Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Digital Commons Network

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

PDF

Constitutional Law

Selected Works

Keyword
Publication Year
Publication

Articles 331 - 360 of 2594

Full-Text Articles in Entire DC Network

Semantic Vagueness And Extrajudicial Constitutional Decisionmaking, Anthony O'Rourke Jan 2018

Semantic Vagueness And Extrajudicial Constitutional Decisionmaking, Anthony O'Rourke

Anthony O'Rourke

No abstract provided.


Windsor Beyond Marriage: Due Process, Equality & Undocumented Immigration, Anthony O'Rourke Jan 2018

Windsor Beyond Marriage: Due Process, Equality & Undocumented Immigration, Anthony O'Rourke

Anthony O'Rourke

The Supreme Court’s recent decision in United States v. Windsor, invalidating part of the federal Defense of Marriage Act, presents a significant interpretive challenge. Early commentators have criticized the majority opinion’s lack of analytical rigor, and expressed doubt that Windsor can serve as a meaningful precedent with respect to constitutional questions outside the area of same-sex marriage. This short Article offers a more rehabilitative reading of Windsor, and shows how the decision can be used to analyze a significant constitutional question concerning the use of state criminal procedure to regulate immigration.

From Windsor’s holding, the Article distills …


Appraising 9/11: 'Sacred' Value And Heritage In Neoliberal Times, Mateo Taussig-Rubbo Jan 2018

Appraising 9/11: 'Sacred' Value And Heritage In Neoliberal Times, Mateo Taussig-Rubbo

Mateo Taussig-Rubbo

On September 11, 2001, United Airlines Flight 93 — one of the four airplanes hijacked that day — crashed into a vacant parcel of land in rural Pennsylvania, killing all on board. For many, including family members of those killed in the attack and the Park Service that now manages the national memorial at the site, the former strip mine was transformed into ‘sacred’ ground. Unable to settle on a price with the landowner, in 2009 the government took the property through eminent domain. Focusing on the ongoing effort in United States of America v. 275.81 Acres of Land to …


To Speak With One Voice: The Political Effects Of Centralizing The International Legal Defense Of The State, Guillermo J. Garcia Sanchez Jan 2018

To Speak With One Voice: The Political Effects Of Centralizing The International Legal Defense Of The State, Guillermo J. Garcia Sanchez

Guillermo J. Garcia Sanchez

When a government official defends a case before an international court, whose interest should he/she be representing? In today’s era of expanding international treaties that give standing to individual claimants, international courts review the actions of different government actors through the yardsticks of international law. The state is not unitary; alleged victims can bring international claims against various government entities including the executive, the legislature, the administrative branch, and the judiciary. Yet, the international legal defense of government actions is in the hands of the executive power. This paper focuses on the consequences of this centralization for inter-branch politics. It …


Temporary Legislation's Finest Hour?: Towards A Proper Model Of Temporary Legislation In Israel שעתן היפה של הוראות השעה?: לקראת מודל ראוי של חקיקה זמנית בישראל, Ittai Bar-Siman-Tov Dec 2017

Temporary Legislation's Finest Hour?: Towards A Proper Model Of Temporary Legislation In Israel שעתן היפה של הוראות השעה?: לקראת מודל ראוי של חקיקה זמנית בישראל, Ittai Bar-Siman-Tov

Dr. Ittai Bar-Siman-Tov

This article discusses a major trend in Israeli legislation in recent years: the rise of temporary legislation in Israel. The first part of the article presents a first-of-its-kind empirical study that reveals that the Knesset is increasingly using temporary legislation, which is referred to in Israel as "temporary provisions." Against this background, the main purpose of the article is normative: to propose a model for proper use of temporary legislation in Israel. After reviewing the normative debate for and against temporary legislation, the article focuses on two central questions: When is it appropriate to make use of temporary legislation; and …


Formal And Informal Amendment Of The United States Constitution, Richard S. Kay Dec 2017

