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Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons™

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Law and Politics

Series

2023

Articles 1 - 6 of 6

Full-Text Articles in Civil Rights and Discrimination

How Discriminatory Censorship Laws Imperil Public Education, Jonathan Feingold, Joshua Weishart Nov 2023

How Discriminatory Censorship Laws Imperil Public Education, Jonathan Feingold, Joshua Weishart

Faculty Scholarship

“Discriminatory censorship laws” regulate classroom conversations about racism, gender identity, and other topics targeted in the backlash against efforts toward inclusive classrooms and curricula. This policy brief examines the proliferation of these laws and their impact on K-12 schools, including the creation of hostile learning environments that expose students and educators to a heightened threat of race- and sex-based harassment and to formal sanctions and social ostracization. The laws also foster a climate of fear and anxiety among educators, effectively coercing them to shun critical inquiry and thought on targeted topics and more generally. The result is a curriculum that …

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Racial Equality, Religious Liberty, And The Complications Of Pluralism, Rachel F. Moran Mar 2023

Racial Equality, Religious Liberty, And The Complications Of Pluralism, Rachel F. Moran

Faculty Scholarship

Constitutional law scholar Laurence Tribe once described due process and equal protection as “a legal double helix.” By this, he meant that protections for substantive liberties coupled with principles of equal treatment created “a single, unfolding tale of equal liberty and increasingly universal dignity.” In his view, equality and liberty were mutually constitutive and “center[ed] on a quest for genuine self-government of groups small and large.” Although this optimistic account of the nation’s constitutional DNA is reassuring, Professor Sahar Aziz’s new book on “The Racial Muslim: When Racism Quashes Religious Freedom” reminds us that the double helix can unravel, so …

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Defeating De Facto Disenfranchisement Of Criminal Defendants, Neil Sobol Mar 2023

Defeating De Facto Disenfranchisement Of Criminal Defendants, Neil Sobol

Faculty Scholarship

In a democracy, voting is not only an important civic duty but also a right that governments owe to their citizens. However, by operation of law, forty-eight states deny voting rights to individuals based on criminal convictions. Activists and scholars attack de jure disenfranchisement as an improper collateral consequence that disproportionately impacts people of color. Although recent years show substantial reforms to reenfranchise defendants, an estimated 5.17 million defendants remained ineligible to vote in 2020.

While efforts to address de jure disenfranchisement remain necessary, a problem that has received considerably less attention is the de facto disenfranchisement of criminal defendants …

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“Do Not Ever Refer To My Lord Jesus Christ With Pronouns”: Considering Controversies Over Religiously Motivated Discrimination On The Basis Of Gender Identity, Linda C. Mcclain Jan 2023

“Do Not Ever Refer To My Lord Jesus Christ With Pronouns”: Considering Controversies Over Religiously Motivated Discrimination On The Basis Of Gender Identity, Linda C. Mcclain

Faculty Scholarship

In the by-now familiar framing “religious freedom versus LGBT+ rights,” perhaps the most visible conflicts today in the United States, and elsewhere, concern the “T”—transgender or gender identity rights. This issue of the Journal of Law and Religion includes a conversation in print between Patrick Parkinson, Laura Portuondo and Claudia Haupt, and Shannon Gilreath on this timely topic, and their contrasting perspectives mirror dimensions of the larger public controversies. Although tweets like those quoted above (by unsuccessful Republican congressional candidate Lavern Spicer) asserting that neither the Bible nor Jesus had pronouns sparked both factual corrections and comical retorts, 3 the …

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Gender And The Law: Revisiting The Legacy Of A Feminist Icon, Deborah L. Brake Jan 2023

Gender And The Law: Revisiting The Legacy Of A Feminist Icon, Deborah L. Brake

Book Chapters

Justice Ginsburg attained celebrity status in her later years as the voice of feminism from the bench, but her influence on law and gender was not always so venerated. For much of her career, feminist scholarly criticism of her gender jurisprudence was sharp. Critics called the approach “formal equality,” pointing out that it benefited those women most similarly situated to men. The criticism echoed that leveled against her strategy as a litigator representing male plaintiffs. In recent years, Justice Ginsburg’s legacy has been burnished by a fresh interpretation crediting it with a more robust vision of gender equality than previously …

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Affirmatively Furthering Health Equity, Mary Crossley Jan 2023

Affirmatively Furthering Health Equity, Mary Crossley

Articles

Pervasive health disparities in the United States undermine both public health and social cohesion. Because of the enormity of the health care sector, government action, standing alone, is limited in its power to remedy health disparities. This Article proposes a novel approach to distributing responsibility for promoting health equity broadly among public and private actors in the health care sector. Specifically, it recommends that the Department of Health and Human Services issue guidance articulating an obligation on the part of all recipients of federal health care funding to act affirmatively to advance health equity. The Fair Housing Act’s requirement that …

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