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The Use Of Procedural Rules To Silence Minority Party Dissent In The Tennessee State Legislature And Its Racially Discriminatory Roots, Rosie Fatt May 2024

The Use Of Procedural Rules To Silence Minority Party Dissent In The Tennessee State Legislature And Its Racially Discriminatory Roots, Rosie Fatt

Journal of Law and Policy

The expulsion of two young Black legislators, Justin Jones and Justin J. Pearson, from the Tennessee General Assembly in April 2023 was not an aberration. This Note argues that the expulsions follow a historical pattern of systematic marginalization of Black representative power in the South. This Note connects the history of minority exclusion in state legislatures, beginning with Black legislators barred from taking their elected seats in the Georgia House, through to the present day. Specifically, it focuses on the use of procedural rules, particularly expulsions, as tools to limit the speech and representative power of Black legislators. It discusses …

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Good Intentions With Bad Consequences: Post-Bruen Gun Legislation In New York, Michal E. Folczyk Dec 2023

Good Intentions With Bad Consequences: Post-Bruen Gun Legislation In New York, Michal E. Folczyk

Journal of Law and Policy

In response to a changing landscape for firearm licensing, New York State adopted training requirements for handgun ownership and sensitive place laws. Prior to obtaining a handgun license, training requirements ensure that applicants will be able to safely use a firearm. Upon obtaining a firearm license, sensitive place laws limit where a licensed individual may or may not bring their firearm, as a preventative measure. A violation of a sensitive place law could not only bring revocation of one’s license to carry a firearm, but also felony charges. Although well-intentioned by New York State, unintended consequences attach. This Note explores …

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Transcript – Civil Liberties: The Next 100 Years, Susan Herman, Erwin Chemerinsky, Ellis Cose, Anthony Romero, Nadine Strossen Dec 2023

Transcript – Civil Liberties: The Next 100 Years, Susan Herman, Erwin Chemerinsky, Ellis Cose, Anthony Romero, Nadine Strossen

Journal of Law and Policy

In honor of Professor Susan Herman’s distinguished academic career and tenure as the ACLU’s president, a panel was held on Friday, October 13, 2023 at Brooklyn Law School and on Zoom to discuss the current state of civil liberties in the United States. The participants also discussed Professor Herman’s new book, Advanced Introduction to US Civil Liberties. The transcription below captures the discussion among Susan Herman, Erwin Chemerinsky, Ellis Cose, Anthony Romero,and Nadine Strossen. All panelists have approved of the overall substantive accuracy of this transcription. Any remaining errors in this transcript should be attributed to the Journal of Law …

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State Of Delay: Are Outdated Capital Post-Conviction Defense Tactics Undermining Effectiveness And The Attorney-Client Relationship?, Lyle C. May May 2023

State Of Delay: Are Outdated Capital Post-Conviction Defense Tactics Undermining Effectiveness And The Attorney-Client Relationship?, Lyle C. May

Journal of Law and Policy

In 2018, death row prisoner Scott Allen was ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation to determine whether he was competent enough to fire his appointed attorneys. The competency hearing was not ordered by Scott’s counsel; rather, a superior court judge did so at the behest of an undisclosed third party. The problem was that Scott Allen had no history or symptoms of an intellectual disability or mental illness, nor was either a mitigatory claim in his appeal. The attorney-client conflict was triggered by Scott’s pro se effort to remove counsel after they ignored his lawful instructions to include potentially exculpatory …

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Leave Your Phone At Home: Combatting Data Exploitation In A Post-Dobbs America, Danielle Terracciano May 2023

Leave Your Phone At Home: Combatting Data Exploitation In A Post-Dobbs America, Danielle Terracciano

Journal of Law and Policy

This Note comments on the dangers of an under-regulated data privacy sphere and highlights the particularly troubling threats posed to individuals seeking reproductive healthcare. In an ever-digitalizing world, smart phone and device users are subjected to violative data practices, like geofencing and location tracking, without their knowledge or consent. Some data service providers use personal data as a commodity to advance advertising or political objectives. Reproductive healthcare patients are at a heightened risk of exploitation because their personal data may infer or reveal their private healthcare decisions. As the fight for bodily autonomy was upended by the Supreme Court’s decision …

