Chapter 224 of the Acts of 2012, an Act Improving the Quality of Health Care and Reducing Costs Through Increased Transparency, Efficiency and Innovation, may radically change the way cost conscious Massachusetts patients make health care choices.  Theoretically, patients will eventually be able to shop around by estimated cost, before deciding which provider they   …Continue Reading Price Shopping for Medical Care in Massachusetts

President Franklin D Roosevelt issued the first proclamation designating Dec. 15, 1941 as Bill of Rights Day. After the U.S. Constitution was signed in 1787, many people in the ratifying conventions that followed thought it should have a section that protected fundamental human rights.  James Madison wrote   …Continue Reading Bill of Rights Day, December 15

There are specific steps that you must take to be effective. Our Trial Court Law Libraries can help. Injunctive Relief: Rule 65 deals solely with the procedural aspects of injunctive relief, not with the court’s exercise of discretion in granting or denying it, which remains   …Continue Reading Requesting or Defending Against Injunctive Relief?

Title 4, section 7 of the United States Code dictates the position and manner of display of the National Flag.  See this helpful guide on the U.S. Flag Code.  The Massachusetts Governor can also decide to fly flags at half-staff in the Commonwealth pursuant to    4 U.S.C.   …Continue Reading When Do Flags Fly at Half-Staff?

             The Old Farmers’ Almanac has been forecasting weather patterns since 1792 and the outlook for the coming winter looks like we’ll need to stock up on warm winter gear and shovels.       As we head into this cold and snowy season, it’s important to   …Continue Reading ‘Tis the Season

      A team of faculty, graduate, and undergraduate students at Northeastern University have created Our Marathon: The Boston Bombing Digital Archive  Our Marathon is an online memorial and archive of crowdsourced stories, photos, video, and social media related to the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings and its aftermath. The   …Continue Reading Boston Bombing Digital Archive

“Written” and “in writing” are defined in Mass. General Laws, c. 4, § 7, clause 38, to “include printing, engraving, lithographing and any other mode of representing words and letters, but if the written signature of a person is required by law, it shall always   …Continue Reading Signing with an “X” explicated

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel The Scarlet Letter (1850) describes the plight of Hester Prynne, who has been forced to wear a scarlet letter A (for “adultery”) on her dress as a sign of shame.  She also had to stand on the scaffold for three hours as   …Continue Reading Scarlet Letter

Famous Trials in American history is a website, created by Professor Douglas O. Linder and maintained by the University of Missouri-Kansas City Law School, that tells the stories of over 70 famous cases, by using a mix of transcripts, testimony, maps, pictures, audio clips, primary documents, links,   …Continue Reading Famous Trials Online

Executive Orders are written orders of the Governor setting forth policies and procedures in furtherance of his statutory and constitutional responsibilities, including: his constitutional authority as “supreme executive magistrate,” his constitutional duty to enforce state laws, his supervisory authority over the executive branch, his constitutional   …Continue Reading What are Executive Orders?