Constitutional Law Commons^™

Brief For Amici Curiae Professors Of Law In Support Of Petitioner, Barbara Allen Babcock, Jeffrey Bellin, Robert P. Burns, Sherman J. Clark, James E. Coleman Jr., Lisa Kern Griffin, Robert P. Mosteller, Deborah Tuerkheimer, Neil Vidmar

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Examining The Americans With Disabilities Act's Reassignment Provision Through An Equal Protection Lens, Danielle Bogaards

UC Law Constitutional Quarterly

Disabled employees were given equal protection rights when Congress acted under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment to enact the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA"). This note begins by analyzing the ADA's reassignment provision, which is triggered when a current employee becomes disabled and can no longer perform the essential tasks of his or her current position. The ADA considers various forms of accommodations the employer may provide; yet circuit courts are split when faced with application of the ADA's reassignment provision because it is often used as a last resort before termination. More specifically, when an employer has a …

Gonzalez V. State, 131 Nev. Adv. Op. 99 (Dec. 31, 2015), Chelsea Stacey

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court, sitting en banc, determined that by failing to answer questions from the jury that suggested confusion on a significant element of the law, failing to give an accomplice-distrust instruction, and by not bifurcating the guilt phase from the gang enhancement phase the district court violated the defendant’s right to a fair trial.

Scott V. First Jud. Dist. Ct., 131 Nev. Adv. Op. 101 (Dec. 31, 2015), Adrian Viesca

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court determined that Carson City Municipal Code (“CCMC”) 8.04.050(1) is (1) unconstitutionally overbroad because it “is not narrowly tailored to prohibit only disorderly conduct or fighting words” and (2) vague because it lacked sufficient guidelines and gave the police too much discretion in its enforcement.

Ross Douthat’S Critique Of Modernity, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “Ross Douthat’s Critique of Modernity“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

December 25, 2015: Merry Christmas 2015, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “Merry Christmas 2015“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Echoes From The Segregationist Past At Oral Argument, Mary Ellen Maatman

Mary Ellen Maatman

Berry V. State, 131 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 96 (Dec. 24, 2015), Brittany L. Shipp

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The issue before the Court was an appeal from a district court order dismissing a post-conviction petition for writ of habeas corpus. The Court reversed and remanded holding that the district court improperly discounted the declarations in support of the appellant’s petition, which included a confession of another suspect, whom the petitioner implicated as the real perpetrator at trial. The Court held that these declarations were sufficient to merit discovery, and an evidentiary hearing on Petitioner Berry’s gateway actual innocence claim.

Evolution Of A Nation After A Dictatorship: How Law, Politics And Society Of The 1973 Dictatorship In Uruguay And Of The Subsequent Return Of Democracy In 1985, Potentially Helped Evolve The Nation Of Today., Jonathan A. Fein Proaño

Master's Theses

In 1973, Uruguay’s president authored a coup d’état with the military and changed the history and fabric of Uruguay. Once democracy returned to Uruguay in 1985, it was a chance to see if an evolution of the law, politics and society would occur. This thesis aims to analyze and understand the patterns of change and de-evolution or evolution that happened during the dictatorship and then over the last 30 years. I break down the process of changes that happened legally and politically, how the dictatorship and its leaders used law to destroy rule of law, and how society changed.

This …

December 17, 2015: Underlying Consensus?, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “Underlying Consensus?“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

The Government’S Lies And The Constitution, Helen L. Norton

Indiana Law Journal

The government’s lies can be devastating. This is the case, for example, of its lies told to resist legal and political accountability for its misconduct; to inflict economic and reputational harm; or to enable the exercise of its powers to imprison, to deploy lethal force, and to commit precious national resources. On the other hand, the government’s lies can sometimes be helpful: consider lies told to thwart a military adversary or to identify wrongdoing through undercover police work. The substantial harms threatened by some government lies invite a search for ways to punish and prevent them. At the same time, …

The (Not So Dire) Future Of The Necessary And Proper Power After National Federation Of Independent Business V. Sebelius, Celestine Richards Mcconville

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

No abstract provided.