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Defendants In The Dark: How The Jencks Act Is Incompatible With The Adversarial Legal System, Eli J. Esakoff May 2023

Defendants In The Dark: How The Jencks Act Is Incompatible With The Adversarial Legal System, Eli J. Esakoff

Journal of Law and Policy

The Jencks Act is a McCarthy Era law that prohibits compelling the disclosure of any statement made by a government witness in a federal criminal prosecution until after the witness has testified at trial. Passed in 1957 in response to the Supreme Court’s decision in Jencks v. United States, the Act’s life in Congress was “nasty, brutish, and short.” In prosecuting its anti-communist “witch hunts” of the era, the government strove to keep hidden as much of its case against those accused as possible. Against this backdrop of the desire for secrecy, the Supreme Court held that a criminal defendant …

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Public Service Loan Forgiveness? How Improvements To A Student Debt Cancellation Program Can Help To Deliver Gideon's Promise, Jane Fox, Winston Berkman-Breen May 2023

Public Service Loan Forgiveness? How Improvements To A Student Debt Cancellation Program Can Help To Deliver Gideon's Promise, Jane Fox, Winston Berkman-Breen

Journal of Law and Policy

Student debt is a generational crisis facing forty-five million Americans today. Among those with the highest rates of student loan debt are attorneys and among attorneys, those working in public interest have been hit particularly hard as they carry these same high debt rates yet earn low salaries. While student debt has run roughshod over Americans seeking higher education for almost forty years, another crisis has ravaged Americans who are swept up in the criminal legal system. Mass incarceration and mass policing have sent millions to prisons and jails and separated millions of parents and children through family courts. Often …

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Unending Reform: Police Resistance To Consent Decrees And Federal Monitors, Finn Mayock Dec 2022

Unending Reform: Police Resistance To Consent Decrees And Federal Monitors, Finn Mayock

Journal of Law and Policy

The murder of George Floyd and the subsequent protests that engulfed the United States in 2020 reignited public attention towards the violent and discriminatory practices of police departments across the country. While methods of reforming these institutions were debated with new vigor, the federal courts have been quietly overseeing efforts to obtain constitutionally compliant policing in numerous cities for decades. Using legal tools such as consent decrees and monitors, the Department of Justice has enlisted the assistance of federal courts to ensure that police practices are in congruence with the Constitution. As pervasive police violence against black and brown people …

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What Counts As ‘Racist Enough?’: A Clearer Standard For New Trials When Jurors Demonstrate Racial Bias, Priyadarshini Das Dec 2022

What Counts As ‘Racist Enough?’: A Clearer Standard For New Trials When Jurors Demonstrate Racial Bias, Priyadarshini Das

Journal of Law and Policy

The no-impeachment rule, Federal Rule of Evidence 606(b), necessitates that jurors keep their deliberations secret. However, in the 2017 Supreme Court case Peña-Rodriguez v. Colorado, the Court created a racial bias exception to the no-impeachment rule. This exception allows jurors to notify the court when “one or more jurors made statements exhibiting overt racial bias that cast serious doubt on the fairness and impartiality of the jury’s deliberations and resulting verdict.” This Note argues that this standard is too narrow because it fails to consider several situations of racial bias, like implicit bias. The ineffectiveness of this exception is demonstrated …

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Ice Transfers And The Detention Archipelago, Sabrina Balgamwalla Dec 2022

