Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons^™

All Faiths & None: A Guide To Protecting Religious Liberty For Everyone, Elizabeth Reiner Platt, Katherine M. Franke, Keisha E. Mckenzie, Katharine Rhodes Henderson

Faculty Scholarship

Religious liberty rights have been immeasurably damaged over the past several years — often in the name of protecting religious liberty.

Government officials have embraced Islamophobic policies and rhetoric; shut the door on refugees fleeing religious persecution; elevated the religious rights of their political allies over the rights — religious and otherwise — of other communities; used religion as a tool of economic deregulation; and denigrated the beliefs of religious minorities, atheists, and religious progressives.

To achieve true freedom for those of all faiths and none, a complete overhaul of religious liberty policy, and a new understanding of what this …

The Paradox Of Legal Training And Leadership: A Conversation Between Akilah Folami And Susan Sturm, Akilah Folami, Susan P. Sturm

Faculty Scholarship

Professor Akilah Folami:
Welcome and thank you for coming. I am eager to engage in this opening exchange with Susan Sturm today in hopes that it will help bring to surface some of the issues that undergird the conversations planned for today in the panels. So let us begin. Susan has been teasing out a series of paradoxes that she argues develops in the tensions built into lawyer-leadership, i.e., legal training and leadership development. Her work on these lawyer-leadership paradoxes grows out of her other work that is related to the theme of this conference: Leading Differently Across Difference. She …

Covid-19 And Lgbt Rights, Suzanne B. Goldberg

Faculty Scholarship

Even in the best of times, LGBT individuals have legal vulnerabilities in employment, housing, healthcare and other domains resulting from a combination of persistent bias and uneven protection against discrimination. In this time of COVID-19, these vulnerabilities combine to amplify both the legal and health risks that LGBT people face.

This essay focuses on several risks that are particularly linked to being lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender, with the recognition that these vulnerabilities are often intensified by discrimination based on race, ethnicity, age, disability, immigration status and other aspects of identity. Topics include: 1) federal withdrawal of antidiscrimination protections; 2) …

The New Principle-Practice Gap: The Disconnect Between Diversity Beliefs And Actions In The Workplace, Jamillah Bowman Williams, Jonathan Cox

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Following increased calls for racial justice, many organizations have pledged to play their part in dismantling systemic racism. One common step leaders take is to invest in diversity and inclusion programs. Yet, despite organizations’ bold claims to value diversity and the investment of billions of dollars on related efforts, workplace discrimination continues to be a major factor in the lives of people of color. Additionally, existing research highlights a principle-policy gap, wherein people--particularly White Americans--espouse support for the principles of diversity, yet their support wanes for policies that address inequalities. In this survey study, we explore attitudes about organizational diversity …

For Coöperation And The Abolition Of Capital, Or, How To Get Beyond Our Extractive Punitive Society And Achieve A Just Society, Bernard E. Harcourt

Faculty Scholarship

In hindsight, the term "capitalism" was always a misnomer, coined paradoxically by its critics in the nineteenth century. The term misleadingly suggests that the existence of capital produces a unique economic system or that capital itself is governed by economic laws. But that's an illusion. In truth, we do not live today in a system in which capital dictates our economic circumstances. Instead, we live under the tyranny of what I would call "tournament dirigisme": a type of state-directed gladiator sport where our political leaders bestow spoils on the wealthy, privileged elite.

We need to displace this tournament dirigisme with …

The Legalization Of Restorative Justice: A Fifty-State Empirical Analysis, Thalia González

Utah Law Review

This Article addresses the increasing formal legal nature of restorative justice in the United States. Over the last three decades, a substantial body of research has demonstrated the ways in which restorative justice offers an alternative societal response to crime and harm. It has also examined how restorative justice empowers individuals and groups to address violence, respond to social, political and economic injustice, and engage in resistance to existing structural inequities. Yet a prominent gap in the field exists: a comprehensive theoretical and empirical examination of the codification of restorative justice in state law. Studies of this nature are essential …

The Art Of Access: Innovative Protests Of An Inaccessible City, Elizabeth F. Emens

