Gale Encyclopedia Of American Law 3Rd Edition Volume 1 P55 pdf

vBATES, DAISY LEE GATSON Daisy Lee Gatson Bates, a CIVIL RIGHTS activist and newspaper publisher, was a key figure in the integration of public schools in Little Rock, Arkansas, in the l

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into the control of MLB over the airwaves, the federal appellate court ruled that the telecasts were indeed copyrightable works and that clubs were entitled to the revenues derived from them

As a result of these cases, economic decisions regarding baseball have been left to the players and owners For this reason, baseball has been seen as an anomaly with regard to U.S

antitrust laws, and its exemption has been called

“an aberration confined to baseball” (Flood)

The push for congressional action to eliminate this exemption intensified with the baseball players’ strike from 1994 to 1995 The strike left many in baseball, including fans, disenfran-chised Senator Howard M Metzenbaum, an Ohio Democrat who headed the subcommittee

on antitrust laws, led the fight to remove the antitrust exemption from baseball However, the 234-day strike ended in an agreement between owners and players, in which owners promised to pay “luxury taxes” on clubs with high payrolls Congress was spared the necessity

of acting

Local communities, however, faced the possibility of losing their MLB franchises as the economics of baseball changed dramatically

in the late 1990s Major market teams, many of them now owned by corporations rather than

wealthy individuals, drove up player payrolls This change hurt smaller market teams and teams owned by individuals who either lacked the resources or the desire to match salaries The Minnesota Twins, unable to secure a new, publicly funded baseball stadium, threatened to move to another state in 1997 The state of Minnesota sought unsuccessfully to probe the team’s finances and that of MLB, but in the end the Twins could not secure a sale or move for the team

Unable to curb rising costs, the baseball league proposed contracting two teams before the 2002 season Under contraction, MLB would buy out the owners and distribute the players to other teams through a draft The league argued that contraction would strengthen the financial wellbeing of the sport The owners, however, needed to move quickly if contraction was to happen before the 2002 season

The Montreal Expos and the Minnesota Twins were rumored to be the teams selected for contraction In Minnesota, the operators of the Metrodome, where the Twins play their home games, sued the Twins and MLB, asking a state court to order the Twins to play the 2002 season They sought either to win on the merits

or delay contraction for a year The judge issued

a PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION and the Twins appealed, arguing that the team did have an obligation to pay the rent for the season, but they could decide whether to play the season The Minnesota Court of Appeals, in Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission v Minnesota Twins Partnership, 638 N.W.2d 214 (2002), upheld the injunction, which meant that contraction be-came impossible for the 2002 season The baseball league later abandoned the concept of contraction, at least for the near future

In addition to its ongoing financial trou-bles, baseball has faced other difficulties from incidence of steroid abuse Baseball first began testing for performance-enhancing drugs dur-ing the 2003 season The testdur-ing was a type of survey, designed to assess the number of players using steroids in the league The tests were to be anonymous, and even those who tested positive would not be punished In November 2003, MLB revealed that more than

5 percent of the tests conducted during the

2003 season were positive, prompting the first-ever mandatory testing and punishment for players who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs

Donald Fehr of the

Major League Baseball

Players Association

addresses the findings

of the Mitchell Report,

which investigated

steroid use in baseball.

AP IMAGES

528 BASEBALL

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In 2004 MLB faced increasing pressure from

government to strengthen its drug policy or face

legislative intervention In 2005 MLB

signifi-cantly increased the penalties for testing positive

for performance-enhancing drugs The more

stringent standards required a 50-game

suspen-sion for the first offense, 100-game for the

second offense, and a lifetime ban from baseball

for the third offense

In 2006 baseball commissioner Bud Selig

appointed former U.S Senator George Mitchell

to investigate the use of performance-enhancing

drugs in major league baseball Senator Mitchell’s

investigation culminated with the delivery of the

“Report to the Commissioner of Baseball of an

Independent Investigation into the Illegal Use

of Steroids and Other Performance Enhancing

Substances By Players in Major League Baseball,”

also known as the“Mitchell Report.” The Mitchell

Report, issued in 2007, found that the use of

performance-enhancing drugs had been

perva-sive for more than a decade, and it made

recommendations for MLB for the future As of

2009, the legal ramifications of the steroid

investigation include government probes into

drug distribution and indictments against major

league players for PERJURY and OBSTRUCTION OF

JUSTICE, related to allegedly false denials of

steroid use

FURTHER READINGS

Burk, Robert F 1994 Never Just a Game Chapel Hill: Univ.

of North Carolina Press.