Ice Transfers And The Detention Archipelago, Sabrina Balgamwalla

Journal of Law and Policy

This article examines transfers as an understudied but critical dimension of the immigration detention system. Transfers regularly take detainees in immigration custody from public to private facilities, across state lines, and beyond the jurisdiction of individual courts. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) has virtually unlimited authority to use transfers strategically to further agency goals of immigration enforcement. For individual detainees, transfers shape outcomes in their immigration cases. Noncitizens are regularly funneled into detention centers in legal jurisdictions generally hostile to claims for relief. Transfers also regularly send detainees to facilities in isolated, rural communities, where they are more likely to …

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When Sexual Assault Becomes Incident To Military Service, Lauren C. Brady Dec 2022

When Sexual Assault Becomes Incident To Military Service, Lauren C. Brady

Journal of Law and Policy

For seventy-two years, federal courts have barred military servicemembers who are survivors of sexual assault from recovery under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA). The Feres doctrine, promulgated from the Supreme Court case Feres v. United States, became the foundation for federal courts’ decisions that sexual assault is incident to one’s service in the military. Courts’ over-deference to the military has enabled a system that turns a blind eye to perpetrators and abusive environments on bases. However, the Ninth Circuit recently turned the tide in FTCA cases, holding in Spletstoser v. Hyten that military sexual assault survivors should be permitted …

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Book Review: The Mighty Roe Has Fallen (Probably): A Call To Action As An Antidote To Despair, Loreen Peritz Jun 2022

Book Review: The Mighty Roe Has Fallen (Probably): A Call To Action As An Antidote To Despair, Loreen Peritz

Journal of Law and Policy

Reviewing CONTROLLING WOMEN: WHAT WE MUST DO NOW TO SAVE REPRODUCTIVE FREEDOM. By Kathryn Kolbert & Julie Kay. New York, NY: Hachette Books, 2021. 304 pp., $29.00

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Slaying The Serpents: Why Alternative Intervention Is Necessary To Protect Those In Mental Health Crisis From The State-Created Danger “Snake Pit”, Kathleen Giunta Jun 2022

Slaying The Serpents: Why Alternative Intervention Is Necessary To Protect Those In Mental Health Crisis From The State-Created Danger “Snake Pit”, Kathleen Giunta

Journal of Law and Policy

The Black Lives Matter protests in 2020 and ongoing reports of police brutality around the United States sparked extensive debate over qualified immunity and the legal protections that prevent police accountability. Individuals experiencing mental health crises are especially vulnerable to police violence, since police officers lack the requisite skills and knowledge to provide effective crisis support during mental health emergencies. Although the state-created danger doctrine was created by the courts as an exception to qualified immunity, it is so rarely applied that individuals harmed or even killed by police are left without legal remedy. This Note explores qualified immunity and …

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The Historical Diagnosis Criterion Should Not Apply: Reasonable Accommodations In Standardized Testing For Individuals With A Later Diagnosis Of Adhd, Denise Elliot Dec 2021

The Historical Diagnosis Criterion Should Not Apply: Reasonable Accommodations In Standardized Testing For Individuals With A Later Diagnosis Of Adhd, Denise Elliot

Journal of Law and Policy

There is a growing number of adults being diagnosed with ADHD who were not diagnosed in childhood, misdiagnosed, or primarily exhibited symptoms in adulthood. Notably, most of the later diagnoses of ADHD in adults are individuals pursuing some level of higher education. Some of the reasons posited for this increase in ADHD diagnoses in higher education may be attributed to increased workloads, decreased structural and community supports, misdiagnosis in childhood, masking, and racial and socioeconomic factors that overlook subpopulations like children of color, female-presenting, and gender-nonbinary children with ADHD. Unfortunately, testing agencies that administer college entrance exams, graduate school entrance …

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The Roberts Court, State Courts, And State Constitutions: Judicial Role Shopping, Ariel L. Bendor, Joshua Segev Dec 2021

The Roberts Court, State Courts, And State Constitutions: Judicial Role Shopping, Ariel L. Bendor, Joshua Segev