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay considers inaccessible New York City through the lens of artistic production. The landscape of disability art and protest is vast and wildly diverse. This Essay proposes to capture one slice of this array. From Ellis Avery’s Zodiac of NYC transit elevators, to Shannon Finnegan’s Anti-Stairs Club Lounge at the Vessel in Hudson Yards, to Park McArthur’s work exhibiting the ramps that provided her access to galleries showing her work – these and other creative endeavors offer a unique way in to understanding the problems and potential of inaccessible cities. Legal actions have challenged some of the specific sites …

The Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary: An Exploration Of Changing The Discourse On Conservation, Arielle Ben-Hur

Pitzer Senior Theses

In 2015, the Northern Chumash Tribal Council submitted a National Marine Sanctuary Nomination to establish the Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary– a means by which to ensure the protection of one of the most culturally and biologically diverse coastlines in the world. On October 5, 2015, John Armor of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) responded to the nomination, adding it to the inventory of areas NOAA may consider in the future for national marine sanctuary designation.

In my thesis, I explore how the nomination of the Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary acts as a platform from which Traditional …

Blue Lives & The Permanence Of Racism, I. India Thusi

Faculty Scholarship

In true dystopian form, the killing of unarmed Black people by the police has sparked a national narrative about the suffering of police officers. “Blue Lives Matter” has become the rallying call for those offended by the suggestion that we should hold police officers accountable for killing unarmed Black people. According to a December 2016 poll, 61% of Americans believed that there was a “war on police,” and 68% of Whites had a favorable view of the police as compared to 40% of Blacks. Lawmakers around the country have been proposing Blue Lives Matter laws that make it a hate …

On Beauty And Policing, I. India Thusi

Faculty Scholarship

ABSTRACT-"To protect and serve" is the motto of police departments from Los Angeles to Cape Town. When police officers deviate from the twin goals of protection and service, for example by using excessive force or by maintaining hostile relations with the community, scholars recommend more training, more oversight, or more resources in policing. However, police appear to be motivated by a superseding goal in the area of sex work policing. In some places, the policing of sex workers is connected to police officers' perceptions of beauty, producing a hierarchy of desirable bodies as enforced by those sworn to protect and …

Hernandez, Bivens, And The Supreme Court's Expanding Theory Of Judicial Abdication, William J. Aceves

Faculty Scholarship

Sergio Adrián Hernández Güereca, a fifteen-year-old Mexican child, was playing with his friends in Mexico when he was shot in the face by a U.S. Border Patrol Agent standing in the United States. Sergio died on the concrete ground where he fell.

In Hernandez v. Mesa, Sergio’s family brought a federal lawsuit seeking to hold Agent Jesus Mesa, Jr. responsible for the death of their son. They alleged Agent Mesa had violated Sergio’s constitutional rights and based their claim on the Bivens doctrine. In Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, the Supreme Court established a …

Standing In Between Sexual Violence Victims And Access To Justice: The Limits Of Title Ix, Hannah Brenner Johnson

Faculty Scholarship

Sexual violence proliferates across communities, generally, and is especially prevalent in places like colleges and universities. As quasi-closed systems, colleges and universities are governed by their own internal norms, policies, and federal laws, like Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which address how sex discrimination must be handled in institutions of higher education that are in receipt of federal funds. Title IX focuses on all facets of sex discrimination including reporting, investigation, adjudication, and prevention. When schools are accused of failing to adequately respond to reports of sexual misconduct on their campuses, Title IX has been interpreted by …

On The Proposed Legalization Of Commercial Surrogacy: I Thought We Had Abolished The Sale Of Human Beings, Phyllis Chesler

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.

Discounting Credibility: Doubting The Stories Of Women Survivors Of Sexual Harassment, Deborah Epstein

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

For decades, federal and state laws have prohibited sexual harassment on the job; despite this fact, extraordinarily high rates of gender-based workplace harassment still permeate virtually every sector of the American workforce. Public awareness of the seriousness and scope of the problem increased astronomically in the wake of the #MeToo movement, as women began to publicly share countless stories of harassment and abuse. In 2015, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s Task Force on the Study of Harassment in the Workplace published an important study analyzing a wide range of factors contributing to this phenomenon. But the study devotes only limited …

Racial Purges, Robert L. Tsai

Michigan Law Review

Review of Beth Lew-Williams' The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America.

