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Full-Text Articles in Law
Federalism And Subnational Political Community, James A. Gardner
Federalism And Subnational Political Community, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
No abstract provided.
The Incompatible Treatment Of Majorities In Election Law And Deliberative Democracy, James A. Gardner
The Incompatible Treatment Of Majorities In Election Law And Deliberative Democracy, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
Deliberative democracy offers a distinctive and appealing conception of political life, but is it one that might be called into service to guide actual reform of existing election law? This possibility seems remote because election law and deliberative democracy are built around different priorities and theoretical premises. A foundational area of disagreement lies in the treatment of majorities. Election law is structured, at both the legislative and constitutional levels, so as to privilege majorities and systematically to magnify their power, whereas deliberative democracy aims at privileging minorities (or at least de-privileging majorities). The main purpose of the election law now …
Election Law As Applied Democratic Theory, James A. Gardner
Election Law As Applied Democratic Theory, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
Democracy does not implement itself; a society’s commitment to govern itself democratically can be effectuated only through law. Yet as soon as law appears on the scene significant choices must be made concerning the legal structure of democratic institutions. The heart of the study of election law is thus the examination of the choices that our laws make in seeking to structure a workable system of democratic self-rule. In this essay, written for a symposium on Teaching Election Law, I describe how my Election Law course and materials focus on questions of choice in institutional design by emphasizing election law’s …
Anonymity And Democratic Citizenship, James A. Gardner
Anonymity And Democratic Citizenship, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
Many aspects of modern democratic life are or can be performed anonymously – voting, financial contributions, petition signing, political speech and debate, communication with and lobbying of officials, and so forth. But is it desirable for citizens to perform such tasks anonymously? Anonymity frees people from social pressures associated with observation and identifiability, but does this freedom produce behavior that is democratically beneficial? What, in short, is the effect of anonymity on the behavior of democratic citizens, and how should we evaluate it?
In this paper, I attempt a first pass answer to these questions by turning to both democratic …
New York’S Inbred Judiciary: Pathologies Of Nomination And Appointment Of Court Of Appeals Judges, James A. Gardner
New York’S Inbred Judiciary: Pathologies Of Nomination And Appointment Of Court Of Appeals Judges, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
The practice of selecting judges by popular election, commonplace among the American states, has recently come in for a good deal of criticism, much of it well-founded. But if popular election of judges is a bad method of judicial selection, what ought to replace it? Opponents of judicial election typically treat gubernatorial appointment as self-evidently better. New York’s experience with gubernatorial appointment to its highest court, the Court of Appeals, suggests that greater caution is in order. Although New York’s current method of selecting Court of Appeals judges was designed to be wide open and based entirely on merit, the …
Anti-Regulatory Absolutism In The Campaign Arena: Citizens United And The Implied Slippery Slope, James A. Gardner
Anti-Regulatory Absolutism In The Campaign Arena: Citizens United And The Implied Slippery Slope, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
Perhaps the most striking feature of the Supreme Court’s constitutional campaign jurisprudence is its longstanding, profound hostility to virtually any government regulation whatsoever of campaign speech and spending. Such an approach is highly unusual in constitutional law, which typically tolerates at least some level of regulatory intervention even with respect to strongly protected rights. The Court’s behavior in this respect is consistent with – and, I argue, is best understood as – the kind of behavior in which a court engages when it fears a slide down a slippery slope. But what lies at the bottom of the slope? And …
The Dignity Of Voters—A Dissent, James A. Gardner
The Dignity Of Voters—A Dissent, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
Since the waning days of the Burger Court, the federal judiciary has developed a generally well-deserved reputation for hostility to constitutional claims of individual right. In the field of democratic process, however, the Supreme Court has not only affirmed and expanded the applications of previously recognized rights, but has also regularly recognized new individual rights and deployed them with considerable vigor. The latest manifestation of this trend appears to be the emergence of a new species of vote dilution claim that recognizes a constitutionally grounded right against having one’s vote “cancelled out” by fraud or error in the casting and …
Democracy Without A Net? Separation Of Powers And The Idea Of Self-Sustaining Constitutional Constraints On Undemocratic Behavior, James A. Gardner
Democracy Without A Net? Separation Of Powers And The Idea Of Self-Sustaining Constitutional Constraints On Undemocratic Behavior, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
The United States Constitution is designed to achieve good government by relying on two distinct systems: a primary system that achieves good governance through democratic electoral accountability; and a set of self-sustaining structural backup systems designed for situations in which the democratic system fails, and which operate by limiting the ability of bad rulers to do serious harm to the public good. A key premise of this kind of dual structural arrangement is that effective backup systems must operate independently of primary democratic systems; because they are needed precisely when democratic mechanisms have failed, they cannot depend for their success …
Can Party Politics Be Virtuous?, James A. Gardner
Can Party Politics Be Virtuous?, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
No abstract provided.
Liberty, Community And The Constitutional Structure Of Political Influence: A Reconsideration Of The Right To Vote, James A. Gardner
Liberty, Community And The Constitutional Structure Of Political Influence: A Reconsideration Of The Right To Vote, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
No abstract provided.
Shut Up And Vote: A Critique Of Deliberative Democracy And The Life Of Talk, James A. Gardner
Shut Up And Vote: A Critique Of Deliberative Democracy And The Life Of Talk, James A. Gardner
Journal Articles
No abstract provided.