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Articles 1 - 24 of 24
Full-Text Articles in Law
Decolonizing Equal Sovereignty, Rosa Hayes
Decolonizing Equal Sovereignty, Rosa Hayes
William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice
In Shelby County v. Holder, 570 U.S. 529 (2013), the Supreme Court announced that a tradition of equal sovereignty among the states prohibits unwarranted federal intrusions into state sovereignty and invoked this newly created doctrine to strike down Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act. Scholarly critiques in Shelby County’s immediate aftermath debated the constitutional validity of the Court’s equal sovereignty reasoning and warned of the dire threat the VRA’s effacement posed to voting rights—concerns that recent litigation have vindicated.
But other recent litigation suggests that, abstracted from its problematic and consequential origins, equal sovereignty may be deployed …
The Legal Origins Of Catholic Conscientious Objection, Jeremy Kessler
The Legal Origins Of Catholic Conscientious Objection, Jeremy Kessler
William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal
This Article traces the origins of Catholic conscientious objection as a theory and practice of American constitutionalism. It argues that Catholic conscientious objection emerged during the 1960s from a confluence of left-wing and right-wing Catholic efforts to participate in American democratic culture more fully. The refusal of the American government to allow legitimate Catholic conscientious objection to the Vietnam War became a cause célèbre for clerical and lay leaders and provided a blueprint for Catholic legal critiques of other forms of federal regulation in the late 1960s and early 1970s—most especially regulations concerning the provision of contraception and abortion.
Over …
Shelter From The Storm: Human Rights Protections For Single-Mother Families In The Time Of Covid-19, Theresa Glennon, Alexis Fennell, Kaylin Hawkins, Madison Mcnulty
Shelter From The Storm: Human Rights Protections For Single-Mother Families In The Time Of Covid-19, Theresa Glennon, Alexis Fennell, Kaylin Hawkins, Madison Mcnulty
William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice
COVID-19’s arrival, and the changes it has unleashed, reveal how longstanding legal and policy decisions produced structural inequalities that have left so many families, and especially single-parent families with children, all too insecure. The fragility of single-mother families is amplified by the multifaceted discrimination they face. While all single parents, including single fathers and other single relatives who are raising children, share many of these burdens, this Article focuses on the challenges confronting single mothers.
Federal policy choices stand in sharp contrast to the political rhetoric of government support for families. Social and economic policy in the twentieth century developed …
Petitions From The Grave: Why Federal Executions Are A Violation Of The Suspension Clause, Taran Wessells
Petitions From The Grave: Why Federal Executions Are A Violation Of The Suspension Clause, Taran Wessells
William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal
This Note will address the intersection of wrongful convictions, the federal death penalty, and habeas corpus to conclude that the federal death penalty is an unconstitutional violation of the Suspension Clause of the United States Constitution. Part I of this Note will establish that Congress may not suspend the writ of habeas corpus outside of wartime. Then, Part II will show that wrongfully convicted prisoners therefore have a constitutional right to a habeas petition if they discover new, exonerating evidence. Part III will argue that because executed prisoners cannot file a habeas petition for release, executing wrongfully convicted prisoners is …
The President And Individual Rights, Mark Tushnet
The President And Individual Rights, Mark Tushnet
William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal
No abstract provided.
Reconsidering Section 1983'S Nonabrogation Of Sovereign Immunity, Katherine Mims Crocker
Reconsidering Section 1983'S Nonabrogation Of Sovereign Immunity, Katherine Mims Crocker
Faculty Publications
Motivated by civil unrest and the police conduct that prompted it, Americans have embarked on a major reexamination of how constitutional enforcement works. One important component is 42 U.S.C. § 1983, which allows civil suits against any "person" who violates federal rights. The U.S. Supreme Court has long held that "person" excludes states because Section 1983 flunks a condition of crystal clarity.
This Article reconsiders that conclusion--in legalese, Section 1983's nonabrogation of sovereign immunity--along multiple dimensions. Beginning with a negative critique, this Article argues that because the Court invented the crystal-clarity standard so long after Section 1983's enactment, the caselaw …
Brief Of Amici Curiae Professors Katherine Mims Crocker And Brandon Hasbrouck In Support Of Neither Party With Respect To Defendant's Motion To Dismiss, Katherine Mims Crocker, Brandon Hasbrouk
Brief Of Amici Curiae Professors Katherine Mims Crocker And Brandon Hasbrouck In Support Of Neither Party With Respect To Defendant's Motion To Dismiss, Katherine Mims Crocker, Brandon Hasbrouk
Briefs
No abstract provided.
Force-Feeding Pretrial Detainees: A Constitutional Violation, Bryn L. Clegg
Force-Feeding Pretrial Detainees: A Constitutional Violation, Bryn L. Clegg
William & Mary Law Review
No abstract provided.