Journal of Law and Policy

In this Article we reveal a dual dilemma, both material and institutional, that the Supreme Court in its current composition faces when reviewing liberal state court decisions based on the state constitution. The Article further describes substantive and procedural tactics that the Court adopts to address this dilemma, and illustrates the arguments by analyzing a number of recent Supreme Court decisions. The two dilemmas, the combination of which serve as a “power multiplier,” of sorts, have arisen following the last three appointments to the Supreme Court, which resulted in a solid majority of conservative Justices nominated by Republican presidents. One …

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How Artificial Intelligence Machines Can Legally Become Inventors: An Examination Of And Solution To The Decision On Dabus, Justyn Millamena Dec 2021

How Artificial Intelligence Machines Can Legally Become Inventors: An Examination Of And Solution To The Decision On Dabus, Justyn Millamena

Journal of Law and Policy

With proliferation of Artificial Intelligence research and development, it is foreseeable that these machines will invent many new patentable technologies. However, the United States Patent and Trademark Office recently deemed a patent application incomplete for listing an AI machine as the inventor. If the USPTO’s decision is not corrected, the patent system will be in danger because many fraudulent patent applications that list incorrect inventors will be filed. This would drastically change existing and settled inventorship jurisprudence and might endanger the patent protection over such patents. This Note argues that the USPTO’s reasons for not allowing the Artificial Intelligence machine …

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A Firm Pillar Of Local Justice: The Failures Of The New York Town And Village Justice Courts Supporting Statewide Adoption Of The District Court Model, Noah Sexton Jun 2021

A Firm Pillar Of Local Justice: The Failures Of The New York Town And Village Justice Courts Supporting Statewide Adoption Of The District Court Model, Noah Sexton

Journal of Law and Policy

Town and village justice courts have been the center of municipal law, both civil and criminal, since the mid-nineteenth century. However, in the modern world, they have become corrupt, poorly managed institutions, creating issues involving procedural integrity and civil rights. In order to remedy these failures and modernize the New York State Unified Court System, state legislators must look to the district court model as it currently exists in Nassau and Eastern Suffolk Counties. The district court model offers several benefits, including the imposition of educational and experiential requirements for judges, the creation of internal and external oversight institutions, the …

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“A Dollar Ain’T Much If You’Ve Got It”: Freeing Modern-Day Poll Taxes From Anderson-Burdick, Lydia Saltzbart Jun 2021

“A Dollar Ain’T Much If You’Ve Got It”: Freeing Modern-Day Poll Taxes From Anderson-Burdick, Lydia Saltzbart

Journal of Law and Policy

How much should it cost to vote in the United States? The answer is clear from the Supreme Court’s landmark opinion in Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections—nothing. Yet more than fifty years later, many U.S. voters must jump over financial hurdles to access the franchise. These hurdles have withstood judicial review because the Court has drifted away from Harper and has instead applied the more deferential Anderson-Burdick analysis to modern poll tax claims—requiring voters to demonstrate how severely the cost burdens them. As a result, direct and indirect financial burdens on the vote have proliferated. Millions of voters …

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“More Than Tangential”: When Does The Public Have A Right To Access Judicial Records?, Jordan Elias Jun 2021

“More Than Tangential”: When Does The Public Have A Right To Access Judicial Records?, Jordan Elias

Journal of Law and Policy

 Public accountability requires open proceedings and access to documents filed with the courts. The strong policy favoring access to judicial records creates a presumption against sealing documents without a compelling reason.  The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals recently held that this presumption of access arises when a proceeding relates “more than tangentially” to the merits. This is a low standard under which many types of motions qualify for the compelling reasons test.  With too much litigation occurring in secret, courts can use the “more than tangential” standard proactively to keep electronic case dockets available to citizens.

