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Articles 1 - 30 of 50
Full-Text Articles in Law
Notes On Borrowing And Convergence, Robert L. Tsai, Nelson Tebbe
Notes On Borrowing And Convergence, Robert L. Tsai, Nelson Tebbe
Faculty Scholarship
This is a response to Jennifer E. Laurin, "Trawling for Herring: Lessons in Doctrinal Borrowing and Convergence," 111 Colum. L. Rev. 670 (2011), which analyzes the Supreme Court's resort to tort-based concepts to limit the reach of the Fourth Amendment's exclusionary rule. We press three points. First, there are differences between a general and specific critique of constitutional borrowing. Second, the idea of convergence as a distinct phenomenon from borrowing has explanatory potential and should be further explored. Third, to the extent convergence occurs, it matters whether concerns of judicial administration or political reconstruction are driving doctrinal changes.
Lochner V. New York (1905) And Kennedy V. Louisiana (2008): Judicial Reliance On Adversary Argument, Douglas E. Abrams
Lochner V. New York (1905) And Kennedy V. Louisiana (2008): Judicial Reliance On Adversary Argument, Douglas E. Abrams
Faculty Publications
Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist called Lochner v. New York (1905) “one of the most ill-starred decisions that [the Supreme Court ever rendered.” The Justices’ deliberations preceding the 5-4 decision demonstrate the courts’ reliance on advocacy in the adversary system of civil and criminal justice. The stark imbalance between the state’s “incredibly sketchy” brief and Joseph Lochner’s sterling submission may have determined Lochner’s outcome, and thus may have changed the course of constitutional history, by leading two Justices to join the majority on the central question of whether New York’s maximum-hours law for bakery workers was a reasonable public health …
Bad News For Professor Koppelman: The Incidental Unconstitutionality Of The Individual Mandate, Gary S. Lawson, David Kopel
Bad News For Professor Koppelman: The Incidental Unconstitutionality Of The Individual Mandate, Gary S. Lawson, David Kopel
Faculty Scholarship
In "Bad News for Mail Robbers: The Obvious Constitutionality of Health Care Reform," Professor Andrew Koppelman concludes that the individual mandate in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is constitutionally authorized as a law "necessary and proper for carrying into Execution" other aspects of the PPACA. However, the Necessary and Proper Clause rather plainly does not authorize the individual mandate.
The Necessary and Proper Clause incorporates basic norms drawn from eighteenth-century agency law, administrative law, and corporate law. From agency law, the clause embodies the venerable doctrine of principals and incidents: a law enacted under the clause must …
Optimal Specificity In The Law Of Separation Of Powers: The Numerous Clauses Principle, Gary S. Lawson
Optimal Specificity In The Law Of Separation Of Powers: The Numerous Clauses Principle, Gary S. Lawson
Faculty Scholarship
In this response to Professor John Manning’s Separation of Powers as Ordinary Interpretation, Professor Gary Lawson agrees with Manning’s argument that there is no overarching constitutional principle of “optimal specificity.” Lawson argues, however, that there are other overarching principles that are fairly derivable from the text, such as a principle of “decisional independence.” Moreover, Lawson suggests a bigger potential problem with Manning’s argument: when judges apply functionalist or formalist reasoning to decide cases, they may be engaging in a qualitatively different activity than Manning assumes, and his careful interpretative analysis may therefore be largely beside the point.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's Appointment With Trouble, Kent H. Barnett
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's Appointment With Trouble, Kent H. Barnett
Scholarly Works
This article considers whether the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director’s appointment of the Bureau’s Deputy Director comports with the Appointments Clause. The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act established the Bureau in July 2010, as well as the offices of the Bureau’s Director and Deputy Director, to coordinate the regulation and enforcement of federal consumer-financial-protection laws. Under that act, the Director appoints the Deputy Director. The Appointments Clause permits “Heads of Departments” to appoint inferior officers like the Deputy Director. But it is unclear if the Bureau is a “department” and thus if the Director is a department …
Dangerous People Or Dangerous Weapons: Access To Firearms For Persons With Mental Illness, Lawrence O. Gostin, Katherine L. Record
Dangerous People Or Dangerous Weapons: Access To Firearms For Persons With Mental Illness, Lawrence O. Gostin, Katherine L. Record
Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works
The recent attempted assassination of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords has once again focused the nation’s attention on the danger of the wide availability of firearms. The Supreme Court has ruled that gun restrictions may only be imposed on those deemed “prohibited persons” under the Gun Control Act of 1968. Although some are easily identifiable (e.g., children, convicted felons), one widely inclusive group is not – the mentally ill.