The Epistemic Function Of Fusing Equal Protection And Due Process, Deborah Hellman
The Epistemic Function Of Fusing Equal Protection And Due Process, Deborah Hellman
William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal
The fusion of equal protection and due process has attracted significant attention with scholars offering varied accounts of its purpose and function. Some see the combination as productive, creating a constitutional violation that neither clause would generate alone. Others see the combination as merely strategic, offered to make a claim acceptable at a particular historical moment but not genuinely necessary. This Article offers a third alternative. Judges have and should bring both equal protection and due process together to learn what each clause independently requires. On this Epistemic vision of constitutional fusion, a focus on equality helps judges learn what …
Four Responses To Constitutional Overlap, Michael Coenen
Four Responses To Constitutional Overlap, Michael Coenen
William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal
Sometimes government action implicates more than one constitutional right. For example, a prohibition on religious expression might be said to violate both the Free Speech Clause and the Free Exercise Clause, a rule regarding same-sex marriage might be said to violate both equal protection and substantive due process, an exercise of the eminent domain power might be said to violate both procedural due process and the Takings Clause, a disproportionate criminal sentence based on judge-found facts might be said to violate both the defendant’s right to trial by jury and that defendant’s right against cruel and unusual punishment, and so …
The New Jim Crow’S Equal Protection Potential, Katherine Macfarlane
The New Jim Crow’S Equal Protection Potential, Katherine Macfarlane
William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal
In 1954, the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education opinion relied on social science research to overturn Plessy v. Ferguson’s separate but equal doctrine. Since Brown, social science research has been considered by the Court in cases involving equal protection challenges to grand jury selection, death penalty sentences, and affirmative action. In 2016, Justice Sotomayor cited an influential piece of social science research, Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, in her powerful Utah v. Strieff dissent. Sotomayor contended that the Court’s holding overlooked the unequal racial impact of suspicionless …
Incorporation, Total Incorporation, And Nothing But Incorporation?, Christopher R. Green
Incorporation, Total Incorporation, And Nothing But Incorporation?, Christopher R. Green
William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal
Kurt T. Lash’s The Fourteenth Amendment and the Privileges and Immunities of American Citizenship (2014) defends the view that the Fourteenth Amendment’s “privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States” cover only rights enumerated elsewhere in the Constitution. My own book, however, Equal Citizenship, Civil Rights, and the Constitution: The Original Sense of the Privileges or Immunities Clause (2015), reads the Clause to guarantee equality broadly among similarly situated citizens of the United States. Incorporation of an enumerated right into the Fourteenth Amendment requires, I say, national consensus such that an outlier state’s invasion of the right would produce …
Windsor Beyond Marriage: Due Process, Equality & Undocumented Immigration, Anthony O'Rourke
Windsor Beyond Marriage: Due Process, Equality & Undocumented Immigration, Anthony O'Rourke
William & Mary Law Review
The Supreme Court’s recent decision in United States v. Windsor, invalidating part of the federal Defense of Marriage Act, presents a significant interpretive challenge. Early commentators have criticized the majority opinion’s lack of analytical rigor, and expressed doubt that Windsor can serve as a meaningful precedent with respect to constitutional questions outside the area of same-sex marriage. This Article offers a more rehabilitative reading of Windsor and shows how the decision can be used to analyze a significant constitutional question concerning the use of state criminal procedure to regulate immigration.
From Windsor’s holding, the Article distills two concrete doctrinal propositions …
Presidential Constitutionalism And Civil Rights, Joseph Landau
Presidential Constitutionalism And Civil Rights, Joseph Landau
William & Mary Law Review
As the judicial and legislative branches have taken a more passive approach to civil rights enforcement, the President’s exercise of independent, extrajudicial constitutional judgment has become increasingly important. Modern U.S. presidents have advanced constitutional interpretations on matters of race, gender, HIV-status, self-incrimination, reproductive liberty, and gun rights, and President Obama has been especially active in promoting the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons—most famously by refusing to defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Commentators have criticized the President’s refusal to defend DOMA from numerous perspectives but have not considered how the President’s DOMA policy fits within …
Ows, Discourse, And Narratives, Timothy Zick
Ows And The Constitution, Timothy Zick
Trans-Border Exclusion And Execution, Timothy Zick
Trans-Border Exclusion And Execution, Timothy Zick
Popular Media
No abstract provided.
The Sanctity Of Polling Places, Timothy Zick
The Contemporary Protest Movement, Timothy Zick
Public Protest, Militarization, And Critical Democratic Moments, Timothy Zick
Public Protest, Militarization, And Critical Democratic Moments, Timothy Zick
Popular Media
No abstract provided.
The Survival Of Racism Under The Constitution, Juan Williams
The Survival Of Racism Under The Constitution, Juan Williams
William & Mary Law Review
No abstract provided.
Where's The Politics?: Introduction To Williams, Eastland, Days, And Rabkin, Neal Devins
Where's The Politics?: Introduction To Williams, Eastland, Days, And Rabkin, Neal Devins
William & Mary Law Review
No abstract provided.
The Judicial Protection Of Unenumerated Constitutional Rights, Gene R. Nichol
The Judicial Protection Of Unenumerated Constitutional Rights, Gene R. Nichol
Popular Media
No abstract provided.
Racial Discrimination In "Private" Schools, Norman Dorsen
Racial Discrimination In "Private" Schools, Norman Dorsen
William & Mary Law Review
No abstract provided.