Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 12 of 12
Full-Text Articles in Law
Turning The Page On Section 5: The Implication Of Multiracial Coalition Districts On Section 5 Of The Voting Rights Act, Daniel A. Zibel
Turning The Page On Section 5: The Implication Of Multiracial Coalition Districts On Section 5 Of The Voting Rights Act, Daniel A. Zibel
Michigan Law Review
This Note analyzes the use of coalition districts in light of current section 5 and equal protection jurisprudence and argues that, in some circumstances, the Equal Protection Clause compels the use of coalition districts to achieve non retrogression under section 5. Part I examines the use of coalition districts, using the litigation in Page v. Bartels as an example. It then argues that the Supreme Court's opinion in Georgia v. Ashcroft permits jurisdictions to create viable racial coalition districts to comply with section 5. Part II argues that while Georgia v. Ashcroft permits the use of coalition districts to achieve …
Reinforcing Representation: Congressional Power To Enforce The Fourteenth And Fifteenth Amendments In The Rehnquist And Waite Courts, Ellen D. Katz
Reinforcing Representation: Congressional Power To Enforce The Fourteenth And Fifteenth Amendments In The Rehnquist And Waite Courts, Ellen D. Katz
Michigan Law Review
A large body of academic scholarship accuses the Rehnquist Court of "undoing the Second Reconstruction," just as the Waite Court has long been blamed for facilitating the end of the First. This critique captures much of what is meant by those generally charging the Rehnquist Court with "conservative judicial activism." It posits that the present Court wants to dismantle decades' worth of federal antidiscrimination measures that are aimed at the "reconstruction" of public and private relationships at the local level. It sees the Waite Court as having similarly nullified the civil-rights initiatives enacted by Congress following the Civil War to …
The Contested Right To Vote, Richard Briffault
The Contested Right To Vote, Richard Briffault
Michigan Law Review
For those who believe the United States is a representative democracy with a government elected by the people, the events of late 2000 must have been more than a little disconcerting. In the election for our most important public office - our only truly national office - the candidate who received the most popular votes was declared the loser while his second place opponent, who had received some 540,000 fewer votes, was the winner. This result turned on the outcome in Florida, where approximately 150,000 ballots cast were found not to contain valid votes. Further, due to flaws in ballot …
The 2000 Presidential Election: Archetype Or Exception?, Michael C. Dorf
The 2000 Presidential Election: Archetype Or Exception?, Michael C. Dorf
Michigan Law Review
The day after the Supreme Court's decision in Bush v. Gore, a colleague who specializes in tax law approached me with mock sympathy. "It must be very discouraging trying to teach constitutional law," he said, "when it's so obviously made up." This view of the Court's decision remains widely held, at least within the academy and among those who did not vote for President Bush. Unlike many of my fellow Democrats and academic colleagues, however, I see no reason to question the motives of the majority (or dissenting) Justices in Bush v. Gore. I certainly do not think that the …
The Unwelcome Judicial Obligation To Respect Politics In Racial Gerrymandering Remedies, Jeffrey L. Fisher
The Unwelcome Judicial Obligation To Respect Politics In Racial Gerrymandering Remedies, Jeffrey L. Fisher
Michigan Law Review
Like it or not, the attack on "bizarrely" shaped majority-minority electoral districts is now firmly underway. Nearly four years have passed since the Supreme Court first announced in Shaw v. Reno that a state's redistricting plan that is "so extremely irregular on its face that it rationally can be viewed only as an effort to segregate the races for purposes of voting" may violate the Equal Protection Clause. Such a district, the Court held, reinforces racial stereotypes, carries us further from the goal of a political system in which race no longer matters, and "threatens to undermine our system of …
Constitutional Law--Equal Protection--Minimum Age Requirement For Candidates For Detroit Common Council Violates Equal Protection Clause Of Fourteenth Amendment--Manson V. Edwards*, Michigan Law Review
Constitutional Law--Equal Protection--Minimum Age Requirement For Candidates For Detroit Common Council Violates Equal Protection Clause Of Fourteenth Amendment--Manson V. Edwards*, Michigan Law Review
Michigan Law Review
This Recent Development will discuss the validity and potential impact of the court's selection of the compelling interest test to measure the compliance of Detroit's age restriction on candidacy with the fourteenth amendment. It will also explore the possible state goals sought to be achieved by requiring a minimum age for candidates and examine whether these goals can be viewed as "compelling governmental interests."
Reapportionment In The Supreme Court And Congress: Constitutional Struggle For Fair Representation, Robert G. Dixon Jr.
Reapportionment In The Supreme Court And Congress: Constitutional Struggle For Fair Representation, Robert G. Dixon Jr.
Michigan Law Review
Fair representation is the ultimate goal. At the time of the Reapportionment Decisions, much change was overdue in some states, and at least some change was overdue in most states. We are a democratic people and our institutions presuppose according population a dominant role in formulas of representation. However, by its exclusive focus on bare numbers, the Court may have transformed one of the most intricate, fascinating, and elusive problems of democracy into a simple exercise of applying elementary arithmetic to census data. In so doing, the Court may have disabled itself from effectively considering the more subtle issues …
Some Comments On The Reapportionment Cases, Paul G. Kauper
Some Comments On The Reapportionment Cases, Paul G. Kauper
Michigan Law Review
Any appraisal of the Supreme Court's decisions in the legislative reapportionment cases must necessarily distinguish between the basic policy ingredients and social consequences of the decisions on the one hand, and the question whether the results were reached by a proper exercise of judicial power on the other. Respecting the first of these considerations, I have no difficulty identifying the social advantages accruing from these decisions. Because of the stress on the population principle, the decisions will afford a greater voice to urban interests, will make the legislative process more responsive to current needs of particular concern to urban dwellers, …
Court, Congress, And Reapportionment, Robert B. Mckay
Court, Congress, And Reapportionment, Robert B. Mckay
Michigan Law Review
In the United States, governmental power is divided vertically between nation and states and horizontally, at the national level, among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. The Constitution leaves the lines of demarcation deliberately imprecise. Thus, from the beginning it was easy to predict that among those holders of power there would be tension (at least), conflict (probably), or total collapse (a possibility). The miracle of the American governmental system, with just this complexity and lack of definition, is the fact of its survival. It is not at all surprising that there have been a number of crises, some of …
Residency Requirements For Voting And The Tensions Of A Mobile Society, John R. Schmidhauser
Residency Requirements For Voting And The Tensions Of A Mobile Society, John R. Schmidhauser
Michigan Law Review
It is the purpose of this article to determine the extent to which persons otherwise qualified to vote are disenfranchised by the complex of state residency requirements and to assess the practical and constitutional aspects of any statutory prospects for change.
Political Thickets And Crazy Quilts: Reapportionment And Equal Protection, Robert B. Mckay
Political Thickets And Crazy Quilts: Reapportionment And Equal Protection, Robert B. Mckay
Michigan Law Review
If asked to identify the two most important cases decided by the Supreme Court of the United States in the twentieth century, informed observers would be likely to name, in whichever order, Brown v. Board of Education and Baker v. Carr.
Legislative Apportionment And Representative Government: The Meaning Of Baker V. Carr, Jo Desha Lucas
Legislative Apportionment And Representative Government: The Meaning Of Baker V. Carr, Jo Desha Lucas
Michigan Law Review
In three recent cases the Supreme Court has reopened the question of the extent to which federal courts will review the general fairness of state schemes of legislative apportionment. It is a question on which the Court has had nothing to say for over a decade, leaving the bar to patch together the current state of the law from the outcome of cases disposed of without opinion considered against a backdrop of language used in earlier decisions.