Helyar, John 1994 Lords of the Realm New York: Villard

Books.

Kovaleff, Theodore P 1994 The Antitrust Impulse New

York: Sharpe.

Laitner, Colin 2006 “Steroids and Drug Enhancements in

Sports: The Real Problem and the Real Solution

”De-Paul Journal of Sports Law and Contemporary Problems.

3 (Summer).

Lewis, Michael 2003 Moneyball: The Art of Winning an

Unfair Game New York: Norton.

Manfred, Robert D., Jr 2008 “Federal Labor Law Obstacles

to Achieving a Completely Independent Drug Program

in Major League Baseball ”Marquette Sports Law

Review 19 (Fall).

Radomski, Kirk 2009 Bases Loaded: The Inside Story of the

Steroid Era in Baseball by the Central Figure in the

Mitchell Report New York: Hudson Street Press.

Sands, Jack, and Peter Gammons 1993 Coming Apart at the

Seams New York: Macmillan.

U.S Congress Subcommittee on Economic and Commercial

Law 1993 –94 Baseball’s Antitrust Exemption: Hearing

before the Subcommittee on Economic and Commercial Law.

Washington, D.C.: U.S Government Printing Office.

U.S Congress Subcommittee on Oversight and

Govern-ment 2008 The Mitchell Report: The Illegal Use of

Steroids in Major League Baseball Washington, D.C.:

U.S Government Printing Office.

Zimbalist, Andrew S 1992 Baseball and Billions: A Probing Look Inside the Big Business of Our National Pastime.

New York: Basic Books.

Zimbalist, Andrew S., and Bob Costas 2003 May the Best Team Win: Baseball Economics and Public Policy.

Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution.

CROSS REFERENCE Sports Law.

BASIC BOOKS V KINKO’S GRAPHICS CORP

See COPYRIGHT “Copyright Law in Action”

(Sidebar)

BASIS The minimum, fundamental constituents, foun-dation, or support of a thing or a system without which the thing or system would cease to exist In accounting, the value assigned to an asset that is sold or transferred so that it can be determined whether a gain or loss has resulted from the transaction The amount that property is

estimat-ed to be worth at the time it is purchasestimat-ed, acquired, and received for tax purposes

In a simple case, the basis of property for tax purposes under theINTERNAL REVENUE CODEis the purchase price of a piece of property For example, if a taxpayer purchases a parcel of land for $500,000, and no deductions apply to that parcel of land, the taxpayer’s basis is $500,000

If the taxpayer later sells the property for

$550,000, the amount of gain realized by the transaction is the sale price ($550,000) less the adjusted basis ($500,000), or $50,000

Where a taxpayer is allowed to depreciate property with a limited useful life, such as an automobile used primarily for business pur-poses, the taxpayer’s adjusted basis is reduced

Assume a taxpayer purchases an automobile for

$30,000, and then claims deductions for $5,000

The adjusted basis of the automobile is then reduced to $25,000 When the taxpayer sells the automobile for $26,000, the amount of gain realized is $1,000 (the sale price of $26,000 minus the adjusted basis of $25,000)

FURTHER READINGS Bankman, Joseph, et al 2008 Federal Income Tax: Examples and Explanations 5th ed Frederick, MD: Wolters Kluwer Law & Business.

Hudson, David M., and Stephen A Lind 2007 Federal Income Taxation Eagan, MN: West.

BASIS 529

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McEowen, Roger, and Neil Harl 2008 Estate Planning, PM–993 Available online at http://www.calt.iastate.

edu/basis.html; website home page: http://www.calt.

iastate.edu (accessed August 28, 2009).

CROSS REFERENCES Internal Revenue Code; Profit.