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“A Climate Of Lawlessness”: Upholding A Government’S Affirmative Duty To Protect The Environment Using Deshaney’S Special Relationship Exception, Katherine G. Horner Dec 2020

“A Climate Of Lawlessness”: Upholding A Government’S Affirmative Duty To Protect The Environment Using Deshaney’S Special Relationship Exception, Katherine G. Horner

Journal of Law and Policy

The Industrial Revolution introduced an era of exceptional technological advances. However, it also led to rampant environmental pollution and degradation. The proliferation of toxic pollutants in the air, water and soil has led us to the precipice of an unimaginable future; a future defined by climate change. This Note argues for the use of the special relationship exception, affirmed by the Supreme Court in DeShaney v. Winnebago, in environmental litigation in order to uphold governments’ affirmative duty to protect the environment. As federal and state governments have the sole power to regulate environmental pollution and enforce environmental protections, individuals are …

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Emergency Removals Without A Court Order: Using The Language Of Emergency To Duck Due Process, Jane Brennan Dec 2020

Emergency Removals Without A Court Order: Using The Language Of Emergency To Duck Due Process, Jane Brennan

Journal of Law and Policy

For a brief moment during the recent September democratic presidential debate, the ugly underbelly of the child welfare system unexpectedly took center stage. When asked about what responsibility Americans need to take to repair the legacy of slavery, the former vice president responded by propagating a myth that Black parents do not know how to parent. Former Vice President Joe Biden said “[w]e bring social workers into homes and parents to help them deal with how to raise their children. It’s not that they don’t want to help. They don’t—they don’t know quite what to do.” What exactly is it …

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Restoring The Rights Multiplier: The Right To An Education In The United States, Katherine Smith Davis, Jeffrey Davis May 2020

Restoring The Rights Multiplier: The Right To An Education In The United States, Katherine Smith Davis, Jeffrey Davis

Journal of Law and Policy

In 1973 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that education was not a fundamental right, leaving in place systems that continue today to perpetrate vast inequities among school districts. Through a comparative analysis of treaties, constitutions, legislation, and international and state judicial decisions, we demonstrate that education is indeed a fundamental human right, though our constitutional jurisprudence has denied its fundamental right status. We use case studies from Baltimore, a typical city whose residents face economic hardships, to reveal the dire consequences of this ruling. Without the right to an education, schoolchildren in poor systems continue to be deprived of the …

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“Disturbing Schools” Laws: Disturbing Due Process With Unconstitutionally Vague Limits On Student Behavior, Rachel Smith Dec 2019

“Disturbing Schools” Laws: Disturbing Due Process With Unconstitutionally Vague Limits On Student Behavior, Rachel Smith

Journal of Law and Policy

For over a century, the United States Supreme Court has held, in sum and substance, that students do not “shed their constitutional rights . . . at the schoolhouse gate.” In practice, however, while not shed entirely, many of those rights have been increasingly limited. “Disturbing Schools” Laws subject students to criminal charges for behaving in a distracting or obnoxious manner on campus—behavior which can easily be conceptualized as typical adolescent behavior. Challenges to Disturbing Schools Laws have resulted in opposing outcomes across Circuit Courts. This Note discusses how students may use the Fourth Circuit case Kenny v. Wilson to …

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Protecting Health Information In Utero: A Radical Proposal, Luke Isaac Haqq Dec 2019

Protecting Health Information In Utero: A Radical Proposal, Luke Isaac Haqq

Journal of Law and Policy

This Article introduces an underappreciated space in which protected health information (“PHI”) remains largely unprotected, a fact that will become only more problematic as clinical medicine increasingly turns to genomics. The past decade has seen significant advances in the prevention of birth defects, especially with the introduction of clinical preconception, prenatal, and neonatal genomic sequencing. Parental access to the results of embryonic and fetal clinical sequencing is critical to reproductive autonomy; results can provide parents with important considerations in determining whether to seek or avoid conception, as well as in deciding whether to carry a pregnancy to term. The information …

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The Long Road Back To Skokie: Returning The First Amendment To Mask Wearers, Rob Kahn Dec 2019

The Long Road Back To Skokie: Returning The First Amendment To Mask Wearers, Rob Kahn

