Law Commons^™

Oral Argument In Moore V. Harper And The Perils Of Finding “Compromise” On The Independent State Legislature Theory, Katherine A. Shaw

Faculty Online Publications

The Supreme Court’s cert grant last June in Moore v. Harper was an ominous note on which to end an explosive term. The grant seemed to broadcast an openness to embracing what’s known as the “independent state legislature theory,” or ISLT. It is a once-fringe idea that the U.S. Constitution, and in particular Article I’s “elections clause,” grants to state legislatures alone, and withholds from other state entities (think: courts and constitutions), the power to regulate elections for federal office.

Textualism, Judicial Supremacy, And The Independent State Legislature Theory, Leah M. Litman, Katherine A. Shaw

Faculty Articles

This piece offers an extended critique of one aspect of the so-called "independent state legislature" theory. That theory, in brief, holds that the federal Constitution gives state legislatures, and withholds from any other state entity, the power to regulate federal elections. Proponents ground their theory in two provisions of the federal Constitution: Article I's Elections Clause, which provides that "[t]he Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof," and Article H's Presidential Electors Clause, which provides that "[e]ach State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature …

Scotus On Immigration: A Review Of Recent Decisions & What's To Come, Cardozo Journal Of Equal Rights And Social Justice

Flyers 2022-2023

Click here to view the event invitation.

Distinguished Lecture Series, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Flyers 2022-2023

The Supreme Court's 2022 Term with Kate Shaw, Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Floersheimer Center for Constitutional Democracy.

Scotus On Immigration: A Review Of Recent Decisions & What's To Come, Cardozo Journal Of Equal Rights And Social Justice

Event Invitations 2022

Please join the Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights and Social Justice for a panel discussion with seven immigration attorneys. The discussion will cover recent SCOTUS decisions impacting immigration, the impacts of these decisions and important cases on the docket for this upcoming session.

Moderator: Mauricio Noroña, Visiting Clinical Assistant Professor of Law in the Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic, Cardozo Law

Panelists:

• Peter Markowitz, Associate Dean of Equity in Curriculum and Teaching and Professor of Law, Founding Faculty Member and Co-Director of the Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic, Cardozo Law

• Lindsay Nash, Associate Professor of Law, Co-Director of …

A Conversation With Dahlia Lithwick, Floersheimer Center For Constitutional Democracy

Event Invitations 2022

The Floersheimer Center for Constitutional Democracy invites you to join us for a conversation with New York Times bestselling author and Supreme Court reporter Dahlia Lithwick to discuss her book, Lady Justice. Cardozo Professor Kate Shaw will moderate.

Click here to view the flyer.

A Conversation With Dahlia Lithwick, Floersheimer Center For Constitutional Democracy

Flyers 2022-2023

Click here to view the event invitation.

Why Florida Copied Its ‘Don’T Say Gay’ Bill From Hungary & What It Means For Democracy In The United States, Floersheimer Center For Constitutional Democracy

Event Invitations 2022

On the eve of mid-term elections in which polls find large majorities of Americans worried about the future of U.S. democracy, scholars and journalists are tracking growing interest here in the successful path of autocratic leaders abroad. Do once-democratic countries like Hungary offer American populists a meaningful roadmap for reforming the structures of U.S. democratic governance and constitutional law?

Moderator: Deborah Pearlstein, Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Floersheimer Center for Constitutional Democracy

Panelists:

• Zack Beauchamp, Senior Correspondent, Vox
• Kim Lane Scheppele, Laurance S. Rockefeller Professor of Sociology and International Affairs in the Princeton School of Public and International …

Why Florida Copied Its ‘Don’T Say Gay’ Bill From Hungary & What It Means For Democracy In The United States, Floersheimer Center For Constitutional Democracy

Flyers 2022-2023

Click here to view the event invitation.

Click here to view the recording.