Formal And Informal Amendment Of The United States Constitution, Richard S. Kay

Richard Kay

This is the United States report submitted for the session on Formal and Informal Constitutional Amendment at the Twentieth Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law to be held in Fukuoka, Japan in July, 2018. The report reviews the rules of Article V of the United States Constitution that sets out the rules for constitutional amendment and it provides a brief chronology of the twenty-eight amendments adopted to date. It notes a number of potential problems of interpretation associated with Article V. The report considers the widely held assumption that the United States Constitution is one of the hardest, …


Carpenter V. United States And The Fourth Amendment: The Best Way Forward, Stephen E. Henderson Dec 2017

Carpenter V. United States And The Fourth Amendment: The Best Way Forward, Stephen E. Henderson

Stephen E Henderson

We finally have a federal ‘test case.’  In Carpenter v. United States, the Supreme Court is poised to set the direction of the Fourth Amendment in the digital age.  The case squarely presents how the twentieth-century third party doctrine will fare in contemporary times, and the stakes could not be higher.  This Article reviews the Carpenter case and how it fits within the greater discussion of the Fourth Amendment third party doctrine and location surveillance, and I express a hope that the Court will be both a bit ambitious and a good measure cautious. 
 
As for ambition, the …


The Common-Law Exceptions Clause: Congressional Control Of Supreme Court Appellate Jurisdiction In Light Of British Precedent, Daniel Birk Dec 2017

The Common-Law Exceptions Clause: Congressional Control Of Supreme Court Appellate Jurisdiction In Light Of British Precedent, Daniel Birk

Daniel Birk

No abstract provided.


Constitutional Clause Aggregation And The Marijuana Crimes, Scott W. Howe Dec 2017

Constitutional Clause Aggregation And The Marijuana Crimes, Scott W. Howe

Scott W. Howe

An important question for our time concerns whether the Constitution could establish a right to engage in certain marijuana-related activities. Several states have now legalized cannabis, within strict limits, for recreational purposes, and that number will grow. Yet, some states will not promptly legalize but, instead, continue to criminalize, or only “decriminalize” in minor ways, and the federal criminalization statutes also will likely survive for a time. There currently is no recognized right under the Constitution to possess, use, cultivate or distribute cannabis for recreational purposes, even in small amounts, and traditional, single-clause arguments for such a right are weak. …


The Property Question.Pdf, William A. Edmundson Dec 2017

The Property Question.Pdf, William A. Edmundson

William A. Edmundson

for presentation at the Property and Political Economy Conference at the Smith Institute,
Chapman University, April 20-21, 2018
The “property question” is the constitutional question whether a society’s basic resources are
to be publicly or privately owned; that is, whether these basic resources are to be available to
private owners, perhaps subject to tax and regulation, or whether instead they are to be
retained in joint public ownership, and managed by democratic processes. James Madison’s
approach represents a case in which prior holdings are taken for granted, and the property
question itself is kept off of the political agenda. By …


Fourth Amendment Anxiety, Stephen E. Henderson, Kiel Brennan-Marquez Dec 2017

Fourth Amendment Anxiety, Stephen E. Henderson, Kiel Brennan-Marquez

Stephen E Henderson

In Birchfield v. North Dakota (2016), the Supreme Court broke new Fourth Amendment ground by establishing that law enforcement’s collection of information can be cause for “anxiety,” meriting constitutional protection, even if subsequent uses of the information are tightly restricted.  This change is significant.  While the Court has long recognized the reality that police cannot always be trusted to follow constitutional rules, Birchfield changes how that concern is implemented in Fourth Amendment law, and importantly, in a manner that acknowledges the new realities of data-driven policing.
 
