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Articles 1 - 19 of 19
Full-Text Articles in Judges
The “Critical Stage” Of Plea-Bargaining And Disclosure Of Exculpatory Evidence, Gabriella Castellano
The “Critical Stage” Of Plea-Bargaining And Disclosure Of Exculpatory Evidence, Gabriella Castellano
NYLS Law Review
No abstract provided.
No, The Firing Squad Is Not Better Than Lethal Injection: A Response To Stephanie Moran’S A Modest Proposal, Michael Conklin
No, The Firing Squad Is Not Better Than Lethal Injection: A Response To Stephanie Moran’S A Modest Proposal, Michael Conklin
Seattle University Law Review
In the article A Modest Proposal: The Federal Government Should Use Firing Squads to Execute Federal Death Row Inmates, Stephanie Moran argues that the firing squad is the only execution method that meets the requirements of the Eighth Amendment. In order to make her case, Moran unjustifiably overstates the negative aspects of lethal injection while understating the negative aspects of firing squads. The entire piece is predicated upon assumptions that are not only unsupported by the evidence but often directly refuted by the evidence. This Essay critically analyzes Moran’s claims regarding the alleged advantages of the firing squad over …
Justice Sonia Sotomayor: The Court’S Premier Defender Of The Fourth Amendment, David L. Hudson Jr.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor: The Court’S Premier Defender Of The Fourth Amendment, David L. Hudson Jr.
Seattle University Law Review
This essay posits that Justice Sotomayor is the Court’s chief defender of the Fourth Amendment and the cherished values it protects. She has consistently defended Fourth Amendment freedoms—in majority, concurring, and especially in dissenting opinions. Part I recounts a few of her majority opinions in Fourth Amendment cases. Part II examines her concurring opinion in United States v. Jones. Part III examines several of her dissenting opinions in Fourth Amendment cases. A review of these opinions demonstrates what should be clear to any observer of the Supreme Court: Justice Sotomayor consistently defends Fourth Amendment principles and values.
Harmless Constitutional Error: How A Minor Doctrine Meant To Improve Judicial Efficiency Is Eroding America's Founding Ideals, Ross C. Reggio
Harmless Constitutional Error: How A Minor Doctrine Meant To Improve Judicial Efficiency Is Eroding America's Founding Ideals, Ross C. Reggio
CMC Senior Theses
The United States Constitution had been in existence for almost two hundred years before the Supreme Court decided that some violations of constitutional rights may be too insignificant to warrant remedial action. Known as "harmless error," this statutory doctrine allows a court to affirm a conviction when a mere technicality or minor defect did not affect the defendant's substantial rights. The doctrine aims to promote judicial efficiency and judgment finality. The Court first applied harmless error to constitutional violations by shifting the statutory test away from the error's effect on substantial rights to its impact on the jury's verdict. Over …
The High Price Of Poverty: A Study Of How The Majority Of Current Court System Procedures For Collecting Court Costs And Fees, As Well As Fines, Have Failed To Adhere To Established Precedent And The Constitutional Guarantees They Advocate., Trevor J. Calligan
Trevor J Calligan
No abstract provided.
The Not So Great Writ: Constitution Lite For State Prisoners, Ursula Bentele
The Not So Great Writ: Constitution Lite For State Prisoners, Ursula Bentele
Ursula Bentele
Examination of the universe of cases in which the Supreme Court has recently reversed grants of federal habeas relief by circuit courts by issuing summary, per curiam opinions reveals some disturbing patterns. Substantively, the opinions continue the Court’s narrow interpretation of what law has been so clearly established that state courts must abide by its constitutional principles. Moreover, any rejection of a constitutional claim must be upheld unless there is no possibility that fairminded jurists could disagree with that determination. In terms of process, the summary reversals are issued in response to petitions for review by wardens, when the petitioners …
Immigrants Unshackled: The Unconstitutional Use Of Indiscriminate Restraints, Fatma E. Marouf
Immigrants Unshackled: The Unconstitutional Use Of Indiscriminate Restraints, Fatma E. Marouf
Fatma E Marouf
This Article challenges the constitutionality of indiscriminately restraining civil immigration detainees during removal proceedings. Not only are immigration detainees routinely placed in handcuffs, leg irons, and belly chains without any individualized determination of the need for restraints, but Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the prosecuting party, makes the decisions about the use of restraints, rather than the judge. After examining the rationale for the well-established prohibition against the indiscriminate use of restraints during criminal and civil jury trials, and discussing how some courts have extended this rationale to bench trials, this Article contends that ICE’s practice violates substantive and procedural …
Juvenile Justice Reform 2.0, Tamar R. Birckhead
Juvenile Justice Reform 2.0, Tamar R. Birckhead
Tamar R Birckhead
Before the 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education, the United States Supreme Court’s exercise of judicial review did not support the notion that constitutional litigation could be an effective instrument of social reform. The Court’s principled rejection of racially segregated public education, however, gave new legitimacy to the concept of judicial review, transforming it from an obstacle into a principal means of achieving social progress. Since then, federal courts have impacted public policy in many areas – from housing, welfare, and transportation to mental health institutions, prisons, and juvenile courts. Yet, there are inherent structural challenges to effecting …
Interrogation Of Detainees: Extending A Hand Or A Boot?, Amos N. Guiora
Interrogation Of Detainees: Extending A Hand Or A Boot?, Amos N. Guiora
ExpressO
The so called “war on terror” provides the Bush administration with a unique opportunity to both establish clear guidelines for the interrogation of detainees and to make a forceful statement about American values. How the government chooses to act can promote either an ethical commitment to the norms of civil society, or an attitude analogous to Toby Keith’s “American Way,” where Keith sings that “you’ll be sorry that you messed with the USofA, ‘Cuz we’ll put a boot in your ass, It’s the American Way.”
