Law Commons^™

Administrative Failure And Local Democracy: The Politics Of Deshaney, Jack M. Beermann

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay is an effort to construct a normative basis for a constitutional theory to resist the Supreme Court's recent decision in DeShaney v. Winnebago County Department of Social Services.¹ In DeShaney, the Court decided that a local social service worker's failure to prevent child abuse did not violate the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment even though the social worker "had reason to believe" the abuse was occurring. ² Chief Justice Rehnquist's opinion for the Court held that government inaction cannot violate due process unless the state has custody of the victim, ³ thus settling a controversial …

Advice, Consent, And Influence, Robert F. Nagel

Publications

No abstract provided.

Justice Scalia And The Elusive Idea Of Discrimination Against Interstate Commerce, Richard B. Collins

Publications

No abstract provided.

Developments In Constitutional Law: The 1988-89 Term, A. Wayne Mackay, Dianne Pothier

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

This article canvasses the major developments from the 1988-89 term of the Supreme Court of Canada.

In terms of Charter jurisprudence there were major developments concerning equality rights, mobility rights, freedom of expression, and section 7.

More generally, there were also important developments in the federal trade and commerce power and broad hints as to the Supreme Court's leanings in relation to the federal spending power. There is clarification on how both federal and provincial laws affect federal undertakings, and re-affirmation of the ancillary nature of powers in relation to language. The Court reassesses the tests of when a provincial …

Political Pressure And Judging In Constitutional Cases, Robert F. Nagel

Publications

No abstract provided.

Progressive And Conservative Constitutionalism, Robin West

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

American constitutional law in general, and fourteenth amendment jurisprudence in particular, is in a state of profound transformation. The "liberal-legalist" and purportedly politically neutral understanding of constitutional guarantees that dominated constitutional law and theory during the fifties, sixties, and seventies, is waning, both in the courts and in the academy. What is beginning to replace liberal legalism in the academy, and what has clearly replaced it on the Supreme Court, is a very different conception - a new paradigm - of the role of constitutionalism, constitutional adjudication, and constitutional guarantees in a democratic state. Unlike the liberal-legal paradigm it is …