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Full-Text Articles in Law
Undignified: The Supreme Court, Racial Justice, And Dignity Claims, Darren Lenard Hutchinson
Undignified: The Supreme Court, Racial Justice, And Dignity Claims, Darren Lenard Hutchinson
UF Law Faculty Publications
The Supreme Court has interpreted the Equal Protection Clause as a formal equality mandate. In response, legal scholars have advocated alternative conceptions of equality, such as antisubordination theory, that interpret equal protection in more substantive terms. Antisubordination theory would consider the social context in which race-based policies emerge and recognize material distinctions between policies intended to oppress racial minorities and those designed to ameliorate past and current racism. Antisubordination theory would also closely scrutinize facially neutral state action that systemically disadvantages vulnerable social groups. The Court has largely ignored these reform proposals. Modern Supreme Court rulings, however, have invoked the …
Preventing Balkanization Or Facilitating Racial Domination: A Critique Of The New Equal Protection, Darren Lenard Hutchinson
Preventing Balkanization Or Facilitating Racial Domination: A Critique Of The New Equal Protection, Darren Lenard Hutchinson
UF Law Faculty Publications
The Supreme Court requires that equal protection plaintiffs prove defendants acted with discriminatory intent. The intent rule has insulated from judicial invalidation numerous policies that harmfully impact racial and ethnic minorities. Court doctrine also mandates that state actors generally remain colorblind. The colorblindness doctrine has led to the judicial invalidation of policies designed to ameliorate the conditions of racial inequality. Taken together, these two equality doctrines facilitate racial domination. The Court justifies this outcome on the ground that the Constitution does not protect “group rights.”
Constitutional law theorists have criticized these aspects of equal protection doctrine. Recently, however, some theorists …
"Continually Reminded Of Their Inferior Position": Social Dominance, Implicit Bias, Criminality, And Race, Darren Lenard Hutchinson
"Continually Reminded Of Their Inferior Position": Social Dominance, Implicit Bias, Criminality, And Race, Darren Lenard Hutchinson
UF Law Faculty Publications
This Article contends that implicit bias theory has improved contemporary understanding of the dynamics of individual bias. Implicit bias research has also helped to explain the persistent racial disparities in many areas of public policy, including criminal law and enforcement. Implicit bias theory, however, does not provide the foundation for a comprehensive analysis of racial inequality. Even if implicit racial biases exist pervasively, these biases alone do not explain broad societal tolerance of vast racial inequality. Instead, as social dominance theorists have found, a strong desire among powerful classes to preserve the benefits they receive from stratification leads to collective …
The Anticanonical Lesson Of Huckleberry Finn, Sharon E. Rush
The Anticanonical Lesson Of Huckleberry Finn, Sharon E. Rush
UF Law Faculty Publications
Some books included in the canon of American literature no longer belong there, because they presently lack normative approval. Adapting concepts found in constitutional law, an anticanon of American literature functions the way the anticanon of constitutional law would operate and explicitly removes books from the canon. In law, the anticanon identifies outdated interpretations of the constitution. In education, it is time to consider removing from the canon and placing in an anticanon books that are inconsistent with multicultural education. One such book is Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, which is part of the canon of American literature and viewed as …
Diversity: The Red Herring Of Equal Protection, Sharon E. Rush
Diversity: The Red Herring Of Equal Protection, Sharon E. Rush
UF Law Faculty Publications
Couching the constitutional inquiry in cases like Bakke and VMI in the context of integration also puts in perspective the diversity justification. Affirmative action policies are constitutional because they integrate state programs. Integration on the basis of race and sex also diversifies state programs. In contrast, attempts to justify sex-segregation in state programs by arguing the policy promotes diversity is irrelevant to an equal protection analysis. Voluntarily created all-female schools should be constitutional because they promote the equal citizenship of women without damaging the equal citizenship stature of men. This is true for voluntarily race-segregated programs for minorities; as well. …