The current system designed to bar the mentally ill from purchasing or possessing firearms is ineffectual due to a lack of reporting and the existence of loopholes. What’s more, no state has developed …
Book Review: The Free Press Crisis Of 1800: Thomas Cooper's Trial For Seditious Libel, Eric Easton
Book Review: The Free Press Crisis Of 1800: Thomas Cooper's Trial For Seditious Libel, Eric Easton
All Faculty Scholarship
This article was an invited book review of a book of the same title by Peter Charles Hoffer. Hoffer, Distinguished Research Professor of History at the University of Georgia, has published this accessible case history as part of the University Press of Kansas’s Landmark Law Cases & American Society series, which he co-edits.
The book discusses one of the cases arising as a result of the Alien & Sedition Act under the presidency of John Adams, mostly targeting Republicans who editorialized against the Adams administration.
The Oberlin Fugitive Slave Rescue: A Victory For The Higher Law, Steven Lubet
The Oberlin Fugitive Slave Rescue: A Victory For The Higher Law, Steven Lubet
Faculty Working Papers
This article tells the story of the Oberlin fugitive slave rescue and the ensuing prosecutions in federal court. The trial of rescuer Charles Langston marked one of the first times that adherence to "higher law" was explicitly raised as a legal defense in an American courtroom. The article is adapted from my book -- Fugitive Justice: Runaways, Rescuers, and Slavery on Trial -- which tells this story (and several others) in much more detail.
In the fall of 1859, John Price was a fugitive slave living in the abolitionist community of Oberlin, Ohio. He was lured out of town and …
The Architecture Of First Amendment Free Speech, Edward J. Eberle
The Architecture Of First Amendment Free Speech, Edward J. Eberle
Law Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Illegal Aid: Legal Assistance To Immigrants In The United States, Geoffrey Heeren
Illegal Aid: Legal Assistance To Immigrants In The United States, Geoffrey Heeren
Law Faculty Publications
There is an enormous unmet need for immigrant legal aid in the United States. This is partly due to regulations that bar federally funded legal services organizations from representing many types of immigrants. The possible repeal of these restrictions is rarely discussed as a means to expand immigrant access to counsel. Federal funding for immigrant legal aid appears to have become taboo, despite the fact that for much of its history, legal aid was deeply connected to immigration. This forgotten history reveals that there was once broad national consensus in favor of immigrant legal aid; it became contentious and faced …
The Fifth Freedom: The Constitutional Duty To Provide Public Education, Areto Imoukhuede
The Fifth Freedom: The Constitutional Duty To Provide Public Education, Areto Imoukhuede
Faculty Scholarship
“The fifth freedom is freedom from ignorance. It means that every[one], everywhere, should be free to develop his [or her] talents to their full potential – unhampered by arbitrary barriers of race or birth or income.” Lyndon B. Johnson This article argues that education is a fundamental human right that the U.S. Supreme Court has failed to recognize because of the Court’s bias towards negative, rather than positive rights. Viewed from the limited perspective of rights as liberties, the concern with declaring a fundamental right to education is that education legislation would be strictly scrutinized, thus causing the undesired result …
All Things In Proportion - American Rights Review And The Problem Of Balancing, Jud Mathews, Alec Stone Sweet
All Things In Proportion - American Rights Review And The Problem Of Balancing, Jud Mathews, Alec Stone Sweet
Journal Articles
This paper describes and evaluates the evolution of rights doctrines in the United States, focusing on the problem of balancing as a mode of rights adjudication. In the current Supreme Court, deep conflict over whether, when, and how courts balance is omnipresent. Elsewhere, we find that the world’s most powerful constitutional courts have embraced a stable, analytical procedure for balancing, known as proportionality. Today, proportionality analysis (PA) constitutes the defining doctrinal core of a transnational, rights-based constitutionalism. This Article critically examines alleged American exceptionalism, from the standpoint of comparative constitutional law and practice. Part II provides an overview of how …
"Displaced By A Force To Which They Yielded And Could Not Resist": A Historical And Legal Analysis Of Mayor And City Counsel Of Baltimore V. Charles Howard Et. Al, Matthew Kent
Legal History Publications
The experience of the Baltimore Police Commissioners is instructive in understanding the state of affairs in Baltimore during the Civil War era. The removal of the commissioners by the Union Army and the subsequent civil trial, The Mayor and City Council of Baltimore v. Charles Howard, provides a window through which one may examine the historical, legal and political circumstances of the time. The legal status of the commissioners also sheds light on modern legal doctrine related to the detention of American citizens as “enemy combatants” without the benefit of certain constitutional guarantees. By analyzing the Howard case with a …
What Will We Lose If The Trial Vanishes?, Robert P. Burns
What Will We Lose If The Trial Vanishes?, Robert P. Burns
Faculty Working Papers
The number of trials continues to decline andfederal civil trials have almost completely disappeared. This essay attempts to address the significance of this loss, to answer the obvious question, "So what?" It argues against taking a resigned or complacent attitude toward an important problem for our public culture. It presents a short description of the trial's internal structure, recounts different sorts of explanations, and offers an inventory of the kinds of wounds this development would inflict.
