and vital role" for the UN in Iraq. The UN has issued this press release.

Voting 33-3 in favor of a workers' compensation bill, California's senate joined the state's house, which earlier today passed the bill by an overwhelming 77-3 vote. Legislative approval of the measure marks a huge victory for Republican governor Arnold Schwarzenegger who, according to USA Today, heavily emphasized the issue in his campaign. AP notes that Schwarzenegger may gain considerable momentum from the legislative success, engineered by a threat to the state's Democratic lawmakers to take the issue directly to voters. The new plan intends to save money by setting limits on medical benefits and limiting disability payments to two years, from the current maximum of five years. The bill also seeks to prevent workers from shopping for physicians beyond a limited pool of doctors selected by employers and insurance companies. AP has more.

In international law news Friday, the International Court of Justice will hear arguments next week from eight NATO members who claim that the court is not competent to hear cases brought against them by Serbia and Montenegro. The cases against Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and the UK involve questions of the legality of the use of force in the 1999 bombing raids on Yugoslavia. AFP has the full story. The ICJ has this press release which includes a history of the proceedings. The schedule of public hearings is here. Additional case materials are available from the ICJ's docket page (see cases 4-11).... Robert Ballard, discoverer of the Titanic, is advocating for an international law that would designate shipwrecks as historical sites and protect them from salvaging. Ballard has announced that he is planning a return expedition to the site of the Titanic to document the ship's deterioration since it was discovered 20 years ago. The Boston Herald has more.... Cardinal Renato Martino, head of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, has called for UN reforms which he says are necessary as a result of weakening of international law caused by the fight against terrorism. Also speaking at a conference sponsored by Rome's Russian Ecumenical Center was Italian professor Vittorio Possenti, who called for UN statutes to be strengthened so that member states who violate UN rules will be sanctioned. The Catholic News Service has more.

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One month after publicly calling upon his university to acknowledge its historical ties to slavery, Professor Alfred Brophy of the University of Alabama School of Law must be gratified with the university's answer. As announced in a press release Thursday, the University of Alabama has resolved to "more formally recognize the African-American history of its campus." Among its initiatives, it plans to recognize slave burial sites and buildings associated with slavery on campus, and to re-submit its application for a federal historic marker on the site of Governor George Wallace's 1963 stand against integration. Brophy has also called upon the university to apologize for its role in slavery, and according to today's Birmingham News, he has personally drafted the apology for the Faculty Senate's consideration next week. See JURIST's initial report on the matter here.

Elsewhere, the Western New England College of Law has announced plans to launch Massachusetts's first LLM degree program in estate planning in the fall of 2005. According to the Western Mass Law Tribune, WNECL will join only two other schools of law nationally in offering such such a program. Professor and program director Frederick Royal will target the program to solo practitioners and small firms in the school's vicinity. See the Tribune's full report here.

In Friday's corporations and securities law news, Ernst Welteke, president of Germany's Bundesbank, who had received benefits from a bank he regulates resigned on Friday afternoon, after two weeks of unremitting pressure from the German government. Read the personal statement by Welteke here[PDF]. Read the statement by the executive board announcing the move here[PDF]. The Financial Times has more.

In other news, a federal judge in the trial of four former Merrill Lynch bankers and two former Enron excutives rejected the defendants' request to delay the trial and instead moved up the start of the criminal trial one week. The defendants' wanted a delay to study documents recently turned over by the prosecution. Reuters has more.... The SEC has filed a complaint against household tool manufacturer Spear & Jackson Inc. related to the conduct of Chief Executive Dennis Crowley has allegedly been selling company stock in secret through brokerage accounts in the British Virgin Islands over the last two years totalling $3 million. Reuters has more.... A federal judge has urged attorneys to continue negotiations to reach a settlement in the lawsuit by the SEC against the Heartland Advisers Inc. investment firm. Read the SEC complaint here. AP has more.... Qwest Communications International Inc. has agreed to pay $7.5 million fine to the Colorado Office of Consumer Counsel to settle charges that it signed sweetheart deals with some competing telecom companies. The Denver Business Journal has more.

Also, the Delaware Supreme Court affirmed a lower court ruling by finding that former CEO of HealthSouth Corp., Richard Scrushy, would have to repay a $25 million loan to the company he founded. Reuters has more.... Limited Brands Inc. and its CEO, Leslie H. Wexner, could pay up to $10 million to settle a lawsuit filed by shareholders which alleges that rescinding an agreement related to stock held by the Wexner Children's Trust was a waste of corporate assets. AP has more.... Finally, directors of Royal/Dutch Shell are meeting in The Hague to discuss the internal investigation related to its surprise January cut in oil and gas reserves. Reuters has more.

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Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius (official profile page here) Friday vetoed a state bill [PDF] that would have allowed Kansans to carry concealed handguns. In an explanatory message to the state legislature, she said that while supporting Kansans' Second Amendment rights,

I do not believe the widespread legalization of concealed firearms that House Bill 2798 would allow would make Kansans safer. I do not believe allowing people to carry concealed handguns into sporting events, shopping malls, grocery stores, or the workplace would be good public policy. And, to me, the likelihood of exposing children to loaded handguns in their parents' purses, pockets, and automobiles is simply unacceptable.