Beyond offering a careful reading of Birchfield, this Article has two goals. …


The Supreme Court's Political Docket: How Ideology And The Chief Justice Control The Court's Agenda And Shape Law, Benjamin B. Johnson Dec 2017

The Supreme Court's Political Docket: How Ideology And The Chief Justice Control The Court's Agenda And Shape Law, Benjamin B. Johnson

Benjamin Johnson

The Supreme Court is unique among federal courts in that it chooses - using the writ of certiotari - which cases it will decide. Justice Brennan once noted that this discretionary power is "second to none in importance." This article examines the institutional politics behind this certiorari process. Specifically, it uses an original dataset of Justices' agenda-setting votes from 1986 to 1993 to show how Justices use the rules that govern certiorari to pursue ideological goals. In addition, and in contrast to existing qualitative accounts, the data suggest some Justices queue off of the Chief Justice's vote giving the Chief's …


The [̶T̶A̶K̶I̶N̶G̶S̶] Keepings Clause: An Analysis Of Framing Effects From Labeling Constitutional Rights, Donald J. Kochan Dec 2017

The [̶T̶A̶K̶I̶N̶G̶S̶] Keepings Clause: An Analysis Of Framing Effects From Labeling Constitutional Rights, Donald J. Kochan

Donald J. Kochan

Did you know that the “Takings Clause” was not called the “Takings Clause” by any court before 1955? That was the first time that any court of any jurisdiction referred to the provisions regarding takings of private property in either the federal or state constitutions under the label “Taking Clause.” Did you know that justices of the U.S. Supreme Court did not use that moniker “Taking Clause” in any opinion before 1978? Given this history, the phrase “takings clause,” whether an apt descriptor or not, certainly cannot be justified as the dominant way to refer to these provisions by contemporaneous …


Reasoning Through Clashes Between Religion And Equality: Case Law, Skeptics, And Social Coherence, Michael A. Helfand Dec 2017

Reasoning Through Clashes Between Religion And Equality: Case Law, Skeptics, And Social Coherence, Michael A. Helfand

Michael A Helfand

A review of Nelson Tebbe's new book, Religious Freedom in An Egalitarian Age (Harvard University Press, 2017). Forthcoming 2018.


When Judges Are Theologians: Adjudicating Religious Questions, Michael A. Helfand Dec 2017

When Judges Are Theologians: Adjudicating Religious Questions, Michael A. Helfand

Michael A Helfand

In this chapter, I explore how judges—and, more generally, U.S. courts—deal with legal disputes when they must consider not only laws and facts, but also religion, or maybe even more precisely, theology. Indeed, in a wide range of circumstances, judges are confronted with cases where the outcome in some way or another requires them to issue a decision that is predicated, to varying to degrees, on a theological question upon which there is some debate. While in American law the ostensibly simple answer to this question is simply that the Constitution prohibits courts from adjudicating religious questions, the reality is …


Implied Consent To Religious Institutions: A Primer And A Defense, Michael A. Helfand Dec 2017

Implied Consent To Religious Institutions: A Primer And A Defense, Michael A. Helfand

Michael A Helfand

One of the recent fault lines over religious liberty is the scope of protections afforded religiously motivated institutions and corporations. Courts and scholars all seem to agree that such religious institutions deserve some degree of protection. But there remains significant debate over the principles that should guide judicial decisions addressing the circumstances in which religiously motivated institutions should, and in which circumstances they should not, receive the law’s protection.

In this Article, I expound, and defend, my proposed “implied consent” framework for addressing religious institutional claims. Such a framework grounds the authority of religious institutions not in a degree of …


Sexual Orientation And Gender Identity Discrimination, Holning Lau Dec 2017

Sexual Orientation And Gender Identity Discrimination, Holning Lau

Holning Lau

Laws concerning sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) have undergone a sea change. Still, legal protections against SOGI discrimination vary widely around the world. As jurisdictions wrestle with whether and how to protect people against SOGI discrimination, several conceptual questions emerge. This Brill volume reviews and discusses legal developments and scholarly commentary concerning these questions. Specifically, this volume examines the following five questions: (1) Is SOGI discrimination encompassed by existing laws prohibiting discrimination based on sex? (2) Should sexual orientation and gender identity be considered protected categories in and of themselves? (3) Is there a standard sequence of steps for …