America's Paper Prisons: The Second Chance Gap, Colleen Chien

Michigan Law Review

Over the last decade, dozens of states and the federal government have enacted “second chance” reforms that increase the eligibility of individuals arrested, charged, or convicted of crimes to shorten their sentences, clear their criminal records, and/or regain the right to vote. While much fanfare has accompanied the increasing availability of “second chances,” little attention has been paid to their delivery. This study introduces the concept of the “second chance gap,” which it defines as the difference between eligibility and delivery of second chance relief; explores its causes; and approximates its size in connection with several second chance laws and …

Color-Blind But Not Color-Deaf: Accent Discrimination In Jury Selection, Jasmine Gonzales Rose

Faculty Scholarship

Every week brings a new story about racialized linguistic discrimination. It happens in restaurants, on public transportation, and in the street. It also happens behind closed courtroom doors during jury selection. While it is universally recognized that dismissing prospective jurors because they look like racial minorities is prohibited, it is too often deemed acceptable to exclude jurors because they sound like racial minorities. The fact that accent discrimination is commonly racial, ethnic, and national origin discrimination is overlooked. This Article critically examines sociolinguistic scholarship to explain the relationship between accent, race, and racism. It argues that accent discrimination in jury …

Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence: An Overview, Suzie Dunn

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

Technology facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) is a complex worldwide phenomenon with devastating results. Research to date shows that victim-survivors of intimate partner violence are tracked by their abusive partners who use technology to monitor their movements and communication. Many women journalists, human rights defenders and politicians face daily death threats and rape threats for speaking out about equality issues or for simply being a woman in a leadership role. Those with intersecting marginalized identities are at specific risk, with Black, Indigenous, and people of colour, LGBTQ+ people, and people with disabilities facing higher rates of attacks and concerted attacks that …

Creative And Responsive Advocacy For Reconciliation: The Application Of Gladue Principles In Administrative Law, Andrew Martin

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

A s a response to the estrangement and alienation of Indigenous peoples from the Canadian justice system, Gladue principles are central to reconciliation in sentencing and other criminal law contexts. However, the role of Gladue principles in administrative law more broadly remains uncertain. In this paper, I argue that the factors underlying Indigenous peoples’ estrangement and alienation from the justice system indicate estrangement and alienation from the administrative state itself, and thus Gladue principles appropriately apply in administrative law contexts. Using the results of a comprehensive search of reported decisions by tribunals and by courts on judicial review, I analyze …

Brief Of Amici Curiae Scholars Of The Constitutional Rights And Interests Of Children In Support Of Respondents, Angela Onwuachi-Willig, Catherine E. Smith, Tanya Washington Hicks, Lauren Fontana, Jessica Dixon Weaver, Cary Martin Shelby

Faculty Scholarship

This Brief of Amici Curiae Scholars of the Constitutional Rights and Interests of Children in Support of Respondents filed in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia makes two points. First, a categorical exemption, based on religious beliefs rather than foster children’s needs, does not serve the best interests of children and violates the government’s duty to foster youth. Such an exemption needlessly restricts the pool of prospective foster parents, increasing the risk of a greater number of children being confined to long-term, institutional care. The reduction of same-sex foster parents would also have a disproportionate impact on “special needs” and LGBT …

Brief Of Amici Curiae Legal Scholars In Support Of Equality In Support Of Respondents, Fulton V. City Of Philadelpha, Kyle Velte, David Cruz, Michael Higdon, Anthony Michael Kreis, Shirley Lin, Linda C. Mcclain

Faculty Scholarship

This Brief of Amici Curiae Legal Scholars in Support of Equality in Support of Respondents filed in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia addresses the propriety of an analogy to race discrimination in public accommodation cases involving sexual orientation discrimination. The race analogy in sexual orientation cases proceeds as follows: Advocates and judges widely agree that courts should, and would, reject a religious exemption claim by a public accommodation—such a foster care agency—seeking to turn away an African-American or interracial couple based on the public accommodation’s religious beliefs that Blacks are inferior to whites or that the races should not mix. …

Equality Is A Brokered Idea, Robert L. Tsai

Faculty Scholarship

This essay examines the Supreme Court's stunning decision in the census case, Department of Commerce v. New York. I characterize Chief Justice John Roberts' decision to side with the liberals as an example of pursuing the ends of equality by other means – this time, through the rule of reason. Although the appeal was limited in scope, the stakes for political and racial equality were sky high. In blocking the administration from adding a citizenship question to the 2020 Census, 5 members of the Court found the justification the administration gave to be a pretext. In this instance, that lie …