Atlantic Legal's commitment to ensuring that only sound science enters the courtroom remains as vigorous as ever. Our most recent defense of that fundamental principle takes the form of an amicus brief submitted to the California Court of Appeal as it prepares to hear arguments in Aguilar v. ExxonMobil Corporation , one of the ongoing lawsuits in the now infamous Lockheed litigation. Filed on behalf of a group of scientists who have studied the role science plays in public affairs, the brief may play a pivotal role in one of the most contentious and costly toxic tort actions in history.

In mid-July Atlantic Legal filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court of the United States in Rumsfeld v. FAIR.

The case involves a challenge to the constitutionality of the Solomon Amendment, which provides that certain federal funds may not be granted to colleges and universities that do not give military recruiters the same access to on-campus recruiting as the school provides to other outside employers.

Although the Supreme Court established firm and clear standards for admissibility for expert testimony in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, 509 U.S. 579 (1993), state courts have been slow to grasp the principles of sound science underpinning that decision. This slowness has been especially obvious--and ironic--in cases involving medical causation. Though Daubert was itself a medical causation case in which it was alleged that a child's birth defects were caused by medication the mother took while pregnant, state courts have repeatedly exempted medical causation cases from Daubert standards of evidence. Likewise, as courts continue to struggle to apply the Daubert principle fairly and responsibly, Atlantic Legal continues to clarify that principle persistently and successfully.

In GEOD v. New Jersey (U.S. District Court, New Jersey) the Foundation represented a small aerial surveying firm which had been virtually excluded from participating in New Jersey state construction projects because of the state’s "minority and woman owned business enterprise" program, which required prime contractors to subcontract seven percent and three percent, respectively, of the value of the state contract to minority and woman owned businesses. We alleged that this program, embodied both in statute and regulations, violated GEOD's equal protection rights under both the United States Constitution and the New Jersey constitution.