Weekly Pop-Up Class: Understanding The Lgbtq+ Civil Rights Movement And Why It Matters, Ferkauf Professors Kailey Roberts And Jennifer Cooper, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Event Invitations 2022

Kailey Roberts is an Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychology at Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology specializing in bereavement and existential psychotherapy. Roberts' research and teaching focuses on understanding existential distress and supporting individuals facing adversity through connection to their unique sense of meaning, identity and purpose. Jennifer Cooper, is an Assistant Professor at Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology. Cooper’s research agenda is focused on preventing and treating youth mental, emotional and behavioral issues through improving the use of multi-tier frameworks and culturally responsive evidence-based practices in schools. They will discuss "Cultivating Psychosocial Wellbeing in LGBTQIA+ Individuals and Communities."

More On The Varying Meanings Of “Congress” And “Legislature”, Michael Herz

Faculty Online Publications

In a recent Election Law Blog post regarding the Independent State Legislature doctrine, Rick Pildes observes that the term “Congress” in the U.S. Constitution sometimes means Congress acting alone and sometimes means Congress acting through legislation. Given that, it makes perfect sense that the term “legislature” can also sometimes mean the one and sometimes the other. I agree. This post just expands the intratextual analysis.

Weekly Pop-Up Class: Lgbtq Rights And The Crisis Of Democracy, Deborah Pearlstein, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Event Invitations 2022

Deborah Pearlstein is Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Floersheimer Center for Constitutional Democracy. Pearlstein has repeatedly testified before Congress on topics from war powers to executive branch oversight. Her work on the U.S. Constitution, international law, and national security has appeared widely in law journals and the popular press.

Democracy Harms And The First Amendment, Deborah Pearlstein

Faculty Articles

The First Amendment tolerates—has long tolerated—the regulation of certain kinds of false speech. Indeed, regulable lies are not limited to traditionally less-protected categories of speech like defamation and commercial deception. They include an array of other established speech regulations, administered by government institutions every day, from criminal laws barring perjury and other lies to government officials, to disciplinary measures by elected bodies sanctioning members for false or otherwise objectionable speech. Yet while it is easy to identify the kinds of lies that existing doctrinal categories make regulable for the personal, physical, or reputational harms they inflict on individuals¸ it has …

Weekly Pop-Up Class: Understanding The Lgbtq+ Civil Rights Movement And Why It Matters, Kate Shaw, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Event Invitations 2022

Cardozo Professor Kate Shaw is the Co-Director of the Floersheimer Center for Constitutional Democracy. Before joining Cardozo, she worked in the White House Counsel’s Office as a Special Assistant to the President and Associate Counsel to the President. She clerked for Justice John Paul Stevens of the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Richard A. Posner of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.

Weekly Pop-Up Class: Understanding The Lgbtq+ Civil Rights Movement And Why It Matters, Rachel B. Tiven, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Event Invitations 2022

Rachel Tiven will discuss "A History of U.S. Immigration Exclusion." Tiven is a civil rights leader turned historian. As the head of national non-profits Lambda Legal, Immigration Equality, and Immigrant Justice Corps, Tiven fought for equality for immigrants and LGBTQ/HIV+ people. Tiven has been recognized for her work by the Advocate magazine, New York County Lawyers Association and United We Dream.

A Second Look For Children Sentenced To Die In Prison, Kathryn E. Miller

Faculty Articles

Scholars have championed “second look” statutes as a decarceral tool. Second look statutes allow certain incarcerated people to seek resentencing after having served a portion of their sentences. This Essay weighs the advantages and disadvantages of these statutes as applied to children sentenced to die in prison and argues that focusing on this small, discrete group may be a digestible entry point for more conservative states who fear widespread resentencing. Moreover, because early data indicates that children convicted of homicide and released as adults have very low recidivism rates, second look beneficiaries are likely to pose little threat to public …

Weekly Pop-Up Class: Understanding The Lgbtq+ Civil Rights Movement And Why It Matters, Dmytro Vovk, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Event Invitations 2022

Dmytro Vovk, Cardozo Visiting Associate Professor will cover Religious Freedom and LGBTQ+ Rights: The European Court of Human Right's Perspective.

Dmytro Vovk runs the Center for Rule of Law and Religion Studies at Yaroslav the Wise National Law University in Kharkiv, Ukraine. He was an expert on human rights and rule of law for USAID, OSCE/ODIHR, Council of Europe and Constitutional Commission of Ukraine.

