Law Commons^™

A House Divided: When State And Lower Federal Courts Disagree On Federal Constitutional Rights, Wayne A. Logan

Scholarly Publications

Despite their many differences, Americans have long been bound by a shared sense of federal constitutional commonality. As this article demonstrates, however, federal constitutional rights do in fact often differ — even within individual states — as a result of state and lower federal court concurrent authority to interpret the Constitution and the lack of any requirement that they defer to one another’s positions. The article provides the first in-depth examination of intra-state, state-federal court conflicts on federal constitutional law and the problems that they create. Focusing on criminal procedure doctrine in particular, with its unique impact on individual liberty …