From Loving To Obergefell: Elevating The Significance Of Discriminatory Effects, Holning Lau Dec 2017

From Loving To Obergefell: Elevating The Significance Of Discriminatory Effects, Holning Lau

Holning Lau

Loving v. Virginia and Obergefell v. Hodges are both landmark Supreme Court cases that advanced marriage equality. In Obergefell, the Court invalidated bans on same-sex marriage by building upon precedent it set nearly five decades earlier in Loving, which declared antimiscegenation laws unconstitutional. Indeed, commentators often describe Loving as an important precursor to Obergefell. Yet Obergefell’s reasoning deviated from that of Loving. The differences between the two cases are all too often overlooked. This Essay thus seeks to address this blind spot by drawing attention to a critical distinction: Loving and Obergefell differ in their …


Introduction To Constraining The Executive, Tom Campbell Dec 2017

Introduction To Constraining The Executive, Tom Campbell

Tom Campbell

The essays in this symposium illuminate aspects of the task of keeping the executive branch within its constitutionally appointed boundaries. The symposium was conceived before the 2016 elections, so its plan was not directed toward the current president. Nevertheless, it is inescapable that, writing after those elections, the authors took recent developments into account. The lessons to be learned from these essays, however, have more permanent application than simply for the immediate present. In this introduction, I review the articles of the symposium hoping to highlight the valuable contribution to separation of powers jurisprudence that each offers for the long …


Half-Based Discrimination Against Gays, Alan E. Garfield Dec 2017

Half-Based Discrimination Against Gays, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.


Judicial Review And Non-Enforcement At The Founding, Matthew Steilen Nov 2017

Judicial Review And Non-Enforcement At The Founding, Matthew Steilen

Matthew Steilen

This Article examines the relationship between judicial review and presidential non-enforcement of statutory law. Defenders of non-enforcement regularly argue that the justification for judicial review that prevailed at the time of the founding also justifies the president in declining to enforce unconstitutional laws. The argument is unsound. This Article shows that there is essentially no historical evidence, from ratification through the first decade under the Constitution, in support of a non-enforcement power. It also shows that the framers repeatedly made statements inconsistent with the supposition that the president could refuse to enforce laws he deemed unconstitutional. In contrast, during this …


The Political Economy Of Criminal Procedure Litigation, Anthony O'Rourke Nov 2017

The Political Economy Of Criminal Procedure Litigation, Anthony O'Rourke

Anthony O'Rourke

Criminal procedure has undergone several well-documented shifts in its doctrinal foundations since the Supreme Court first began to apply the Constitution’s criminal procedure protections to the States. This Article examines the ways in which the political economy of criminal litigation – specifically, the material conditions that determine which litigants are able to raise criminal procedure claims, and which of those litigants’ cases are appealed to the United States Supreme Court – has influenced these shifts. It offers a theoretical framework for understanding how the political economy of criminal litigation shapes constitutional doctrine, according to which an increase in the number …


Ideal Theory And The Limits Of Historical Narrative, Anthony O'Rourke Nov 2017

Ideal Theory And The Limits Of Historical Narrative, Anthony O'Rourke

Anthony O'Rourke

Some intellectual concepts that once played a central role in America’s constitutional history are, for both better and worse, no longer part of our political language.[1] These concepts may be so alien to us that they would remain invisible without carefully reexamining the past in order to challenge the received narratives of America’s constitutional development.[2] Should constitutional theorists undertake this kind of historical reexamination? If so, to what extent should they be willing to stray from the disciplinary norms that govern intellectual history? And what normative aims can they reasonably expect to achieve by exploring ideas in our …


The Speedy Trial Right And National Security Detentions: Critical Comments On United States V. Ghailani, Anthony O'Rourke Nov 2017

The Speedy Trial Right And National Security Detentions: Critical Comments On United States V. Ghailani, Anthony O'Rourke

Anthony O'Rourke

No abstract provided.