The Eighth Amendment And Tax Evasion: Whether Fatca Non-Compliance Fines And Fbar Penalties Are Excessive, Tyler R. Murray

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

No abstract provided.

Trending @ Rwu Law: Carl Bogus's Post: 'Should We Be Afraid? Absolutely. But Not Only Of Crazed Jihadists...', Carl Bogus

Law School Blogs

No abstract provided.

Under School Colors: Private University Police As State Actors Under § 1983, Leigh J. Jahnig

Northwestern University Law Review

Under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, individuals may sue those who violate their constitutional rights while acting under color of state law. The Supreme Court has held that private actors may act under color of state law, and may be sued under § 1983 in some circumstances. However, courts have not been consistent in determining whether private university police forces act under color of state law. Private universities often maintain police forces that are given extensive police powers by state statutes but are controlled by private entities. Some courts have looked directly to the state statutes that delegate police power, but …

Right-To-Die, Bruce Morton

Bruce N. Morton

No abstract provided.

How Much Fuel To Add To The Fire Of Genius? Some Questions About The Repair/Reconstruction Distinction In Patent Law , Arthur Gajarsa, Evelyn Aswad, Joseph Cianfrani

Evelyn Aswad

No abstract provided.

Quasi-Affirmative Rights In Constitutional Criminal Procedure, David Sklansky

David A Sklansky

No abstract provided.

Reflexiones Jurídicas Sobre El Atentado Contra Juan Pablo Ii A La Luz Del Debido Proceso.®, Daniel Fernando Gómez Tamayo

Daniel Fernando Gómez Tamayo

¿Qué sentido tiene que la oficial americana inculpe a un musulmán de un ilícito que posiblemente no cometió? ¿Qué sentido tiene generar un conflicto con los musulmanes, si la Santa Sede mantiene un diálogo interreligioso, respetuoso y pacífico con los musulmanes?

How Much Diversity Can The Us Constitution Stand?, Tanya Washington

Tanya Monique Washington

No abstract provided.

December 9, 2015: The Spirit Of Doom, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The Spirit of Doom“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Affirmative Action And The Crisis In Higher Education, Scott D. Gerber

ConLawNOW

At all but the nation’s top colleges and universities, enrollments are down and budgets are strapped. Although many offer ideas why, the heavy-headed use of racial and ethnic preferences in student admissions, financial aid, and faculty hiring is also to blame, but also nobody ever mentions that. The term “affirmative action” originated with an executive order signed by President John F. Kennedy on March 6, 1961. Fast forward five decades and, to borrow a line from Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, “We’re not in Kansas any more.” Bluntly stated, there is systemic discrimination in all three categories of affirmative …

Tradition, Policy And The Establishment Clause: Justice Kennedy's Opinion In Town Of Greece V. Galloway, Wilson Huhn

ConLawNOW

The great jurisprudential battle that has raged in the Supreme Court for more than a century and the question that our society has struggled with since the advent of the Civil War is whether the Constitution is a command by our ancestors that we retain the same political structures, social hierarchies, and cultural traditions that they had, or whether it reflects ideals of liberty, equality, fairness, and tolerance that they aspired to and that they expected us to reach for. That struggle between rules and standards, doctrine and principles, conventionalism and consequentialism, tradition and policy in the interpretation of the …

Prayer And The Meaning Of The Establishment Clause: A Debate On Town Of Greece V. Galloway, Patrick M. Garry

ConLawNOW

Greece v. Galloway involved the constitutionality of the town of Greece’s practice of opening its monthly town board meetings with an invocation given by a volunteer chaplain of the month. The issue in Greece was not the appropriateness, sensitivity, or wisdom of the prayers, nor whether some people are offended by the prayers.

