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Ideological Voting Applied To The School Desegregation Cases In The Federal Courts Of Appeals From The 1960’S And 70’S, Joe Custer
Joe Custer
This paper considers a research suggestion from Cass Sunstein to analyze segregation cases from the 1960's and 1970's and whether three hypothesis he projected in the article "Ideological Voting on Federal Courts of Appeals: A Preliminary Investigation," 90 Va. L. Rev. 301 (2004), involving various models of judicial ideology, would pertain. My paper considers Sunstein’s three hypotheses in addition to other judicial ideologies to try to empirically determine what was influencing Federal Court of Appeals Judges in regard to Civil Rights issues, specifically school desegregation, in the 1960’s and 1970’s.
“Nixon’S Sabotage”: How Politics Pushed The “Discriminatory Purpose” Requirement Into Equal Protection Law, Danieli Evans
“Nixon’S Sabotage”: How Politics Pushed The “Discriminatory Purpose” Requirement Into Equal Protection Law, Danieli Evans
Danieli Evans
This article describes the way that politics—resistance from the elected branches coupled with President Nixon appointing Chief Justice Burger—shaped the Court’s unanimous decision in Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg, 402 U.S. 1 (1971), a school desegregation case that played a crucial role in limiting the forms of state action considered unconstitutional discrimination. Chief Justice Burger defied longstanding Supreme Court procedure to assign himself the majority opinion even though he disagreed with the majority outcome. Justice Douglas alleged that he did this “in order to write Nixon’s view of freedom of choice into the law.” Justice Burger’s opinion laid the foundation for limiting …
Why Justice Kennedy's Opinion In Windsor Short-Changed Same-Sex Couples, Adam Lamparello
Why Justice Kennedy's Opinion In Windsor Short-Changed Same-Sex Couples, Adam Lamparello
Adam Lamparello
Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy’s decision in United States v. Windsor—invalidating the Defense of Marriage Act—made the same mistake as his decision in Lawrence v. Texas: it relied upon abstract notions of ‘liberty’ rather than the text-based guarantee of equality. Same-sex couples deserve more. They are entitled to equal treatment under the United States Constitution. Bans on same-sex marriage cannot be supported by a rational state interest, and instead constitute impermissible discrimination under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. By issuing a doctrinally muddled decision that included discussions of federalism, liberty, due process, and equal protection, Justice Kennedy missed an …