Statutory Constraints And Constitutional Decisionmaking, Anthony O'Rourke Nov 2017

Statutory Constraints And Constitutional Decisionmaking, Anthony O'Rourke

Anthony O'Rourke

Although constitutional scholars frequently analyze the relationships between courts and legislatures, they rarely examine the relationship between courts and statutes. This Article is the first to systematically examine how the presence or absence of a statute can influence constitutional doctrine. It analyzes pairs of cases that raise similar constitutional questions, but differ with respect to whether the court is reviewing the constitutionality of legislation. These case pairs suggest that statutes place significant constraints on constitutional decisionmaking. Specifically, in cases that involve a challenge to a statute, courts are less inclined to use doctrine to regulate the behavior of nonjudicial officials. …


Structural Overdelegation In Criminal Procedure, Anthony O'Rourke Nov 2017

Structural Overdelegation In Criminal Procedure, Anthony O'Rourke

Anthony O'Rourke

In function, if not in form, criminal procedure is a type of delegation. It requires courts to select constitutional objectives, and to decide how much discretionary authority to allocate to law enforcement officials in order to implement those objectives. By recognizing this process for what it is, this Article identifies a previously unseen phenomenon that inheres in the structure of criminal procedure decision-making. Criminal procedure’s decision-making structure, this Article argues, pressures the Supreme Court to delegate more discretionary authority to law enforcement officials than the Court’s constitutional objectives can justify. By definition, this systematic “overdelegation” does not result from the …


The "Public Uses" Of Eminent Domain: History And Policy, Errol E. Meidinger Nov 2017

The "Public Uses" Of Eminent Domain: History And Policy, Errol E. Meidinger

Errol Meidinger

This paper examines the effects and implications of the ‘public use’ requirement for the exercise of eminent domain in the United States. It is part of an ongoing inquiry the consequences of eminent domain in the United States. The first part examines the history of the public use requirement, both how the doctrine has been articulated and logically extended and what purposes have been accomplished under it. The second part of the paper is an analytic critique of the public use doctrine. After considering whether any principled standard can be developed to delimit the proper uses of eminent domain, it …


Facing The Ghost Of Cruikshank In Constitutional Law, Martha T. Mccluskey Nov 2017

Facing The Ghost Of Cruikshank In Constitutional Law, Martha T. Mccluskey

Martha T. McCluskey

For a symposium on Teaching Ferguson, this essay considers how the standard introductory constitutional law course evades the history of legal struggle against institutionalized anti-black violence. The traditional course emphasizes the drama of anti-majoritarian judicial expansion of substantive rights. Looming over the doctrines of equal protection and due process, the ghost of Lochner warns of dangers of judicial leadership in substantive constitutional change. This standard narrative tends to lower expectations for constitutional justice, emphasizing the virtues of judicial modesty and formalism. By supplementing the ghost of Lochner with the ghost of comparably infamous and influential case, United States v. Cruikshank …


Autonomy And Isomorphism: The Unfulfilled Promise Of Structural Autonomy In American State Constitutions, James A. Gardner Nov 2017

Autonomy And Isomorphism: The Unfulfilled Promise Of Structural Autonomy In American State Constitutions, James A. Gardner

James Gardner

In the American system of federalism, states have almost complete freedom to adopt institutions and practices of internal self-governance that they find best-suited to the needs and preferences of their citizens. Nevertheless, states have not availed themselves of these opportunities: the structural provisions of state constitutions tend to converge strongly with one another and with the U.S. Constitution. This paper examines two important periods of such convergence: the period from 1776 through the first few decades of the nineteenth century, when states were inventing institutions of democratic governance and representation; and the period following the Supreme Court’s one person, one …


A Retrospective On Lucas V. South Carolina Coastal Council: Public Policy Implications For The 21st Century, Kim Diana Connolly Nov 2017

A Retrospective On Lucas V. South Carolina Coastal Council: Public Policy Implications For The 21st Century, Kim Diana Connolly

Kim Diana Connolly

No abstract provided.