Weekly Pop-Up Class: Understanding The Lgbtq+ Civil Rights Movement And Why It Matters: Professor Edward Stein, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Event Invitations 2022

The first class will cover the evolution of LGBTQ+ family law in the United States and will be presented by LGBTQ+ legal expert and Cardozo Professor and former Vice Dean Edward Stein, author of The Mismeasure of Desire, The Science, Theory, and Ethics of Sexual Orientation and other scholarly works on sexual identity and the law.

A New Supreme Court Case Threatens Another Body Blow To Our Democracy, Katherine A. Shaw, Leah Litman, Carolyn Shapiro

Faculty Online Publications

When the Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade, the justices in the majority insisted they were merely returning the issue of abortion to the democratic process. But a case the court has announced it will hear in its October term could make that democratic process a lot less democratic.

Judges, Judging And Otherwise: Do We Ask Too Much Of State Court Judges - Or Not Enough?, Michael C. Pollack

Faculty Articles

Ask the average person to imagine what a judge does, and the answer will most likely be something right out of a courtroom from Law & Order — or Legally Blonde, Just Mercy, My Cousin Vinny, Kramer vs. Kramer, or any of the myriad law-themed movies and television shows. A judge is faced with a dispute brought by some parties and their lawyers and is charged with resolving it, whether it be a breach of contract, a tort action, a competing claim over property, a disagreement about the meaning of a statute, some accusation that someone …

The Link Between Voting Rights And The Abortion Ruling, Katherine A. Shaw, Leah Litman, Melissa Murray

Faculty Online Publications

The Supreme Court’s opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization gives states the maximum amount of freedom to restrict abortion. The decision is so sweeping that, under its logic, states could ban abortion even in cases of rape or incest; they may even be able — as the dissent notes — to prohibit abortions in circumstances in which a doctor believes the procedure is necessary to preserve the life or health of the pregnant person.

The Other Cause Of January 6, Katherine A. Shaw

Faculty Online Publications

John Eastman. Rudy Giuliani. Donald Trump himself.

These people all bear some responsibility for the events of January 6, 2021. But there is another contributing factor—an institution, not a person—whose role is regularly overlooked, and that deserves a focus in the ongoing January 6 committee hearings: the Electoral College. The Electoral College isn’t responsible for President Trump’s efforts to remain in office despite his clear loss. But it was integral to Trump’s strategy, and it has everything to do with how close he came to success.

We Clerked For Justices Scalia And Stevens. America Is Getting Heller Wrong., Katherine A. Shaw, John Bash

Faculty Online Publications

In the summer of 2008, the Supreme Court decided District of Columbia v. Heller, in which the court held for the first time that the Second Amendment protected an individual right to gun ownership. We were law clerks to Justice Antonin Scalia, who wrote the majority opinion, and Justice John Paul Stevens, who wrote the lead dissent.

The False Allure Of The Anti-Accumulation Principle, Michael E. Herz, Kevin M. Stack

Faculty Articles

Today the executive branch is generally seen as the most dangerous branch. Many worry that the executive branch now defies or subsumes the separation of powers. In response, several Supreme Court Justices and prominent scholars assert that the very separation-of-powers principles that determine the structure of the federal government as a whole apply with full force within the executive branch. In particular, they argue that constitutional law prohibits the accumulation of more than one type of power—legislative, executive, and judicial—in the same executive official or government entity. We refer to this as the anti-accumulation principle. The consequences of this principle, …

"A Mystifying And Distorting Factor": The Electoral College And American Democracy, Katherine A. Shaw

Faculty Articles

A Review of Let the People Pick the President: The Case for Abolishing the Electoral College. By Jesse Wegman.

Intragovernmental Speech And Sanction, Katherine A. Shaw

Faculty Articles

This Essay, prepared as part of a symposium on Professor Helen Norton’s The Government’s Speech and the Constitution, asks what role, if any, we should understand the Constitution to play in mediating disputes over speech between and among government entities. Focusing on the examples of impeachment and censure, the piece considers scenarios in which one arm of government takes action in response to the speech of another arm or entity of government, exploring what role the Constitution should play in shaping or constraining those responses.