Why Jack Balkin Is Disgusting, Andrew Koppelman
Why Jack Balkin Is Disgusting, Andrew Koppelman
Faculty Working Papers
Yale Law Professor Jack Balkin didn't win friends when he announced that (1) he is now a constitutional originalist and (2) the original meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment protects the right to abortion. His claim to membership in the originalist club brought forth a small army of eager bouncers, who were sure that originalism couldn't possibly defend the paradigmatic departure from the Constitution's original meaning.
Balkin has indeed posed a radical challenge to the vision of law that drives the originalists – more radical than he is willing to admit. His theory is in such deep tension with a commonly …
Bad News For Mail Robbers: The Obvious Constitutionality Of Health Care Reform, Andrew Koppelman
Bad News For Mail Robbers: The Obvious Constitutionality Of Health Care Reform, Andrew Koppelman
Faculty Working Papers
Two federal district judges have invalidated the so-called "individual mandate" in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. Their reasoning is bizarre and mischievous. The novel approach to constitutional law that they propose would misread the Constitution, betray the intentions of the framers, and cripple the nation's ability to address one of its most pressing problems.
The correct legal analysis is simple. Congress has the authority to solve problems that the states cannot separately solve. It can choose any reasonable means to do that.
Doma, Romer, And Rationality, Andrew Koppelman
Doma, Romer, And Rationality, Andrew Koppelman
Faculty Working Papers
It has been objected by many that the Defense of Marriage Act lacks a rational basis because it reflects a bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group. The increasing success of the argument, which has persuaded three federal judges, reveals the hidden normative premises of rational basis analysis, at least whenever that analysis is used to invalidate a statute. Since 1996, when DOMA was passed by overwhelming margins in both houses of Congress, the country's attitudes toward gay people have evolved rapidly, to the point where this kind of mindless lashing out at gays looks a lot less attractive. …
Partisan Conflicts Over Presidential Authority, Jide Okechuku Nzelibe
Partisan Conflicts Over Presidential Authority, Jide Okechuku Nzelibe
Faculty Working Papers
A prevailing view in the legal and political science literature assumes that power holders seek to expand or contract their constitutional authority based on incentives that are intrinsic to the logic of the institutional offices they occupy. For instance, it is generally assumed that Presidents are empire builders who will almost always prefer maximum flexibility in shaping their policy objectives, whereas members of Congress may sometimes shirk their institutional prerogatives because of electoral incentives or collective action problems. A similar institutional logic underpins the view that federal courts will often seek to expand their interpretive authority in constitutional controversies at …
Fueling Controversy, Randy Beck
Fueling Controversy, Randy Beck
Scholarly Works
In a recent Yale Law Journal article, Linda Greenhouse and Reva Siegel question the received wisdom that the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade generated a political backlash, inflaming conflict over abortion and damaging the political process. The evidence they highlight shows that political conflict over abortion predated the Roe opinion, spurred by the Catholic Church and by Republican Party strategists seeking to foster party realignment. This enriched picture of the political and social landscape at the time of the decision undermines any simplistic suggestion that Roe served as “the sole cause of backlash” or “single-handedly caused societal polarization …
A Critical Appraisal Of The Department Of Justice's New Approach To Medical Marijuana, Robert A. Mikos
A Critical Appraisal Of The Department Of Justice's New Approach To Medical Marijuana, Robert A. Mikos
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
The Obama Administration has embarked upon a much-heralded shift in federal policy toward medical marijuana. Eschewing the hard-ball tactics favored by earlier Administrations, Attorney General Eric Holder announced in October 2009 that the Department of Justice (DOJ) would stop enforcing the federal marijuana ban against persons who comply with state medical marijuana laws. Given the significance of the medical marijuana issue in both criminal law and federalism circles, this Article sets out to provide the first in-depth analysis of the changes wrought by the DOJ’s new Non Enforcement Policy (NEP). In a nutshell, it suggests that early enthusiasm for the …
Reasoning About The Irrational: The Roberts Court And The Future Of Constitutional Law, H. Jefferson Powell
Reasoning About The Irrational: The Roberts Court And The Future Of Constitutional Law, H. Jefferson Powell
Faculty Scholarship
Commentary on the future direction of the Roberts Court generally falls along lines that correlate with the commentators' political views on the desirability of the Court's recent decisions. A more informative approach is to look for opinions suggesting changes in the presuppositions with which the Justices approach constitutional decision making. In footnote 27 in his opinion for the Court in the District of Columbia v. Heller Second Amendment decision, Justice Scalia suggested a fundamental revision of the Court's assumptions about the role of judicial doctrine, and the concept of rationality, in constitutional law. Justice Scalia would eliminate the normative aspects …
