Law Commons^™

The Meaning Of Sex: Dynamic Words, Novel Applications, And Original Public Meaning, William N. Eskridge Jr., Brian G. Slocum, Stefan Th. Gries

Michigan Law Review

The meaning of sex matters. The interpretive methodology by which the meaning of sex is determined matters Both of these were at issue in the Supreme Court’s recent landmark decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, where the Court held that Title VII protects lesbians, gay men, transgender persons, and other sexual and gender minorities against workplace discrimination. Despite unanimously agreeing that Title VII should be interpreted in accordance with its original public meaning in 1964, the opinions in Bostock failed to properly define sex or offer a coherent theory of how long-standing statutes like Title VII should be interpreted over …

Equality's Understudies, Aziz Z. Huq

Michigan Law Review

Review of Robert L. Tsai's Practical Equality: Forging Justice in a Divided Nation.

Life-Giving Speech Amid An Empire Of Silence, Walter Brueggemann

Michigan Law Review

It will come as no surprise to readers of the Law Review that James Boyd White is a daring and wise practitioner of what Clifford Geertz terms "blurred genres." By appeal to Kenneth Burke, Victor Turner, and Paul Ricoeur, among others, Geertz envisions a broad interpretive venture that breaks out of the rigid regulations of a particular discipline to the larger constructive enterprise that entertains life and its meaning as a "game" of face-to-face engagement, or as a "drama" that presses on to the next scene. White's work fits that vision precisely. In Living Speech: Resisting the Empire of Force, …

What's Wrong With Our Talk About Race? On History, Particularity, And Affirmative Action, James Boyd White

Michigan Law Review

One of the striking and original achievements of the Michigan Law Review in its first century was the publication in 1989 of a Symposium entitled Legal Storytelling. Organized by the remarkable editor-in-chief, Kevin Kennedy - who tragically died not long after his graduation - the Symposium not only brought an important topic to the forefront of legal thinking, it did so in an extraordinarily interesting way. For this was not a mere collection of papers; the authors met in small editorial groups to discuss their work in detail, and as a result the whole project has a remarkable coherence and …

The Substance Of Equality, Jeremy Waldron

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Speaking of Equality: An Analysis of the Rhetorical Force of "Equality" in Moral and Legal Discourse by Peter Westen

The Constitution's Accommodation Of Social Change, Philip A. Hamburger

Michigan Law Review

Did the framers and ratifiers of the United States Constitution think that changes in American society would require changes in the text or interpretation of the Constitution? If those who created the Constitution understood or even anticipated the possibility of major social alterations, how did they expect constitutional law - text and interpretation - to accommodate such developments?

The effect of social change upon constitutional law was an issue the framers and ratifiers frequently discussed. For example, when AntiFederalists complained of the Constitution's failure to protect the jury trial in civil cases, Federalists responded that a change of circumstances might, …

A Tale Of Two Clients: Thinking About Law As Language, Clark D. Cunningham

Michigan Law Review

This is a true story. It is actually three true stories. The article taken as a whole tells a story of my personal search for a new way of talking about the experience of being a lawyer, a quest which is leading me to think more and more about law as a kind of language and lawyering as a form of translation. Rather like a medieval romance, embedded within this story of a quest are two tales, about clients I have represented in the course of my clinical teaching.

As much as possible, both levels of narrative are presented in …

Lying Down Together: Law, Metaphor, And Theology, Jon M. Lipshultz

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Lying Down Together: Law, Metaphor, and Theology by Milner S. Ball

Worlds Beyond Theory: Toward The Expression Of An Integrative Ethic For Self And Culture, Peter Read Teachout

Michigan Law Review

A Review of When Words Lose Their Meaning: Constitutions and Reconstitutions of Language, Character, and Community by James Boyd White

Black English And Equal Educational Opportunity, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

There is a danger that the King case will be misunderstood. The press has sometimes portrayed it as a vindication of the right to use black English in the classroom rather than of the educational opportunities of the children who speak it, and the King opinion itself is at times confusing. This Note clarifies the meaning of King and section 1703(f) by examining four critical steps in Judge Joiner's reasoning. Section I examines the court's holding that "language barriers" under section l 703(f) include impediments to equal educational opportunity arising from dialect differences, and concludes that although the court's argument …

The Prospet Of Liberty Or The View From Saint-Remy, Ralph M. Carson

Michigan Law Review

This celebration of the first century of the Michigan Law School recalls the vain endeavor of the Holy Roman Empire to keep the craft of the law out of the Americas. Que no passasen abogados ni procuradores a las Indias was a clause inserted by the Emperor Charles V into the capitulation of 1540 with Alvar Nunez which sanctioned the exploration of the River Plate. Perhaps it was the futility of lawyers which prompted the Imperial veto. Twenty years before, when the Governor of Cuba sought to halt Cortez with decrees of outlawry from Spain, his cunning captain Sandoval evaded …