No aspect of the “war on terrorism” more clearly addresses this balance than coercive interrogation. …
A Complete Property Right Amendment, John H. Ryskamp
A Complete Property Right Amendment, John H. Ryskamp
ExpressO
The trend of the eminent domain reform and "Kelo plus" initiatives is toward a comprehensive Constitutional property right incorporating the elements of level of review, nature of government action, and extent of compensation. This article contains a draft amendment which reflects these concerns.
Herding Bullfrogs Towards A More Balanced Wheelbarrow: An Illustrative Recommendation For Federal Sentencing Post-Booker, Brian R. Gallini, Emily Q. Shults
Herding Bullfrogs Towards A More Balanced Wheelbarrow: An Illustrative Recommendation For Federal Sentencing Post-Booker, Brian R. Gallini, Emily Q. Shults
ExpressO
The Article argues in favor of shifting the balance in federal sentencing toward a more indeterminate system. By exploring the post-Booker legal landscape at both the federal and state levels, the Article asserts that the judiciary's continued reliance on the “advisory" Guidelines has practically changed federal sentencing procedures very little in form or function. Accordingly, the Article proffers that, rather than insisting upon the Guidelines' immutability, federal sentencing would do well to reflect upon its own history, and the evolution of its state counterparts.
Searches & The Misunderstood History Of Suspicion & Probable Cause: Part One, Fabio Arcila
Searches & The Misunderstood History Of Suspicion & Probable Cause: Part One, Fabio Arcila
ExpressO
This article, the first of a two-part series, argues that during the Framers’ era many if not most judges believed they could issue search warrants without independently assessing the adequacy of probable cause, and that this view persisted even after the Fourth Amendment became effective. This argument challenges the leading originalist account of the Fourth Amendment, which Professor Thomas Davies published in the Michigan Law Review in 1999.
The focus in this first article is upon an analysis of the common law and how it reflected the Fourth Amendment’s restrictions. Learned treatises in particular, and to a lesser extent a …
Bond Repudiation, Tax Codes, The Appropriations Process And Restitution Post-Eminent Domain Reform, John H. Ryskamp
Bond Repudiation, Tax Codes, The Appropriations Process And Restitution Post-Eminent Domain Reform, John H. Ryskamp
ExpressO
This brief comment suggests where the anti-eminent domain movement might be heading next.
Mixed Messages: The Supreme Court’S Conflicting Decisions On Juries In Death Penalty Cases, Ken Miller, David Niven
Mixed Messages: The Supreme Court’S Conflicting Decisions On Juries In Death Penalty Cases, Ken Miller, David Niven
ExpressO
The right to a jury determination of a capital defendant's fate has expanded recently. The era of judges making factual determinations then determining whether to apply a death sentence or judges having the power to overrule a jury's life sentence to impose death is over. The expanded right to access a jury and have it hold determinative power over a defendant's life has not, however, been accompanied by commensurate attention to the instructions that guide those jurors through the applicable law toward their verdict. Nor have adequate procedures been designed to produce a truly representative jury panel. In brief, the …
Review Essay: Using All Available Information, Max Huffman
Review Essay: Using All Available Information, Max Huffman
ExpressO
This is a review essay entitled “Using All Available Information,” in which I review and comment on Justice Stephen Breyer’s new book, Active Liberty: Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution, published in September 2005. Justice Breyer’s book, adapted from the Tanner Lectures given in 2005 at Harvard Law School, serves partly as a response to Justice Scalia’s 1997 volume A Matter of Interpretation: Federal Courts and the Law. I review Justice Breyer’s book in part by comparison to and contrast with Justice Scalia’s. I propose that much about Justice Breyer’s interpretive philosophy, which centers on determining the “purposes” of texts and interpreting …
Breaking The Bank: Revisiting Central Bank Of Denver After Enron And Sarbanes-Oxley, Celia Taylor
Breaking The Bank: Revisiting Central Bank Of Denver After Enron And Sarbanes-Oxley, Celia Taylor
ExpressO
No abstract provided.
Book Review: Forensic Linguistics, Dru Stevenson
Book Review: Forensic Linguistics, Dru Stevenson
ExpressO
Review of John Gibbons' text "Forensic Linguistics"
'You'd Better Be Good': Congressional Threats Of Removal Against Federal Judges, Marc O. Degirolami
'You'd Better Be Good': Congressional Threats Of Removal Against Federal Judges, Marc O. Degirolami
ExpressO
In the attached article, I argue that congressional threats of removal against federal judges are increasing in prevalence and forcefulness and that as a result the strained relationship between the judiciary and Congress – a topic of recent attention and debate – will continue to deteriorate in the coming years. I examine two bills, the Feeney Amendment to the PROTECT Act and House of Representatives Resolution 568 (in which Congress would disavow citation in judicial decisions to foreign law), to demonstrate this thesis.
I next ask what explains the phenomenon of congressional threats of removal, deploying first Thomas Hobbes’ state-of-nature …
Contaminating The Verdict: The Problem Of Juror Misconduct, Bennett L. Gershman
Contaminating The Verdict: The Problem Of Juror Misconduct, Bennett L. Gershman
ExpressO
No abstract provided.