At the Joint Annual Meeting of the Conference of Chief Justices and the Conference of State Court Administrators, CCL President Robert S. Peck spoke and moderated a panel discussion about the use of state constitutions to review the validity of state laws July 30.  Joining him on the panel were Justice Christine Durham of the Utah Supreme Court and Paul Bender, dean emeritus of the law school at Arizona State University. The panelists discussed state constitutions as having an independent protective force for constitutional rights, requiring a full-blown analysis irrespective of any rulings made by the U.S. Supreme Court on similar issues under the U.S. Constitution.  The session was one of the top-rated presentations during the meeting, which took place in Burlington, Vermont. Chief justices from more than 40 states attended.