Law Commons^™

Is Modern Paganism True?, Anthony T. Kronman

San Diego Law Review

Anthony T. Kronman’s contribution to the 2019 Editors’ Symposium: Pagans and Christians in the City.

Jews And The Culture Wars: Consensus And Dissensus In Jewish Religious Liberty Advocacy, Michael A. Helfand

San Diego Law Review

In the recent culture wars, traditionalists and progressives have clashed over dueling conceptions of family, sexuality and religion—manifested in debates over abortion, contraception, and same-sex marriage. Caught in this conflict has been a political and cultural reassessment of religious liberty; a doctrine originally seen as necessary to protect faith commitments from majoritarian persecution, the public salience of religious liberty has waned as it has clashed with the rights of women and LGBT people. And these evolving commitments to dueling rights have triggered religious, political, and ideological realignments, generating new alliances across political and faith communities.

In this new environment, both …

Paganism Is Dead, Long Live Secularism, Samuel C. Rickless

San Diego Law Review

Samuel C. Rickless’s contribution to the 2019 Editors’ Symposium: Pagans and Christians in the City.

The Morality Of Human Rights, Michael J. Perry

San Diego Law Review

My discussion of the morality of human rights in this Article presupposes that the reader is familiar with the internationalization of human rights: the growing international recognition and protection, in the period since the end of the Second World War, of certain rights as human rights. The Appendix to this Article is for readers not familiar with the internationalization of human rights. I begin, in the first Part of the Article, by explaining what the term human right means in the context of the internationalization of human rights. I also explain both the sense in which some human rights are, …

Does The Existing Human Rights Regime Have Political Authority?, Christopher Heath Wellman

San Diego Law Review

In this Article I consider whether the existing international legal human rights regime enjoys political authority over sovereign states. In particular, I explore whether, just as states can cite their role as the primary institutions that protect human rights in order to justify their claim to authority over their citizens, perhaps the current human rights regime might plausibly cite its secondary role in securing human rights in order to ground its authority over these states.

By Hook Or By Cook: Exploring The Legality Of An Ins Sting Operation, Lenni B. Benson

San Diego Law Review

The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) is an agency with responsibility both for enforcing the immigration laws and conferring legal status and other benefits. This author finds that at times these dual roles create conflict, mistrust in the community, and violations of the rights of aliens. This Article critically examines an undercover operation conducted in 1993 by the San Diego District Office, which lured aliens to deportation through INS offers of legal status. The Article discusses the regulatory and statutory provisions governing INS undercover operations and the rights of aliens subject to final orders of deportation. It continues with an …

Population, Immigration And Growth In California, Richard Sybert

San Diego Law Review

This Article presents objective data and analysis regarding the components of California's population growth. It also reviews fiscal impacts from immigration. The author finds that these fiscal impacts are substantially negative for state and local governments. The Article also examines United States workforce needs as they may be affected by an expanding population and as they may implicate immigration. The author recommends changing immigration policy to focus more on workforce needs and skills in California. He recommends federal action on two levels: (1) to compensate California for the hugely disproportionate financial burden it bears from the nation's immigration and refugee …

Entry: What Mama Never Told You About Being There, Kathrin S. Mautino

San Diego Law Review

This Article analyzes the development of entry as an immigration concept, with special attention to those factors that affect entry analysis. These elements that the author finds must be considered in every potential entry into the United States are: (1) the legal status of the alien, (2) the purpose for finding an entry, and (3) the congressional intent behind the statutes involved. This Article explores the legal history of the term "entry," and illustrates the interaction of the three factors above. The author concludes that entry analysis demonstrates the political nature of immigration and the frequency that historical events rather …

Judicial Review Of Discretionary Immigration Decisionmaking, Michael G. Heyman

San Diego Law Review

The Immigration and Nationality Act vests enormous discretion in the Attorney General and subordinates, such discretion exercised frequently at all levels of the immigration system. Despite this, though, judicial review of these decisions has followed a very uneven, troubled course. This Article explores the reasons for this, focusing first on the Administrative Procedure Act and the elusive meaning of discretion itself. The author demonstrates the "disintegration" of administrative law and what he sees as the failure of its general precepts to accommodate immigration issues. The Article traces the development of faulty doctrine through case law, resulting in a stunted judicial …

No-Fault Marital Dissolution: The Bitter Triumph Of Naked Divorce, J Herbie Difonzo

San Diego Law Review

In this Article, the author examines the origins of the no-fault divorce movement, concluding that the abandonment of fault grounds was conceived as a conservative measure intended to facilitate the reversal of the escalating divorce rate and to replace traditional marital dissolution with therapeutic divorce. This reform collapsed at mid-point, achieving only the jettisoning of divorce grounds. The author argues that an unintended consequence of the reform battle was the transformation from mutual consent divorce, the operating milieu for most of the twentieth century, into divorce on demand. The author concludes that this transformation has resulted in a significant loss …

Against First Principles, Jerry L. Mashaw

San Diego Law Review

This Article makes the argument that broad principles often get in the way of sensible public policy analysis and that one should be prepared to abandon them rather quickly when encountering heavy philosophical or political arguments. The author uses Richard Epstein's book Forbidden Grounds: The Case Against Employment Discrimination as a good example of the difficulty of developing plausible policy prescriptions while engaging in an argument based on broad principles. The Article notes weaknesses in Epstein's arguments concerning liberty, utility and efficiency as starting points for an evaluation of antidiscrimination law. The author applies his analysis to the Americans with …

Religious Contributions In Public Deliberation, Jeremy Waldron

San Diego Law Review

This Article commences with an excerpt from a "Pastoral Letter on Catholic Social Teaching and the U.S. Economy" published in 1986 by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. Through this letter, the author leads us to the question, "What part should doctrines and arguments rooted in religious beliefs play in public debate?" The author views such religious contributions as relevant to secular politics. He recommends that people value rethinking the structure of their premises, and see the value of an open, challenging, and indeterminate form of public deliberation in which nothing is taken for granted. He concludes that we can …