Fourteenth Amendment Commons^™

Enforcement Of The Reconstruction Amendments, Alexander Tsesis

Washington and Lee Law Review

This Article analyzes the delicate balance of congressional and judicial authority granted by the Reconstruction Amendments. The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments vest Congress with powers to enforce civil rights, equal treatment, and civic participation. Their reach extends significantly beyond the Rehnquist and Roberts Courts’ narrow construction of congressional authority. In recent years, the Court has struck down laws that helped secure voter rights, protect religious liberties, and punish age or disability discrimination. Those holdings encroach on the amendments’ allocated powers of enforcement.

Textual, structural, historical, and normative analyses provide profound insights into the appropriate roles of the Supreme Court …

What Is "Appropriate" Legislation?: Mcculloch V. Maryland And The Redundancy Of The Reconstruction Amendments, Franita Tolson

Arkansas Law Review

I am thankful for the opportunity to review Professor David Schwartz’s really thoughtful and incisive critique of McCulloch v. Maryland. The book is a creative and masterful reinterpretation of a decision that I thought I knew well, but I learned a lot of new and interesting facts about McCulloch and the (sometimes frosty) reception that the decision has received over the course of the last two centuries. Professor Schwartz persuasively argues that modern views of McCulloch as a straightforward nationalist decision that has always had a storied place in the American constitutional tradition are flat-out wrong. The Spirit of the …

The Superfluous Fifteenth Amendment?, Travis Crum

Northwestern University Law Review

This Article starts a conversation about reorienting voting rights doctrine toward the Fifteenth Amendment. In advancing this claim, I explore an unappreciated debate—the “Article V debate”—in the Fortieth Congress about whether nationwide black suffrage could and should be achieved through a statute, a constitutional amendment, or both. As the first significant post-ratification discussion of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Article V debate provides valuable insights about the original public understandings of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments and the distinction between civil and political rights.

The Article V debate reveals that the Radical Republicans’ initial proposal for nationwide black suffrage included both …

The Democracy Ratchet, Derek T. Muller

Indiana Law Journal

This Article proceeds in five Parts. Part I identifies recent instances in which federal courts have invoked a version of the Democracy Ratchet. It identifies the salient traits of the Democracy Ratchet in these cases. Part II describes why the Democracy Ratchet has gained attention, primarily as a tactic of litigants and as a convenient benchmark in preliminary injunction cases. Part III examines the history of the major federal causes of action concerning election administration—Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, the Burdick balancing test, and the Equal Protection Clause. In each, it traces the path of the doctrine to …

Let All Voters Vote: Independents And The Expansion Of Voting Rights In The United States, Jeremy Gruber, Michael A. Hardy, Harry Kresky

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

A New Voting Rights Act For A New Century: How Liberalizing The Voting Rights Act’S Bailout Provisions Can Help Pass The Voting Rights Advancement Act Of 2017, Mario Q. Fitzgerald

Brooklyn Law Review

The U.S. Supreme Court struck down the coverage formula of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) in Shelby County. v. Holder in 2013. Members of Congress have attempted to renew the VRA with an updated coverage formula through the Voting Rights Advancement Acts of 2015 and of 2017. Unfortunately, Congressional Republicans have not supported either bill. Even if passed in its current form, the Supreme Court is likely to strike down the Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2017 (VRAA) for violating the principle of “equal sovereignty between the States” as set forth by the Court in Shelby County. Therefore, this note …

Did The African-American Electorate Unintentionally Help Elect Donald Trump President?, C. Daniel Chill

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Undocumented Citizens Of The United States: The Repercussions Of Denying Birth Certificates, Anna L. Lichtenberger

St. Mary's Law Journal

Abstract forthcoming

The Post-Crawford Rise In Voter Id Laws: A Solution Still In Search Of A Problem, David M. Faherty

Maine Law Review

In Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, the Supreme Court upheld Indiana’s voter identification law, which required registered voters to present government-issued photo identification at the polls. Instead of applying heighted scrutiny to a law that had an effect on voter qualifications, the Court simply balanced the asserted state interest of protecting the integrity and reliability of elections by preventing voter fraud against the burden imposed on eligible voters who were prevented from voting because they did not possess the required form of photo identification. Not persuaded by the fact that Indiana could not point to a single instance of …

