Law Commons^™

American Constitutionalism: Volume Ii: Rights & Liberties, Howard Gillman, Mark Graber, Keith Whittington

Mark Graber

Constitutionalism in the United States is not determined solely by decisions made by the Supreme Court. Moving beyond traditional casebooks, renowned scholars Howard Gillman, Mark A. Graber, and Keith E. Whittington take a refreshingly innovative approach in American Constitutionalism. Organized according to the standard two-semester sequence--in which Volume I covers Structures of Government and Volume II covers Rights and Liberties--this text is unique in that it presents the material in a historical organization within each volume, as opposed to the typical issues-based organization.

Cheer On Separation Of School, Religious Messages, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

Shall The Twain Never Meet? Competing Narratives And Discourses Of The Rule Of Law In Singapore, Jack Tsen-Ta Lee

Jack Tsen-Ta LEE

This article aims to assess the role played by the rule of law in discourse by critics of the Singapore Government’s policies and in the Government’s responses to such criticisms. It argues that in the past the two narratives clashed over conceptions of the rule of law, but there is now evidence of convergence of thinking as regards the need to protect human rights, though not necessarily as to how the balance between rights and other public interests should be struck. The article also examines why the rule of law must be regarded as a constitutional doctrine in Singapore, the …

Supreme Court Ponders Drug-Detection Dog's 'Sniff Test', Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

Affirmative Action In Education Weighed Again, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

What's Wrong With Us Political System?, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

Conceptualizing Constitutional Litigation As Anti-Government Expression: A Speech-Centered Theory Of Court Access, Robert L. Tsai

Robert L Tsai

This Article proposes a speech-based right of court access. First, it finds the traditional due process approach to be analytically incoherent and of limited practical value. Second, it contends that history, constitutional structure, and theory all support conceiving of the right of access as the modern analogue to the right to petition government for redress. Third, the Article explores the ways in which the civil rights plaintiff's lawsuit tracks the behavior of the traditional dissident. Fourth, by way of a case study, the essay argues that recent restrictions - notably, a congressional limitation on the amount of fees counsel for …

Health Care Back Where It Belongs, Before The Voters, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

Health-Care Law Puts Supreme Court Atop A Slippery Slope, Erin Daly

Erin Daly

Religious Right Versus Government Interest, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

Reforming The Right To Legal Counsel In Singapore, Jack Tsen-Ta Lee

Jack Tsen-Ta LEE

This is an opinion prepared for the Criminal Law Committee of the Law Society of Singapore on an arrested person’s right to legal counsel in Singapore. Specifically, it deals with the following: (1) it summarizes pertinent aspects of the law relating to the right to legal counsel in Singapore; (2) it surveys a number of ASEAN and Commonwealth jurisdictions to determine how long after apprehension the right to counsel is generally accorded to arrested persons, and compares the legal position in these jurisdictions to the situation in Singapore; and (3) it examines two rights ancillary to the right to legal …

The Constitutional Bounding Of Adjudication: A Fuller(Ian) Explanation For The Supreme Court's Mass Tort Jurisprudence, Donald G. Gifford

Donald G Gifford

In this Article, I argue that the Supreme Court is implicitly piecing together a constitutionally mandated model of bounded adjudication governing mass torts, using decisions that facially rest on disparate constitutional provisions. This model constitutionally restricts common law courts from adjudicating the rights, liabilities, and interests of persons who are neither present before the court nor capable of being defined with a reasonable degree of specificity. I find evidence for this model in the Court’s separate decisions rejecting tort-based climate change claims, global settlements of massive asbestos litigation, and punitive damages awards justified as extra-compensatory damages. These new forms of …

Obama Didn't Deny Court's Right Of Review, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

The Ecuadorian Exemplar: The First Ever Vindications Of Constitutional Rights Of Nature, Erin Daly

Erin Daly

The 'Sala de le Corte Provincial' - a provincial court in Ecuador - became the first court ever to vindicate the recently constitutionalized rights of nature. Recognizing the indisputable importance of the rights of nature for present and future generations, the court held the provincial government liable for flooding damages caused by dumping of construction debris. This judicial victory is arguably overshadowed by challenges facing the plaintiffs in seeing the courts order enforced, however. A subsequent case bears witness to the judiciary’s vindication of rights of nature in Ecuador with ever increasing legal effect.

Liberty Isn't The Issue In Health Care Case, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

A Legal Backgrounder On By-Elections, Jack Tsen-Ta Lee

Jack Tsen-Ta LEE

The expulsion of Yaw Shin Leong, the Member of Parliament for Hougang Single Member Constituency, from the Workers’ Party has once again thrust the issue of the Singapore Government’s policy on by-elections into the limelight. This opinion piece considers whether the Government is right in taking the view that it has wide discretion to determine when, and if, to hold a by-election; and the possible consequences of an existing Non-constituency Member of Parliament (NCMP) standing as a candidate in a by-election.

When Is A Lie An Affront To The Law?, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

Free Will Paradigms, Kent Greenfield

Kent Greenfield

One of the iconic issues in American law and politics is the question of free will—sometimes known as agency, choice, or autonomy, or the absence of duress, coercion, and compulsion. In politics, whether one is liberal or conservative, we balk at government limitations on choice and fight those limitations with legal arguments about rights and political rhetoric about freedom. Liberals demand access to abortions, want the ability to purchase medical marijuana, and bristle at pat-down searches before boarding a plane. Conservatives dislike requirements to buy health insurance or pay taxes, rail against limits on gun ownership and school prayer, and …

Neuroscience And Post-Sentence Civil Commitment: A Response To Professors Erickson And Goldberg, Adam Lamparello

Adam Lamparello

Our knowledge of human behavior, particularly when it comes to assessing what a person may do in the future, continues to develop. Neuroscience has provided insight into whether a person is likely to engage in further acts of violence. It is important to proceed cautiously, but to proceed nonetheless, because contemporary efforts to uncover the biological roots of violence have much more promise than their predecessors.