BASTARDY ACTION

An archaic name given to a court proceeding in which the paternity of an illegitimate child is determined in order to impose and enforce support obligations upon the father

The term bastardy action is derived from the early common-law use of the word bastard to describe a child born out of wedlock Modern legislation refers to such proceedings as filiation proceedings or paternity suits because of the derogatory connotation of the term bastard

Although such proceedings are typically civil actions, a few states have established such actions as criminal proceedings

CROSS REFERENCE Illegitimacy.

vBATES, DAISY LEE GATSON Daisy Lee Gatson Bates, a CIVIL RIGHTS activist and newspaper publisher, was a key figure in the integration of public schools in Little Rock, Arkansas, in the late 1950s When a storm of violent public protest swept Little Rock, Bates orchestrated the strategies that would reverse

200 years of state-sanctioned segregation

Bates was born in 1920 in Huttig, in the lumbering region of southeast Arkansas When she was a baby, her mother was raped and

murdered No one was prosecuted for the crime, but suspicion in the town centered on three white men After her mother’s death, her father fled, leaving Bates with his best friends, Orlee Smith and Susie Smith, who adopted her and raised her as their only child They were kind and indulgent parents and Bates grew to be

a strong-willed and determined child When she was eight, she learned of the circumstances of her birth and adoption The painful knowledge

of her parents’ suffering and the harsh realities

of life in the rural south became driving forces

in Bates’s life

Although she grew up during difficult economic times, Bates’s childhood was

relative-ly comfortable Her relationship with her adoptive parents was warm and loving, and she was especially close to her father Neverthe-less, Bates’s childhood was not easy Like other black children, she experienced the sting of racial discrimination from an early age She attended a segregated public school, using worn textbooks handed down from the white chil-dren’s school Her school was little more than a room with a potbellied stove that gave so little heat she and her classmates often kept their coats on all day

In 1941 Orlee Smith became gravely ill When he knew he was going to die, he called his daughter to his side He was aware of the anger and pain she carried because of her mother’s death and her father’s disappearance and because

of the bigotry that was a part of their everyday life He counseled her not to let hatred and hostility control her but rather to use her strong feelings as a catalyst to work for change He said:

Don’t hate white people just because they’re white If you hate, make it count for

Daisy Lee Gatson Bates 1920–1999

1975 1950

1925

◆

1920 Born

Huttig, Ark.

1954 Brown v Board of Education

decided by U.S Supreme Court

1952 Elected president of Arkansas State Conference of NAACP branches

1939–45 World War II

1942 The Arkansas State

Press first published

1950–53 Korean War

1957 Little Rock Nine integrated Central High School

1959 State Press closed for financial reasons

1962 The Long Shadow of

Little Rock published

1971 Public school busing to achieve integration began

1967 Elected to NAACP national board

1961–73 Vietnam War

1978 U.S Supreme Court rejected racial

quotas in University of California v Bakke

1986 The Long

Shadow of Little Rock reprinted

1988 The Long Shadow of Little Rock

won American Book Award

1995

◆

1999 Died, Little Rock, Ark.

2001 Arkansas state law established annual state holiday in memory of Bates

530 BASTARDY ACTION

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something Hate the humiliations we are

living under in the South Hate the

discrimi-nation that eats away at the soul of every

black man and woman Hate the insults

hurled at us by white scum—then try to do

something about it, or your hate won’t spell a

thing

Smith’s death became a kind of rebirth for

Bates She did not know it then, but his words

would strengthen and sustain her resolve during

the difficult struggles she was to face

In 1942 Bates married Lucius Christopher

Bates, an insurance agent and friend of her late

father, and settled in Little Rock Her husband

had majored in journalism at Wilberforce

College, in Ohio, and the young couple pooled

their savings and began publishing the Arkansas

State Press While writing and publishing the

fledgling paper, Bates also enrolled in business

administration and public relations courses at

Shorter College, in Rome, Georgia The State

Press quickly became the largest and most

influential black paper in Arkansas

With the entry of the United States into

WORLD WAR II, Camp Robinson, near Little Rock,

was reopened The influx of soldiers, many of

whom were black men from northern cities,

caused racial tensions to rise in the city The State Press had gained a reputation as an independent“voice of the people” and regularly attacked police brutality, segregation, and inequities in the criminal justice system When the paper reported a particularly gruesome incident in which a black soldier was killed by

a white policeman, many advertisers who were wary of antagonizing their white patrons withdrew their support, and circulation of the paper dropped However, the Bateses were able

to stay afloat and eventually regain their advertisers and rebuild the paper’s circulation