Shelby County V. Holder And The Voting Rights Act: Getting The Right Answer With The Wrong Standard, Michael James Burns

Catholic University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Native Hawaiians And The Ceded Lands Trust: Applying Self-Determination As An Alternative To The Equal Protection Analysis, R. Hōkūlei Lindsey

American Indian Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Latest Phase Of Negro Disfranchisement [1912 Reprint From The Harvard Law Review], Julien C. Monnet

Oklahoma Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reinforcing Representation: Congressional Power To Enforce The Fourteenth And Fifteenth Amendments In The Rehnquist And Waite Courts, Ellen D. Katz

Michigan Law Review

A large body of academic scholarship accuses the Rehnquist Court of "undoing the Second Reconstruction," just as the Waite Court has long been blamed for facilitating the end of the First. This critique captures much of what is meant by those generally charging the Rehnquist Court with "conservative judicial activism." It posits that the present Court wants to dismantle decades' worth of federal antidiscrimination measures that are aimed at the "reconstruction" of public and private relationships at the local level. It sees the Waite Court as having similarly nullified the civil-rights initiatives enacted by Congress following the Civil War to …

Sexualized Racism/Gendered Violence: Outraging The Body Politic In The Reconstruction South, Lisa Cardyn

Michigan Law Review

From its establishment in the months following the Civil War by a motley assortment of disgruntled former rebels, the first Ku Klux Klan, like its many vigilante counterparts, employed terror to realize its invidious social and political aspirations. This terror assumed disparate shapes - from the storied nightriding of disguised bands on horseback, to cryptic threats, horrific assaults, and, not infrequently, murder. While students of Reconstruction have considered many facets of klan violence, none to date has focused exclusively on sexual violence in its historical specificity. Yet, as the work of Catherine Clinton, Laura Edwards, and Martha Hodes persuasively demonstrates, …

Civil Rights - Legislation - The Civil Rights Act Of 1957, Thomas R. Winquist S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

It is the purpose of this comment to note the nature of the prior legislation in the civil rights area, the provisions of the new act and the effect of the new act upon civil rights protection.

Constitutional Law - Civil Rights - Right Of Negro To Vote In State Primary Elections, John C. Hall S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

The Jaybird Democratic Association was formed in Fort Bend County, Texas, in 1889. Membership was open to all white voters in the county. The association was not governed by the state statute regulating political parties. Candidates nominated by the Jaybird Party entered the Democratic county primary as individuals, not as Jaybird candidates, but those candidates won both the Democratic primary and the general election with only one exception in the entire history of the Jaybird Party. Terry, a Negro, sought a declaratory judgment and injunction permitting Negroes to vote in the Jaybird primary. The federal district court ruled that the …

Constitutional Law - Discrimination Against Negroes - Control Of Party Membership, Everett S. Brown

Michigan Law Review

The petitioner, R. R. Grovey, allegedly a citizen of the United States and of Texas, and possessing all the qualifications of a voter, was refused a ballot for a Democratic party primary because he was of the Negro race. Grovey demanded ten dollars damages from the respondent, Albert Townsend, the county clerk, a state officer. The Revised Civil Statutes of Texas provide for primary elections and regulate absentee voting. When Grovey demanded of Townsend an absentee ballot it was refused in virtue of a resolution of the state Democratic convention of Texas, adopted May 24, 1932, as follows:

"Be it …

Primary Elections And The Constitution, Luther Harris Evans

Michigan Law Review

Recent attempts in Texas and elsewhere to exclude Negro voters from primary elections reveal the unsettled state of constitutional law in this field. Two struggles of principle, individualism versus police power and States' rights versus nationalism, are outlined in the judicial opinions reviewed below under the following headings: (I) Basis of state power over primaries; (II) Limitations on state power over primaries imposed by the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments; (III) Basis of state power over primaries for nominating United States Senators and Representatives; and (IV) Basis of national power over primaries for nominating United States Senators and Representatives.