The Establishment Clause is not about feelings, just as the Speech Clause is not about the feelings of people who disagree with or are offended by other people’s speech. The Establishment Clause is not an individual rights clause; it is a clause focused on the institutional liberty …

Navigating A "Legal Black Hole": The View From Guantanamo Bay, Carlos Warner

ConLawNOW

This article discusses the unique and perhaps bizarre litigation surrounding the detainees held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba by the United States Government. The article describes in detail the development of the litigation making “meaningful judicial review” impossible for the detained men. The article also describes how one attorney has strategically advanced the causes of his clients in spite of restrictive classification of material and impossible legal standards. The article describes the conditions and logistics surrounding visiting clients in Guantanamo and litigating cases.

Finally, the article concludes that the only way to "win" the Guantanamo litigation is through a "Dada" approach …

Who Amended The Amendment?, John Olsson

ConLawNOW

The purpose and intent of the Sixth Amendment of the US Constitution has been repeatedly distorted by textualist misinterpretation, orchestrated by elements of the judiciary more concerned with preserving the power of government than the rights of individual defendants. As a result, it is hard to know what the Amendment stands for, since it has been successively re‑interpreted and, effectively, amended for at least the past 80 years and possibly longer. The author argues that it is time for courts to return to the spirit of the laws that actuated the Bill of Rights over two hundred years ago, and …

The Founders On: "Does The Constitution Work?", Craig A. Stern

ConLawNOW

Whether the Constitution works depends upon the purpose of its working. Discerning that purpose, however, has resisted consensus. Consequently, this article suggests a roundabout way to supply at least a tentative answer to the question whether the Constitution works. The Founders believed that the Constitution, like any republican form of government, would work only for a moral and religious people. They framed and adopted the Constitution in that belief. John Adams warned that without morality and religion, the passions of the people “would break the strongest cords of our Constitution.” A glance at how some cords have fared with a …

A Constitutional Right To Police Protection And Classical Liberal Theory: Complement, Not Conflict, Laura Rae Dove

ConLawNOW

This article considers whether an obligation should be placed upon the State to enforce its own laws in situations where the State is in a unique position to protect particular citizens. The author argues that the current system, under which the State has virtually no obligation to enforce its own laws, affronts the classical liberal underpinnings on which the United States was founded.

The article examines the U.S. Supreme Court’s holdings in DeShaney v. Winnebago County Department of Social Services and in Town of Castle Rock v. Gonzales. These two holdings, the author argues, do not properly consider the …

Realism Over Formalism And The Presumption Of Constitutionality: Chief Justice Roberts' Opinion Upholding The Individual Mandate, Wilson Huhn

ConLawNOW

This article examines Chief Justice Roberts’ opinion in National Federal of Independent Business v. Sebelius, a decision that upheld the constitutionality of key provisions in the Affordable Care Act. The individual mandate, the focus of this article and perhaps the most hotly contested provision in the Act, requires private citizens to purchase health insurance or face financial penalty for remaining uninsured. The individual mandate has had and will continue to have important ramifications both for the national economy and for constitutional interpretation in future cases.

First, the article addresses important repercussions of upholding the Act, including significant consequences for …

The Unconstitutionality Of Ohio's House Bill 125: The Heartbeat Bill As Analyzed Under The First Amendment Of The United States Constitution, Jessica L. Knopp

ConLawNOW

This article examines the constitutionality of Ohio’s controversial House Bill 125 (“H.B. 125”), which includes new restrictions and requirements for abortion procedures performed in Ohio. The author argues that, while the new abortion measures conflict with the Supreme Court’s Fourteenth Amendment jurisprudence established in Roe v. Wade and in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, H.B. 125 also violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by imputing religious beliefs about conception and the value of life onto all Ohioans.

The article first outlines the current legal framework for constitutionally acceptable and unacceptable abortion restrictions, including a discussion of informed consent …