Their tenacity paid off in changes in working and living conditions for blacks in Arkansas For example, as a result of their reporting on police brutality in black neighborhoods, black police officers were hired to patrol those areas

From their earliest days in Little Rock, Bates and her husband were active in the local branch

of the National Association for the Advance-ment of Colored People (NAACP) In 1952 Bates was elected president of the Arkansas State Conference of NAACP branches In 1954 when the Supreme Court handed down its historic decision in BROWN V BOARD OF EDUCATION 347 U.S 483, 74 S Ct 686, 98 L Ed 873 (1954), declaring that segregated schools are“inherently unequal,” she and her colleagues began pressing for implementation of the Court’s mandate to desegregate the schools “with all deliberate speed” (Brown v Board of Education, 349 U.S

294 at 301, 75 S Ct 753 at 756, 99 L Ed 1083 [1955]) Because of her prominent position with the NAACP, Bates found herself a central character in the integration battle that soon erupted in Little Rock

The Little Rock School Board chose nine black students to be the first to integrate Little Rock Central High School Planning and coordination of the activities of the group, which came to be known as the Little Rock Nine, fell to Bates By September 1, 1957, angry crowds had begun milling around Central High

to protest and try to prevent the enrollment of the black students On September 2, the day before school was to open, Governor Orval Faubus dispatched the ArkansasNATIONAL GUARD

and ordered it to surround Central Claiming that he was protecting Little Rock’s citizens from possible mob violence, he declared that no black students would be allowed to enter the

Daisy Bates.

AP IMAGES

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school and that “blood [would] run in the streets” if any attempted to do so

NAACP lawyers Wiley Branton and THUR-GOOD MARSHALL (later a U.S Supreme Court justice) promptly obtained an injunction against Faubus for his interference, but Faubus refused

to withdraw the troops Bates decided to have the students enter the school in a group She contacted eight of them and told them to assemble at a designated intersection the morning of September 4 and travel to school together The ninth student, Elizabeth Eckford, did not receive word of the plan Unaware of the maelstrom awaiting her, Eckford arrived at Central High alone and was taunted, jeered, and accosted by hundreds of white people as reporters and photographers from around the world observed and recorded the scene The National Guard did not attempt to help Eckford but instead blocked her entrance to the school

Neither she nor any of the other members of the Little Rock Nine—who arrived later in a group,

as arranged—were allowed to pass through the line of Guard members surrounding the school

The attempt by Bates and the nine students

to enter Central set off a series of violent incidents that continued for 17 days On September 20, attorneys Branton and Marshall obtained an injunction barring the use of the National Guard to interfere with integration at Central High By this time, the Bateses’ home had become the unofficial center of activity and communication for the integration effort

Reporters from all over the United States came and went, some staying days or weeks

On September 23 all the Little Rock Nine met at the Bates home to try again to exercise their right to enter Central High Traveling in two cars they drove to a side entrance of the building, away from the persistent throng, and were escorted into the school by police officers

Again mob violence spread through the city

Later in the day the students were secretly removed from the school through a delivery entrance, and the chief of police declared that Little Rock was under a reign of terror

The next day the black students remained at home The mayor and the chief of police appealed to the U.S DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE for assistance In response, President DWIGHT D

EISENHOWER federalized the Arkansas National Guard and ordered Secretary of Defense Charles

E Wilson to enforce the integration order

Wilson ordered 1,000 paratroopers from the 101st Airborne (“Screaming Eagles”) Division

of the 327th Infantry Regiment into Little Rock

to restore order

On September 25 the Little Rock Nine assembled again at the Bates home Under the protection of the paratroopers they were taken

to Central High, where they entered under the watchful eyes of hundreds of reporters, photo-graphers, and news camera operators The paratroopers remained at Central until Septem-ber 30, when they withdrew to Camp Robinson,

12 miles away The federalized Arkansas National Guard remained on patrol at Central until the end of the school year Although it was not necessary to recall the paratroopers, and the number of minority students in Little Rock’s formerly white schools steadily increased, vio-lence, hatred, and acrimony continued to plague the city for many years