Journal of Law and Policy

When the Seventh Circuit upheld the First Amendment right of Nazis to march in Skokie, Illinois in 1978, the protection of mask wearers was not far behind. Since then, doctrinal paths have diverged. While the Supreme Court continues to protect hate speech, mask wearing has been increasingly placed outside First Amendment protection. This article seeks to get to the bottom of this doctrinal divergence by addressing the symbolic purposes of mask bans—rooted in repudiating the Ku Klux Klan—as well as the doctrinal steps taken over the past forty years to restrict the First Amendment claims of mask wearers. It also …

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A Second Opinion: Can Windsor V. United States Survive President Trump’S Supreme Court?, Artem M. Joukov May 2019

A Second Opinion: Can Windsor V. United States Survive President Trump’S Supreme Court?, Artem M. Joukov

Journal of Law and Policy

This Article examines President Donald Trump’s recent recomposition of the United States Supreme Court and the potential effects on Windsor v. United States and its progeny. The Article considers whether the shifting balance of the Court may lead to reconsideration of Windsor, particularly via attempted exploits of the weaknesses in the standard of review applied to reach the decision. The Article will conclude that while revolutionary, Windsor lacked the doctrinal clarity of its offspring, Obergefell v. Hodges, and therefore may be at greatest risk of reversal by the increasingly conservative Court. In particular, the Court may rely on the conflict …

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When Death Becomes An Option: How Aedpa’S Opt-In Provisions Will Violate The Constitutional Rights Of Habeas Corpus Petitioners, Alexander Brock May 2019

When Death Becomes An Option: How Aedpa’S Opt-In Provisions Will Violate The Constitutional Rights Of Habeas Corpus Petitioners, Alexander Brock

Journal of Law and Policy

For centuries, the writ of habeas corpus has allowed imprisoned men and women to challenge the validity of their detention as the final source of relief from criminal sentences. For those convicted of the death penalty, it is the last resource standing between life and death. Despite its monumental significance in America’s legal history, the “Great Writ” was dealt a devastating blow with the introduction of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (“AEDPA”) of 1996. Designed to expedite the legal processes from sentencing to execution, AEDPA drastically limited the avenues of relief sought by habeas petitioners. Yet, the law …

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All The President's Privileges, Ann M. Murphy Oct 2018

All The President's Privileges, Ann M. Murphy

Journal of Law and Policy

This article provides a historical perspective of the evidentiary privilege doctrines that are in play in the current Special Counsel investigation. New issues of waiver by tweet are addressed. It is well established that a sitting president is subject to judicial process in certain circumstances, and that President Trump and his close advisors have and will continue to claim one or both of these privileges. I predict that these privileges will be inapplicable, applicable but waived, or applicable but fall within the crimefraud exception to the privileges. The crime-fraud exception has never been raised in a Special Counsel investigation of …

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Single Subject Rules And Civil Rights: Using Legislative-Process Restrictions To Facially Challenge Constitutionally Suspect Laws, Annie Melton Oct 2018

Single Subject Rules And Civil Rights: Using Legislative-Process Restrictions To Facially Challenge Constitutionally Suspect Laws, Annie Melton

Journal of Law and Policy

This Note argues that the single subject rule, a procedural restriction, can be used to facially challenge certain insidious laws. By giving courts an opening to review a law in its most elemental form—a deliberated-over means of adequately implementing a new, or remedying an existing, policy—the single subject rule tests it for characteristics like clarity, practicality, and predictability. The rule is rarely litigated in many states, but doing so draws attention to a fundamental philosophy of the legislative process, which is especially compelling in light of the ideological battles that are dominating statehouses across the country and giving rise to …

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Speech-And-Display Laws: Balancing Physicians' Free Speech Rights And States' Interests In The Context Of Abortion, Emily Ruppert Oct 2018

Speech-And-Display Laws: Balancing Physicians' Free Speech Rights And States' Interests In The Context Of Abortion, Emily Ruppert

Journal of Law and Policy

“The question is not pro-abortion or anti-abortion, the question is who makes the decision: a woman and her physician, or the government.” – Gloria Steinem

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