Constitutionalizing Local Politics, Joseph Blocher, Ilan Graff
Constitutionalizing Local Politics, Joseph Blocher, Ilan Graff
Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Examining Entrenched Masculinities Within The Republican Government Tradition, Jamie Abrams
Examining Entrenched Masculinities Within The Republican Government Tradition, Jamie Abrams
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
“May all our citizens be soldiers, and all our soldiers citizens,” Sarah Livingston Jay toasted to revelers celebrating the Revolutionary War in 1789. She expressly conveyed what this article describes as the “foundational fusion” of republican government traditions coupling the military service of citizens-soldiers with male political citizenship. While the core of this fusion is deep, long-standing, and well-documented, this article explores the implicit tensions conveyed in her toast – the dominant masculinity dimensions of this foundational fusion. How do women and black men historically gain full political citizenship and effectuate republican government guarantees given its anchoring in entrenched dominant …
Judicial Activism And The Interpretation Of The Voting Rights Act, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer
Judicial Activism And The Interpretation Of The Voting Rights Act, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer
Articles by Maurer Faculty
From the moment the U.S. Supreme Court first confronted the difficult constitutional questions at the heart of the Voting Rights Act, its posture has been one of deference. This posture has continued to this day. In contrast, the Court has interpreted the language of the Act dynamically, often in total disregard to the text of the law or the intent of Congress. But as this Article explains, the Roberts Court appears poised to unsettle this longstanding narrative. The Act is in serious constitutional danger. One way to explain this move on the part of the Court is by invoking the …
The Conflicted Assumptions Of Modern Constitutional Law, H. Jefferson Powell
The Conflicted Assumptions Of Modern Constitutional Law, H. Jefferson Powell
Faculty Scholarship
Contribution to Symposium - The Nature of Judicial Authority: A Reflection on Philip Hamburger's Law and Judicial Duty
Rebel Without A Clause: The Irrelevance Of Article Vi To Constitutional Supremecy, Gary S. Lawson
Rebel Without A Clause: The Irrelevance Of Article Vi To Constitutional Supremecy, Gary S. Lawson
Faculty Scholarship
With Stare Decisis and Constitutional Text, 1 Jonathan Mitchell has produced what I think is the most interesting and creative textual defense2 (or at least partial defense) to date of the use of horizontal precedent in federal constitutional cases.3 Mitchell’s careful analysis of the Supremacy Clause is fascinating and instructive, and he does an impeccable job of drawing out the implications of his premise that the Supremacy Clause prescribes only a very limited choice-of-law rule—a rule that does not, by its own terms, specifically elevate the Constitution above federal statutes and treaties. His innovative and intriguing framework yields four distinct …
The Regrettable Clause: United States V. Comstock And The Powers Of Congress, H. Jefferson Powell
The Regrettable Clause: United States V. Comstock And The Powers Of Congress, H. Jefferson Powell
Faculty Scholarship
In this Article, Powell argues that in Comstock, the Court encountered one of the oldest and most basic constitutional issues about the scope of congressional power-whether there are justiciable limits to the range of legitimate ends Congress may pursue. The Justices, without fully recognizing the fact, were taking sides in an ancient debate, and in doing so, they inadvertently reopened an issue that ought to be deemed long settled. Part II of the Article first addresses the question before the Court in Comstock, which was limited to a pure question of Article I law: is a specific provision of a …
Brief Of Constitutional Law Professors As Amici Curiae In Support Of Petitioner, Ernest A. Young
Brief Of Constitutional Law Professors As Amici Curiae In Support Of Petitioner, Ernest A. Young
Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Cracks In The Wall, A Bulge Under The Carpet: The Singular Story Of Religion, Evolution, And The U.S. Constitution, Susan Haack
Cracks In The Wall, A Bulge Under The Carpet: The Singular Story Of Religion, Evolution, And The U.S. Constitution, Susan Haack
Articles
No abstract provided.
What Happened In Iowa?, David Pozen
What Happened In Iowa?, David Pozen
Faculty Scholarship
Reply to Nicole Mansker & Neal Devins, Do Judicial Elections Facilitate Popular Constitutionalism; Can They?, 111 Colum. L. Rev. Sidebar 27 (2011).
November 2, 2010 is the latest milestone in the evolution of state judicial elections from sleepy, sterile affairs into meaningful political contests. Following an aggressive ouster campaign, voters in Iowa removed three supreme court justices, including the chief justice, who had joined an opinion finding a right to same-sex marriage under the state constitution. Supporters of the campaign rallied around the mantra, “It’s we the people, not we the courts.” Voter turnout surged to unprecedented levels; the national …