Bates endured many attempts to harass and intimidate her, including rocks thrown through her window, gunshots fired at her house, dynamite exploded near her house, and crosses burned on her lawn In late October 1957 she was arrested under a newly enacted ordinance that required officials of organizations to supply information regarding membership, donors, amounts of contributions, and expenditures Although she was found guilty under the ordinance, the conviction was later overturned

by the Supreme Court on grounds that the ordinance requirement interfered with the members’ freedom of association (Bates v City

of Little Rock, 361 U.S 516, 80 S Ct 412, 4 L

Ed 480[1960]) In 1959 Bates and her husband were forced to close the State Press for financial reasons

Through all the harassment Bates remained determined to keep the wheels of the integra-tion movement going forward After closing the newspaper she traveled throughout the United States working on behalf of the Democratic National Committee and the Johnson adminis-tration’s antipoverty programs In 1965 she suffered a stroke and returned to Little Rock, but she continued to be active in the NAACP and in 1967 was elected to its national board In

1968 she moved to Mitchellville, Arkansas, to organize the Mitchellville Office of Economic Opportunity Self-Help Project The project was responsible for new water and sewer systems, paved streets, a community center, and a swimming pool

BE THIS GENERATION

—D AISY B ATES

532 BATES, DAISY LEE GATSON

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In 1984 Bates revived the State Press and was

awarded honorary degrees by the University of

Arkansas and Washington University In 1986

the University of Arkansas Press published a

reprint edition of her autobiography, The Long

Shadow of Little Rock, and in 1988 the book

received the American Book Award, the first

reprint edition to be given that honor

In 1987 Bates sold the State Press but she

remained a consultant for the paper In the

same year Little Rock named a new facility the

“Daisy Bates Elementary School” Bates

contin-ued her involvement in community activities

until shortly before her death on November 4,

1999, in Little Rock President BILL CLINTON

honored her by allowing her body to lie in state

at the Capitol

FURTHER READINGS

Bates, Daisy 2007 The Long Shadow of Little Rock.

Fayetteville: Univ of Arkansas Press.

Branch, Taylor 1989 Parting the Waters: America in the

King Years, 1954–1963 New York: Simon & Schuster.

Hine, Darlene C., Elsa B Brown, Rosalyn Terborg-Penn,

eds 1993 Black Women in America: An Historical

Encyclopedia Bloomington: Indiana Univ Press.

Jacoway, Elizabeth, and C Fred Williams, eds 1999.

Understanding the Little Rock Crisis: An Exercise in

Remembrance and Reconciliation Fayetteville: Univ of

Arkansas.

Smith, Jessie C., ed 2002 Notable Black American Women.

Detroit: Gale Research.

CROSS REFERENCES

Brown v Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas; Civil Rights

Movement; NAACP; School Desegregation.

vBATES, EDWARD

Edward Bates served as U.S attorney general in

the cabinet of PresidentABRAHAM LINCOLN from

1861 to 1864

Bates was born September 4, 1793, in Belmont, Virginia He left his native Virginia

at the age of twenty-one and settled in Missouri, where he concentrated his career efforts

Bates was admitted to the Missouri bar in

1816 and was attorney general from 1820 to

1822 He was also a member of the Missouri Constitutional Convention in 1820

In 1822 Bates began the legislative phase of his career as a member of the Missouri House of

Edward Bates 1793–1869

◆

1793 Born,

Belmont, Va.

1814 Moved to Missouri Territory

1821 Missouri statehood granted

1822 Elected to Missouri House of Representatives

1821–26 Served

as U.S district attorney

1827–29 Served in U.S.

House of Representatives

1830–34 Served as member of Missouri Senate

1834 Reelected

to Missouri House of Representatives

1850 Appointed secretary of war

by President Fillmore; declined appointment

1861–64 Served as U.S.

attorney general under Lincoln

1861–65 U.S Civil War

1869 Died,

St Louis, Mo.

