Law Commons^™

A Reparative Justice Approach To Assessing Ancestral Classifications Aimed At Colonization’S Harms, Susan K. Serrano

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

No abstract provided.

Good Faith Discrimination, Girardeau A. Spann

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

The Supreme Court’s current doctrinal rules governing racial discrimination and affirmative action are unsatisfying. They often seem artificial, internally inconsistent, and even conceptually incoherent. Despite a long and continuing history of racial discrimination in the United States, many of the problems with the Supreme Court’s racial jurisprudence stem from the Court’s willingness to view the current distribution of societal resources as establishing a colorblind, race-neutral baseline that can be used to make equality determinations. As a result, the current rules are as likely to facilitate racial discrimination as to prevent it, or to remedy the lingering effects of past discrimination. …

Discriminatory Acquittal, Tania Tetlow

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

This article is the first to analyze a pervasive and unexplored constitutional problem: the rights of crime victims against unconstitutional discrimination by juries. From the Emmett Till trial to that of Rodney King, there is a long history of juries acquitting white defendants charged with violence against black victims. Modem empirical evidence continues to show a devaluation of black victims; dramatic disparities exist in death sentence and rape conviction rates according to the race of the victim. Moreover, just as juries have permitted violence against those who allegedly violated the racial order, juries use acquittals to punish female victims of …

How The Diversity Rationale Lays The Groundwork For New Discrimination: Examining The Trajectory Of Equal Protection Doctrine, Michael A. Helfand

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

This Article advocates differentiating between two distinct categories of equal protection cases. The first-what I have termed indicator cases-are instances where courts consider whether there are sufficient factual indications to demonstrate the existence of aprimafacie equal protection violation. The second-violation casesare instances where courts consider, having already determined the existence of an equal protection violation, whether there is a good enough justification for a prima facie equal protection violation. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court has not differentiated between these two different types of cases. This has led to a string of decisions where the Supreme Court has erroneously looked for justifications …

Anti-Zionism As Racism: Campus Anti-Semitism And The Civil Rights Act Of 1964, Kenneth L. Marcus

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

No abstract provided.

The Contradiction Between Equal Protection's Meaning And Its Legal Substance: How Deliberate Indifference Can Cure It, Derek W. Black

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

This Article highlights the inherent ambiguities of racial antidiscrimination's core legal language: "equal protection under the law" and "discrimination based on race." It then analyzes how and why the Court has never answered fundamental questions regarding the meaning of these terms. Thus, this Article answers these fundamental questions itself by exploring the original intent behind the Equal Protection Clause. Against this backdrop, this Article reveals how the Court's standard for assessing discrimination claims, the intent doctrine, assumes a meaning for equal protection that is inconsistent with its original meaning. Rather than reflecting equal protection's meaning, the standard lacks any basis …

Shrinking Domain Of Individious Intent, K.G. Jan Pillai

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

The landmark case of Washington v. Davis made invidious intent the touchstone of violation of the Equal Protection Clause. In this Article, Professor K G. Jan Pillai discusses the current state of the doctrine of invidious intent and its evolving role in Supreme Court jurisprudence. In the area of criminal law enforcement, strict application of the doctrine often produces harsh results. Among the existing three-tiered scrutiny standards, the doctrine appears out of place. In recent racial gerrymandering cases, the Supreme Court substantively modified the meaning of the doctrine. Despite the apparent instability of the doctrine, Professor Pillai concludes the solution …

Lynching And The Law In Georgia Circa 1931: A Chapter In The Legal Career Of Judge Elbert Tuttle, Anne S. Emanuel

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

Elbert Parr Tuttle joined the federal bench in 1954, shortly after the Supreme Court decided Brown v. Board of Education. In 1960, he became the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, the court with jurisdiction over most of the deep south. As Chief Judge, he forged a jurisprudence that proved effective in overcoming the intransigence and outright rebellion of those who had long denied fundamental constitutional rights to African Americans.

This Essay traces an episode that occurred in 1931, when Tuttle spearheaded an effort to obtain a fair trial for John Downer, a …