Law Commons^™

The Anticaste Principle, Cass R. Sunstein

Michigan Law Review

In this essay, I seek to defend a particular understanding of equality, one that is an understanding of liberty as well. I call this conception "the anticaste principle." Put too briefly, the anticaste principle forbids social and legal practices from translating highly visible and morally irrelevant differences into systemic social disadvantage, unless there is a very good reason for society to do so. On this view, a special problem of inequality arises when members of a group suffer from a range of disadvantages because of a group-based characteristic that is both visible for all to see and irrelevant from a …

Caste And The Civil Rights Laws: From Jim Crow To Same-Sex Marriages, Richard A. Epstein

Michigan Law Review

In this essay I address the notion of caste in two separate contexts: in the traditional disputes over race and sex, and in the more modem disputes over sexual orientation. In both cases the idea of caste and its kindred notions of subordination and hierarchy are used to justify massive forms of government intervention. In all cases I think that these arguments are incorrect. In their place, I argue that the idea of caste should be confined to categories of formal, or legal, distinctions between persons before the law. This more limited notion of caste supplies no justification for the …

The Michael Jackson Pill: Equality, Race, And Culture, Jerome Mccristal Culp Jr.

Michigan Law Review

This chronicle is in tribute to the work of Derrick Bell, past, present, and future. I have borrowed his character Geneva Crenshaw as part of that tribute, and I hope she helps me raise some of the issues that he has taught us are important.

All characters in this chronicle are fictional, including Professor Culp and Professor Bell. Any relationship they may have to the real Professor Bell and Professor Culp is dictated by the requirements of creativity and the extent to which reality and fiction necessarily merge. I know that the real Derrick Bell is wiser than the one …

United States Urban Policy: What Is Left? What Is Right?, Jack Sommer

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article has three Parts: Part I provides a perspective on what remains of United States urban policy after the Reagan and Bush years. Part II sets forth a critique of the current institutional framework for the construction of national urban policy. Finally, Part III addresses current challenges for American metropolitan areas. In the spirit of Tocqueville, but with two caveats, I urge that greater reliance be placed on actions of private firms and voluntary associations than on federal programs to restore the central cities of many of the nation's metropolitan areas. Government action to protect citizens and to remove …

Power From The People, Milner S. Ball

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Rebellious Lawyering: One Chicano's Vision of Progressive Law Practice by Gerald P. López

A Distant Heritage: The Growth Of Free Speech In Early America, Jim Greiner

Michigan Law Review

A Review of A Distant Heritage: The Growth of Free Speech in Early America by Larry D. Eldridge

Toil Of The Firestarters, Peter A. Alces

Michigan Law Review

A Review of In the Company of Scholars: The Struggle for the Soul of Higher Education by Julius Getman

Divorce, Custody, Gender, And The Limits Of Law: On Dividing The Child, Lee E. Teitelbaum

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Dividing the Child: Social and Legal Dilemmas of Custody by Elanor E. Maccoby and Robert H. Mnookin

Bargaining With The State, Jonathan D. Hacker

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Bargaining with the State by Richard A. Epstein

Objectivity In Legal Judgement, Heidi Li Feldman

Michigan Law Review

This essay unites the philosophical concern with blend concepts and the legal concern with objectivity. Comparing blend legal concepts with other kinds of blend concepts develops our resources for ascertaining the distinctive characteristics of blend concepts. Cultivating a more refined understanding of blend concepts sharpens our inquiry into objectivity. In Part I of this essay, I explicate the distinctive characteristics of blend concepts, demonstrating that some representative legal concepts, drawn from tort law, possess these characteristics. In Part II, I develop a conception of objectivity suitable for blend judgments - the blend conception of objectivity - and use this conception …

Aiding And Altruism: A Mythopsycholegal Analysis, Thomas C. Galligan Jr.

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article asserts that traditional tort law should be modified to provide for a duty to act in situations in which a reasonable person would act altruistically. Part I examines traditional and more recent tort doctrine governing the duty to aid. Part II discusses compassion from philosophical, literary, and mythological points of view and explores how these viewpoints inform compassion's possible relationship to a legal duty to help. Part III considers the connections between psychological theories and studies of action, altruism, and empathy. In addition to Batson's work, I reexamine the classic studies of Latan6 and Darley and the application …