The Nondelegation Doctrine And The Federal Income Tax: May Congress Grant The President The Authority To Set The Income Tax Rates?, Andre L. Smith

Andre L. Smith

No abstract provided.

Images In/Of Law, Jessica M. Silbey

Jessica Silbey

The proliferation of images in and of law lends itself to surprisingly complex problems of epistemology and power. Understanding through images is innate; most of us easily understand images without thinking. But arriving at mutually agreeable understandings of images is also difficult. Translating images into shared words leads to multiple problems inherent in translation and that pose problems for justice. Despite our saturated imagistic culture, we have not established methods to pursue that translation process with confidence. This article explains how images are intuitively understood and yet collectively inscrutable, posing unique problems for resolving legal conflicts that demand common and …

Strategies And Techniques For Teaching Constitutional Law, Robert Power

Robert C Power

No abstract provided.

To Swear Or Not To Swear: Using Foul Language During A Supreme Court Oral Argument, Alan Garfield

Alan E Garfield

This essay considers the provocative question of whether it is strategically wise for a lawyer to use foul language during a Supreme Court oral argument. This issue doesn’t come up often. But it does when a lawyer claims his client’s First Amendment rights were violated when the government punished him for using foul language. If the lawyer doesn’t use his client’s offensive words, he risks conceding that these words are so horrid they warrant suppression. But if he does use the words, he risks alienating justices who find the words unseemly. The essay uses the “fleeting expletives” case that was …

Western Union, The American Federation Of Labor, Google, And The Changing Face Of Privacy Advocates, Wesley Oliver

Wesley M Oliver

No abstract provided.

Invisible Federalism And The Electoral College, Derek Muller

Derek T. Muller

What role do States have when the Electoral College disappears? With the enactment of the National Popular Vote on the horizon and an imminent presidential election in which a nationwide popular vote determines the winner, States would continue to do what they have done for hundreds of years — administer elections. The Constitution empowers States to decide who votes for president, and States choose who qualifies to vote based on factors like age or felon status. This power of States, a kind of “invisible federalism,” is all but ignored in Electoral College reform efforts. In fact, the power of the …

Constitutional Protection For Environmental Rights: The Benefits Of Environmental Process, Erin Daly

Erin Daly

More and more constitutions around the world -- from Bangladesh to Bolivia, and from the Philippines to the countries of the EU -- are explicitly protecting environmental rights and the values of a clean and healthy environment. In many instances, environmental rights are recognized not as substantive entitlements (which would allow litigants to sue if the government polluted their rivers or clearcut their forests), but as procedural rights. Examples of procedural rights include imposing on governments the obligation to consult with communities before they take actions that will affect their environment or giving individuals the right to participate in governmental …

Not The Power To Destroy: An Effects Theory Of The Tax Power, Robert D. Cooter, Neil Siegel

Robert Cooter

The Supreme Court of the United States requires a tax power jurisprudence that is consistent with its restrictions on the Commerce Clause. Otherwise Congress could “tax” its way around any judicially enforceable limits on the commerce power. Existing case law, however, does not offer such jurisprudence. This paper provides the missing theory by analyzing constitutional text, structure, history, and precedent with help from economics. The key difference between a tax and a penalty turns on the effects of the exaction. Taxes raise revenues because they dampen behavior without preventing it for many people. Penalties, by contrast, raise little or no …

The Structural Constitutional Principle Of Republican Legitimacy, Mark D. Rosen

Mark D. Rosen

Democracy does not spontaneously occur by citizens gathering to choose laws. Instead, representative democracy takes place within an extensive legal framework that determines such matters as who gets to vote, how campaigns are conducted, and what conditions must be met for representatives to make valid law. Many of the “rules of the road” that operationalize republicanism have been subject to constitutional challenges in recent decades. For example, lawsuits have been brought against partisan gerrymandering—which is partly responsible for the fact that most congressional districts are no longer party competitive, but instead are either safely Republican or safely Democratic—and against onerous …

Inside The Civil Rights Ring: Statutory Jabs And Constitutional Haymakers, Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

Civil rights litigators use statutory and constitutional attacks to combat inequality. Each approach has its advantages and drawbacks developed through interpretation by U.S. courts. The first major decision that shaped modern civil rights was the Civil Rights Cases that dodged a constitutional attack to withdraw most private acts of discrimination out of reach until the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed and validated in Heart of Atlanta v. U.S. In addition to the coupling of statutory attacks with private discrimination and constitutional challenges to state biases, statutory attacks have proven to be more adept at addressing disparate impacts as …

The Long And Winding Road From Monroe To Connick, Sheldon Nahmod

Sheldon Nahmod

In this article, I address the historical and doctrinal development of § 1983 local government liability, beginning with Monroe v. Pape in 1961 and culminating in the Supreme Court’s controversial 2011 failure to train decision in Connick v. Thompson. Connick has made it exceptionally difficult for § 1983 plaintiffs to prevail against local governments in failure to train cases. In the course of my analysis, I also consider the oral argument and opinions in Connick as well as various aspects of § 1983 doctrine. I ultimately situate Connick in the Court’s federalism jurisprudence which doubles back to Justice Frankfurter’s view …