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Full-Text Articles in Law and Race

There Are No Racists Here: The Rise Of Racial Extremism, When No One Is Racist, Jeannine Bell Sep 2015

There Are No Racists Here: The Rise Of Racial Extremism, When No One Is Racist, Jeannine Bell

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

At first glance hate murders appear wholly anachronistic in post-racial America. This Article suggests otherwise. The Article begins by analyzing the periodic expansions of the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the protection for racist expression in First Amendment doctrine. The Article then contextualizes the case law by providing evidence of how the First Amendment works on the ground in two separate areas —the enforcement of hate crime law and on university campuses that enact speech codes. In these areas, those using racist expression receive full protection for their beliefs. Part III describes social spaces—social media and employment where slurs and epithets …


Bias Crime Legislation: A Constitutional Rebuttal To Sticks And Stones . . ., Diana M. Torres Jul 2015

Bias Crime Legislation: A Constitutional Rebuttal To Sticks And Stones . . ., Diana M. Torres

Akron Law Review

In a recent article, Susan Gellman of the Ohio bar provides perhaps the clearest and most persuasive arguments against these statutes both on constitutional and policy grounds. 5 This paper is, in many respects, a response to her arguments. It will first briefly discuss the need for bias crime legislation. It will then address the various forms of such statutes and respond to the constitutional objections of vagueness, overbreadth and infringement on free speech as set forth in Gellman's article. The paper will analogize the statutes to civil rights and anti-discrimination legislation and the principles behind sentencing discretion. Finally, the …


Teaching Free Speech From An Incomplete Fossil Record, Michael Kent Curtis Jul 2015

Teaching Free Speech From An Incomplete Fossil Record, Michael Kent Curtis

Akron Law Review

The second part of this symposium has been devoted to how we teach the Constitution. It has emphasized what gets left out. The reader will see a pattern. Paul Finkelman is a leading scholar on the law of slavery and the Constitution. Paul thinks – and I believe he is correct – that the immense influence of slavery on American constitutional law is too often neglected in our constitutional law courses. James Wilson has studied how political philosophers – Aristotle, Rousseau, James Harrington, and others – have understood the distribution of wealth as a central factor affecting how the constitution …


Restricting Hate Speech Against Private Figures: Lessons In Power-Based Censorship From Defamation Law, Victor C. Romero May 2015

Restricting Hate Speech Against Private Figures: Lessons In Power-Based Censorship From Defamation Law, Victor C. Romero

Victor C. Romero

This article examines the debate between those who favor greater protection for minorities vulnerable to hate speech and First Amendment absolutists who are skeptical of any burdens on pure speech. The author also provides another perspective on the debate by highlighting the "public/private figure" distinction as an area within First Amendment law that acknowledges differences in power, a construct anti-hate speech advocates should use to further their cause. Specifically, the author places the "public/private figure" division in a theoretical and historical context and then provides empirical support for the thesis that whites enjoy a more prominent societal role and greater …


A Presumption Of Disclosure: Towards Greater Transparency In Asylum Proceedings, Rose Linton Apr 2015

A Presumption Of Disclosure: Towards Greater Transparency In Asylum Proceedings, Rose Linton

Seattle University Law Review

Every day, Asylum Officers (AOs) and Immigration Judges (IJs) hear cases to determine if the asylum seeker has a genuine claim to protection under the Refugee Act, which prohibits returning a refugee to a country where her life or freedom is threatened due to race, religion, political opinion, nationality, or membership in a particular social group. AOs and IJs are aware that their decision may mean life or death for an asylum seeker. They are also aware that false claims are “distressingly common,” that unscrupulous attorneys and unauthorized practitioners of immigration law have perpetrated fraudulent asylum schemes, and that granting …


Cross-Racial Misidentification: A Call To Action In Washington State And Beyond, Taki V, Flevaris, Ellie F. Chapman Apr 2015

Cross-Racial Misidentification: A Call To Action In Washington State And Beyond, Taki V, Flevaris, Ellie F. Chapman

Seattle University Law Review

Research indicates eyewitness identifications are incorrect approximately one-third of the time in criminal investigations. For years, this phenomenon has significantly contributed to wrongful convictions all over the country, including in Washington State. But jurors, attorneys, and police remain unaware of the nature and extent of the problem and continue to give undue weight to eyewitness evidence. Experts have estimated that approximately 5,000–10,000 felony convictions in the United States each year are wrongful, and research suggests that approximately 75% of wrongful convictions involve eyewitness misidentification. The phenomenon of eyewitness misidentification is also amplified and most troublesome in the context of cross-racial …


New York Times V. Sullivan And The Rhetorics Of Race: A Look At The Briefs, Oral Arguments, And Opinions, Carlo A. Pedrioli Jan 2015

New York Times V. Sullivan And The Rhetorics Of Race: A Look At The Briefs, Oral Arguments, And Opinions, Carlo A. Pedrioli

Carlo A. Pedrioli

Given the strife of the Civil Rights Movement that surrounded the case, this article looks back at the use of race in New York Times v. Sullivan. Specifically, the article examines how the advocates, led by Herbert Wechsler for the Times, I. H. Wachtel, William Rogers, and Samuel Pierce for the four ministers, and Roland Nachman for Sullivan, dealt with race in their rhetorics to the Court, both in their merits briefs and their oral arguments, and also how the justices used race in their opinions. Although Justice William Brennan did not explicitly focus on race in his opinion for …


“Something Wicked This Way Comes”: Political Correctness And The Reincarnation Of Chairman Mao, David Barnhizer Jan 2015

“Something Wicked This Way Comes”: Political Correctness And The Reincarnation Of Chairman Mao, David Barnhizer

David Barnhizer

Mao’s Red Guards and the “Wicked Wisdom” of Lesley Gore There could not possibly be any parallel between the actions of Mao Tse Tung’s young Red Guard zealots and the intensifying demands of identity groups that all people must conform to their version of approved linguistic expression or in effect be condemned as “reactionaries” and “counter-revolutionaries” who are clearly “on the wrong side of history”. Nor, in demanding that they be allowed to effectively take over the university and its curriculum while staffing faculty and administrative positions with people who think like them while others are subjected to “re-education” sessions …


Post-Katrina Suppression Of Black Working-Class Political Expression, Taunya L. Banks Jan 2015

Post-Katrina Suppression Of Black Working-Class Political Expression, Taunya L. Banks

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.