1800

Edward Bates LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

EXIST EXCEPT UNDER GOVERNMENT OF

—E DWARD B ATES BATES, EDWARD 533

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Representatives In 1827 he became a representa-tive for Missouri in the U.S House of Representa-tives, serving for two years, and then returned to state government as a member of the Missouri Senate, serving from 1830 to 1834 In 1834 he became a member of the Missouri House of Representatives for a second time Bates was also a U.S.DISTRICT ATTORNEYfrom 1821 to 1826

Bates was an unsuccessful presidential nominee at the Republican National Conven-tion of 1860 He died March 25, 1869, in

St Louis, Missouri

BATTEL Physical combat engaged in by an accuser and accused to resolve their differences, usually involving a serious crime or ownership of land

It was recognized by the English king from the eleventh to seventeenth centuries

Trial by battel was introduced into England

by William the Conqueror It was based upon the belief that the winner of the battle, which was tried by God, was the party who was in the right in the dispute

BATTERED CHILD/SPOUSE SYNDROME

A condition created by sustained physical, sexual, and/or emotional abuse, which creates a variety of physical and emotional symptoms

Violence of any kind is traumatic to victims, and the thought that someone could exert extreme violence against a loved one or a child

is repulsive Battered-child syndrome and battered-spouse syndrome are both the result

of repeated violence—beatings, choking, sexual

ASSAULT, verbal abuse, or any combination The resulting trauma leaves its victims with physical and emotional scars, which can show up in a variety of symptoms that can come on gradually

or suddenly Often the symptoms are similar to other, less dangerous conditions Sometimes there are no visible symptoms From a legal perspective, this makes both syndromes difficult

to prove The fact that there is heated disagree-ment about these syndromes, what they repre-sent, and in fact whether they are true syndromes at all, only adds to the difficulty

Although both syndromes stem from the same violent behavior (and in some cases, the same perpetrator), they need to be treated separately

Battered-Child Syndrome

Children can be subjected to violence at the hands of any adult with whom they have contact It could be a parent, an older sibling,

a babysitter, a day-care provider, a family friend,

a parent’s romantic partner—in short, anyone Some children are victimized by several people The victimization can come in the form of physical violence,SEXUAL ABUSE, or verbal abuse

If one of these factors is present, chances are that others are present as well Physical abuse can go undetected for a long time A child who suffers repeated falls or broken bones might be considered “clumsy”, or the injuries might be brushed off as the kind of bumps and bruises all children get Sexual abuse might have no outward signs, or the victim might be unusually forward or inappropriately flirtatious with adults

Even infants are not immune to abuse In shaken-baby syndrome, a baby is shaken so violently that brain injury can occur; repeated shaking episodes or even just one particularly severe episode can result in death

A child suffering from battered child syndrome might be quiet and withdrawn, lethargic, depressed, or violent Someone who does not know the particular child might not immediately spot emotional symptoms, but if the child displays unchildlike behavior, coupled with unexplained chronic physical bruising, chances are the child is a victim of abuse Those who investigate child-abuse crimes must be extremely thorough, especially if the child is very young and thus unable to corroborate what the evidence shows Some-times a physician will spot signs of abuse or battered-child syndrome when a child is brought into an emergency room for treatment

of some injury A full investigation requires interviews with anyone who has access to the child, including parents, siblings, other relatives, neighbors, day-care providers or babysitters, teachers, and doctors Even those who are not involved in abuse might have valuable informa-tion to provide Often, those who have committed the abuse will offer vague or conflicting information about what led to a particular injury If warranted, a child could be placed in temporary PROTECTIVE CUSTODY while

an investigation proceeds Depending on the extent and severity of abuse, those who have committed the abuse might benefit from

534 BATTEL

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counseling or other forms of treatment (e.g.,

substance or they might face criminal charges

and serve a prison sentence

Battered-Spouse Syndrome

Battered-spouse syndrome is more commonly

called “battered-women’s syndrome” because

most of the victims are women, either wives or

girlfriends of the perpetrators However, abused

husbands and boyfriends have gained increased

attention, as have same-sex abuse by gay and

lesbian partners WithCHILD ABUSE, investigators

are often at a loss because the child is too young

to testify In cases of battered-spouse syndrome,

however, the problem is that often the victim

refuses to testify Guilt and shame are primary

reasons, particularly for men who expect they

will be ridiculed for being abused by a woman

Fear is an even stronger factor in abuse victims’

silence

Typical symptoms of a battered-spouse

syndrome victim include the openly physical

ones—bruises, black eyes, broken bones, cuts

and scratches The emotional symptoms include

depression, lack of self-esteem, and

hopeless-ness Sufferers might be“hypervigilant” to any

signs of conflict on the part of the spouse

Denial that a problem exists is a common

response to questions from concerned friends,

loved ones, or even medical professionals

The phrase “battered-women’s syndrome”