Perhaps most troubling, though, is the untenable position in which House Bill 2798 would place law enforcement. If House Bill 2798 became law, police officers, highway patrolmen, sheriffs, and deputies in Kansas would be forced to assume that any person they stop could have a firearm. This would make their already dangerous job even more difficult.

Read the full text of her message. From Kansas, the Wichita Eagle has more.

Today's New York Times reports that Henry Viscardi Jr., a graduate of St. John's Law School who later formed Abilities, Inc. and its umbrella organization, the National Center for Disability Services, passed away Tuesday at the age of 91. Viscardi was an advocate for the disabled in many ways, including running Just One Break, an organization that provides employment services for disabled individuals, advising every president from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Jimmy Carter, giving four or more speeches a week, and writing eight books on the subject, including "Give Us The Tools." Viscardi was himself physically disabled, born with withered stumps for legs, but never let that stop him. He even fulfilled his dream of serving his country when, after being rejected by all of the armed forces, he joined the Red Cross as a field service officer. The Boston Globe has more.... Also, today's Washington Post reports that Jerome McGrath,a retired lawyer, lobbyist and trade association executive, died Tuesday at the age of 81. Executive vice president, general counsel and secretary of Interstate Natural Gas Association of America, a national trade group of major interstate and inter-provincial natural gas pipeline companies in the United States, Canada and Mexico beginning in 1968, McGrath was president of the company from 1978 until his retirement in 1988. McGrath was best known for arguing the case Federal Power Commission v. Transcontinental Gas Corp. before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1961. The case involved a natural gas pipeline that was transporting fuel to a New York public utility from Texas.

Italian Prime Ministre Silvio Berlusconi (official profile page here), who also happens to be Italy's richest man, has gone back on trial in Milan after the country's Constitutional Court ruled that a new law granting him immunity from prosecution while he held office was unconstitutional. Berlusconi is charged with trying in the 1980s - before he entered politics - to bribe judges deliberating on a business deal. BBC News has more.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, currently on a visit to the United States and due to meet Friday with President Bush, has said that a new UN Security Council resolution on Iraq is required, given the ongoing unrest in the country and the upcoming June 30 deadline for transfer of sovereignty to Iraqis. The resolution, which Blair broached publicly Thursday in a meeting with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan (read a subsequent press conference transcript here) would officially authorize the transfer and would encourage other countries to support the reconstruction process. President Bush is expected to endorse the proposal. From London, BBC News has more.

Massachusetts governor Matt Romney asked the Massachusetts legislature Thursday for special authorization to seek a stay of the ruling that would otherwise legalize same-sex marriage in Massachusetts mid-May. Read the Governor's press release here. Legislative leaders have said their would reject the measure, however, which appears to leave Romney with what he says is a highly complicated series of implementation issues, especially residency questions relating to a 1913 Massachusetts law that prevents out-of-staters from marrying in Massachusetts unless their marriage would be legal in their home state. Friday's Boston Globe has more.

In Friday's US law and business press, the Boston Business Journal reports that a Canadian court has awarded 3Com Corp. $3.4 million in a fraud case against Intelligent Decisions Inc..... According to the Miami Daily Business Review, a FL federal judge has termed the Miami US Attorney's handling of a small-time drug dealer's case "an abomination" of federal sentencing guidelines.... The Legal Intelligencer reports that a PA federal judge has declined to disqualify the law firm of Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll from representing several defendants in a civil rights suit over the responsibilities of ISPs when their subscribers allegedly trade in child pornography.... The Atlanta Business Chronicle reports that four law partners at Lord Bissell & Brook LLP's Atlanta office have left to form their own firm, to be called Fields, Howell, Athans & McLaughlin.... FindLaw's Writ features Hastings law professor Vikram Amar's column on why executive privilege does not apply to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice's recent public testimony before the 9/11 Commission, as well as legal affairs reporter Seth Stern's book review of Stanford law professor Lawrence Lessig's Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology & The Law To Lock Down Culture & Control Creativity.

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Legal stories running in Friday's foreign press... In China, Xinhua follows attempts by the Chief Executive of Hong Kong's Special Administrative Region to convince the National People's Congress to amend the Election Law that controls his position. His proposal supports maintaining the "one country, two systems," "Hong Kong people governing Hong Kong," and high-degree autonomy principles already in place while strictly adhering to the Hong Kong's Basic Law.... Australia's The Age features reaction to the Prime Minister decision to abolish a commission representing Australia's indigenous peoples. The fucntions of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC), established in 1990 as representative body for indigenous Australians, will be replaced by existing government agencies.... Singapore's Straits Times reports the election committee has proposed requirements that would prohibit blind candidates. The National Awakening Party (PKB), whose presidential candidate is nearly blind, said the requirement would violate a law on presidential polls.

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On April 16, 1963, an incarcerated Martin Luther King, Jr. (arrested for demonstrating in defiance of a court order) wrote his Letter from Birmingham Jail in response to a published statement by eight fellow clergymen from Alabama :

We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we stiff creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging dark of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness" then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

Read the full text of the Letter.