was first used in the early 1980s; in ensuing

years lawyers began using the“battered woman”

defense in HOMICIDE cases in which women

killed their husbands or boyfriends Many

women claimed SELF-DEFENSE, explaining that

theMURDER victim had been physically abusive

for years As the concept of battered-spouse

syndrome became more clearly articulated in

the 1980s and 1990s, the syndrome as a

self-defense argument gained strength In fact, it

played into the CLEMENCY decisions of several

governors, beginning with Governor Richard

Celeste of Ohio, who in 1990 granted clemency

to 25 women who had murdered their spouses

Their trials had been unfair, he concluded,

because testimony about their abuse had not

been allowed as evidence Other governors

followed suit in the ensuing years, including

Maryland governor Donald Schaefer,

Massa-chusetts governor William Weld, and California

governors Pete Wilson and Gray Davis Experts

in DOMESTIC VIOLENCE explained to skeptics the

reason why many battered women did not

simply leave their husbands, either to stay with friends or go to a women’s shelter In some cases, they said, these women had been so emotionally broken that they were too fright-ened to leave Some had been abused for so long that they had actually come to believe that they were responsible for their own abuse

In the 1990s a new movement emerged to point out that abuse can happen to men as well

as women The number of abused men was estimated at no higher than five percent of the abuse cases, and to a large extent it was not taken seriously Advocacy groups for women claimed that for a man to claim that his wife or girlfriend physically terrorized him were absurd

Law enforcement officials often took abuse charges less seriously when the complainant was a man Since the late twentieth century, statistical evidence about male abuse has been gaining credibility Moreover, gay and lesbian partner abuse has also begun to be taken more seriously In 1999 a Brooklyn, N.Y., Supreme Court judge ruled that a gay man who had stabbed his partner to death could invoke battered-spouse syndrome at his trial

The bottom line from a legal standpoint is that spouse syndrome, like battered-child syndrome, requires solid and substantive evidence if it is to be used as a defense in a murder trial A woman who has no visible physical signs of abuse might have been abused, but simply claiming to have been abused with

no evidence at all at least warrants a thorough investigation Cases in which women—and men—have claimed that an estranged spouse has been violent, simply to gain custody of their children, are not uncommon The issue of battered spouses may be clearer in the first years

of the twenty-first century than it was in the 1970s and 1980s, but it continues to evolve

FURTHER READINGS Justice Department Web site 2002 Battered Child Syndrome:

Investigating Physical Abuse and Homicide Washington, D.C.: U.S Department of Justice Available online at http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/161406.pdf; web-site home page: http://www.ncjrs.gov (accessed July 6, 2009).

Parrish, Rob 2009 Abused Men: The Hidden Side of Domestic Violence Westport, CT: Greenwood.

Walker, Lenore E 2009 The Battered Woman Syndrome 3d

ed New York: Springer.

CROSS REFERENCES Domestic Violence; Child Abuse; Women ’s Rights.

BATTERED CHILD/SPOUSE SYNDROME 535

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At common law, an intentional unpermitted act causing harmful or offensive contact with the

“person” of another

Battery is concerned with the right to have one’s body left alone by others

Both a tort and a crime, its essential element, harmful or offensive contact, is the same in both areas of the law The main distinction between the two categories lies in the penalty imposed A

DEFENDANT sued for a tort is civilly liable to the

PLAINTIFFfor damages The punishment for crimi-nal battery is a fine, imprisonment, or both

Usually battery is prosecuted as a crime only in cases involving serious harm to the victim

Elements

The following elements must be proven to establish a case for battery: (1) an act by a defendant; (2) an intent to cause harmful or offensive contact on the part of the defendant; and (3) harmful or offensive contact to the plaintiff

The Act The act must result in one of two forms of contact Causing any physical harm or injury to the victim—such as a cut, a burn, or a bullet wound—could constitute battery, but actual injury is not required Even though there

is no apparent bruise following harmful contact, the defendant can still be guilty of battery;

occurrence of a physical illness subsequent to the contact may also beACTIONABLE The second type of contact that may constitute battery causes no actual physical harm but is, instead, offensive or insulting to the victim Examples include spitting in someone’s face or offensively touching someone against his or her will

Touching the person of someone is defined as including not only contacts with the body, but also with anything closely connected with the body, such as clothing or an item carried in the person’s hand For example, a battery may be committed

by intentionally knocking a hat off someone’s head or knocking a glass out of someone’s hand

Intent Although the contact must be intended, there is no requirement that the defendant intend

to harm or injure the victim InTORT LAW, the intent must be either specific intent—the contact was specifically intended—or general intent—the de-fendant was substantially certain that the act would cause the contact The intent element is satisfied in

CRIMINAL LAWwhen the act is done with an intent to injure or with criminal negligence—failure to use care to avoid criminal consequences The intent for

criminal law is also present when the defendant’s conduct is unlawful even though it does not amount toCRIMINAL NEGLIGENCE

Intent is not negated if the aim of the contact was a joke As with all torts, however, consent is

a defense Under certain circumstances consent

to a battery is assumed A person who walks in a crowded area impliedly consents to a degree of contact that is inevitable and reasonable Con-sent may also be assumed if the parties had a prior relationship unless the victim gave the defendant a previous warning

There is no requirement that the plaintiff be aware of a battery at the time it is committed The gist of the action is the lack of consent to contact It is no defense that the victim was sleeping or unconscious at the time

Harmful or Offensive Conduct It is not necessary for the defendant’s wrongful act to result

in direct contact with the victim It is sufficient if the act sets in motion a force that results in the contact A defendant who whipped a horse on which a plaintiff was riding, causing the plaintiff to fall and be injured, was found guilty of battery Provided all other elements of the offense are present, the offense may also be committed by causing the victim to harm himself A defendant who fails to act when he or she has a duty to do so is guilty—as where a nurse fails to warn a blind patient that he is headed toward an open window, causing him to fall and injure himself

Aggravated Battery

When a battery is committed with intent to do serious harm orMURDER, or when it is done with

a dangerous weapon, it is described as aggravated

A weapon is considered dangerous whenever the purpose for using it is to cause death or serious harm State statutes define aggravated battery in various ways—such asASSAULTwith intent to kill Under such statutes, assault means both battery and assault It is punishable as a felony in all states

Punishment

In aCIVIL ACTIONfor tortious battery, the penalty is damages A jury determines the amount to be awarded, which in most cases is based on the harm done to the plaintiff Even though a plaintiff suffers no actual injury,NOMINAL DAMAGES(a small sum) may still be awarded on the theory that there has been an invasion of a right Also, a court may awardPUNITIVE DAMAGES aimed at punishing the defendant for the wrongful act

536 BATTERY

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Criminal battery is punishable by a fine,

imprisonment, or both If it is considered

aggravated the penalties are greater

vBAYLOR, ROBERT EMMETT

BLEDSOE

Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor achieved

prom-inence as a jurist, a Baptist preacher, and a law

professor He was instrumental in the founding

of the first Baptist college in Texas, which was

named Baylor University in his honor

Baylor was born May 10, 1793, in Lincoln

County, Kentucky He began his political career

in 1819 with service in the Kentucky legislature,

moving to the Alabama legislature in 1824 He

represented Alabama in the U.S House of

Representatives from 1829 to 1831

In 1839 Baylor settled in Texas and began a

judicial career He was appointed to a Texas

district court in 1841 and also served as associate

judge of the Supreme Court of the Republic of

Texas from 1841 to 1845 Following the

annex-ation of Texas by the United States, he rendered

decisions as a U.S district judge from 1845 to

1861 He was also instrumental in the formation

of the Texas state constitution in 1845

As a Baptist preacher, Baylor helped to procure a charter for a Baptist college that would come to be named Baylor University

The university was originally located in Inde-pendence, Texas, but later moved to Waco in

1886, where it remained Baylor began teaching courses in the science of law at the new university in 1849 In 1857, Baylor University established its original school of law, and Baylor served on the original faculty With the excep-tion of the period of the CIVIL WAR, when the school of law did not offer classes, Baylor taught courses in CONSTITUTIONAL LAW and jurispru-dence until 1873 He died on December 30,

1873, in Washington County, Texas

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