Law and Race Commons^™

Racial Targets, Atinuke O. Adediran

Northwestern University Law Review

It is common scholarly and popular wisdom that racial quotas are illegal. However, the reality is that since 2020’s racial reckoning, many of the largest companies have been touting specific, albeit voluntary, goals to hire or promote people of color, which this Article refers to as “racial targets.” The Article addresses this phenomenon and shows that companies can defend racial targets as distinct from racial quotas, which involve a rigid number or proportion of opportunities reserved exclusively for minority groups. The political implications of the legal defensibility of racial targets are significant in this moment in American history, where race …

Champions For Justice 2024, Roger Williams University School Of Law

School of Law Conferences, Lectures & Events

No abstract provided.

Prior Racist Acts And The Character Evidence Ban In Hate Crime Prosecutions, Paul F. Rothstein, Ronald J. Coleman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The killing of unarmed African-American Ahmaud Arbery and others ignited a wave of public outrage and re-focused attention on race and the criminal justice system. During the recent federal hate crimes proceedings for Arbery’s death, the prosecution introduced evidence relating to the alleged past racist acts of the defendants. This type of evidence may be seen as highly probative and desperately needed to do justice in hate crimes cases. On its face, however, such type of evidence appears to be inadmissible owing to the well-known—but little understood— evidentiary ban on character evidence prescribed in Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b) and …

Lethal Immigration Enforcement, Abel Rodríguez

Faculty Publications

Increasingly, U.S. immigration law and policy perpetuate death. As more people become displaced globally, death provides a measurable indicator of the level of racialized violence inflicted on migrants of color. Because of Clinton-era policies continued today, deaths at the border have reached unprecedented rates, with more than two migrant deaths per day. A record 853 border crossers died last year, and the deadliest known transporting incident took place in June 2022, with fifty-one lives lost. In addition, widespread neglect continues to cause loss of life in immigration detention, immigration enforcement agents kill migrants with virtual impunity, and immigration law ensures …

Law School News: For 30 Years: A Justice-Centered Mission 12-19-2023, Helga Melgar

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Haiti’S Legal Claim For Restitution: The Political Context For The Recovery Of The Double-Debt, Ira J. Kurzban

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

This article discusses Haiti’s efforts to seek restitution from France for the “Double-Debt” imposed in 1825. After Haiti gained independence in 1804 following a slave revolt, France threatened to invade and re-enslave the Haitian people if they did not pay compensation to French slave owners for their lost “property.” This became known as the Double-Debt, as French and American banks profited by converting the debt into high-interest loans. In 2003, on the 200th anniversary of Haitian hero Toussaint Louverture’s death, Haiti’s president Jean-Bertrand Aristide announced his intention to demand repayment from France. This sparked retaliation from France and Haiti’s elite, …

Redress For Historical Injustices: Haiti’S Claim For The Restitution Of Post-Independence Payments To France, Günther Handl

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

No abstract provided.

Restitution For Haiti, Reparations For All: Haiti’S Place In The Global Reparations Movement, Brian Concannon Jr., Kristina Fried, Alexandra V. Filippova

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

Haiti’s claim for restitution of the debt coerced by France in exchange for Haiti’s 1804 independence has unique legal advantages that can open the door to broader reparations for the descendants of all people harmed by slavery. But in order to assert the claim, Haiti first needs help reclaiming its democracy from a corrupt, repressive regime propped up by the powerful countries that prospered through slavery and overthrew the Haitian President who dared to assert his country’s legal claim. This article explores Haiti’s Independence Debt, and the fight for restitution of it, in the context of two centuries of continued …

Haiti And The Indemnity Question, Alex Dupuy

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

1) Haiti did not agree to pay an indemnity to France in 1825 because it feared a war with its former colonial power. In 1814, France sent envoys to Haiti to demand that King Henry Christophe, who controlled the north of Haiti, and President Alexandre Pétion, who controlled the south and west, resubmit to French sovereignty. Christophe had that envoy arrested and jailed. Pétion, on the other hand, offered to pay an indemnity to France to compensate the former colonial property owners in return for France’s official recognition of Haiti’s independence.

2) Jean-Pierre Boyer succeeded Pétion as president of the …

The Lost Haitian Generation And The 1826 “French Debt”: The Case For Restitution To Haiti, Charlot Lucien

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

No abstract provided.

Haiti: Confronting An Immense Challenge, Irwin Stotzky

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

This article analyzes the history of Haiti, from its origins as a slave colony of France, which was the richest colony in the Americas, to its war of independence leading to the first Black independent nation in the Americas, to its economic re-enslavement under the power of France and then the United States. The article discusses the great harm the French caused the Haitian people by imposing through force a ransom of billions of dollars that has led Haiti to its present position of being on the brink of becoming a failed state, with all of the disastrous consequences for …

Haiti And The Burden Of History, Frédérique Beauvois

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

No abstract provided.

Learning To Do Good While Doing Well 11-2023, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Religious Liberty, Discriminatory Intent, And The Conservative Constitution, Luke Boso

Utah Law Review

The Supreme Court shocked the world at the end of its 2021–22 term by issuing landmark decisions ending constitutional protection for abortion rights, expanding gun rights, and weakening what remained of the wall between church and state. One thread uniting these cases that captured the public’s attention is the rhetoric common of originalism—a backwards-looking theory of constitutional interpretation focused on founding-era meaning and intent. This Article identifies the discriminatory intent doctrine as another powerful tool the Court is using to protect the social norms and hierarchies of a bygone era, and to build a conservative Constitution.

Discriminatory intent rose to …

What Do We Do With You: How The United States Uses Racial-Gendered Immigrant Labor To Inform Its Immigrant Inclusion-Exclusion Cycle, Tori Delaney

University of Cincinnati Law Review

No abstract provided.

Race Ethics: Colorblind Formalism And Color-Coded Pragmatism In Lawyer Regulation, Anthony V. Alfieri

Articles

The recent, high-profile civil and criminal trials held in the aftermath of the George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery murders, the Kyle Rittenhouse killings, and the Charlottesville "Unite the Right" Rally violence renew debate over race, representation, and ethics in the U.S. civil and criminal justice systems. For civil rights lawyers, prosecutors, and criminal defense attorneys, neither the progress of post-war civil rights movements and criminal justice reform campaigns nor the advance of Critical Race Theory and social movement scholarship have resolved the debate over the use of race in pretrial, trial, and appellate advocacy, and in the lawyering process more …

Law School News: Dean Bowman On The Scotus Admissions Decision 6-29-2023, Gregory W. Bowman

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Ochoa, Big Ten Law Deans Pledge Support For Diversity Ahead Of Scotus Affirmative Action Ruling, The Indiana Lawyer

Christiana Ochoa (7/22-10/22 Acting; 11/2022-)

s the U.S. Supreme Court prepares to hand down a decision that could fundamentally alter affirmative action, a group of law school deans — including Dean Christiana Ochoa of the Indiana University Maurer School of Law — has issued a statement affirming the deans’ commitment to diversity.

The group of 15 deans represent Big Ten law schools, including IU Maurer. In their statement — which IU Maurer posted to its official Facebook page — the deans say they are “joining together to affirm our commitment to advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion through legally permissible means, regardless of the outcome of …

Proving Intra-Racial Discrimination In The U.S. And Canada: The Room For Making The Artificial Distinction Between Genealogical Relatedness And Race, Martin Kwan

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

This article takes the role of the Devil’s advocate in order to question the judicial willingness to distinguish “race” from comparable notions. It suggests that, depending on the exact circumstances, a defendant can make an arguable case that the alleged intra–racial discrimination is motivated by perceived genealogical relatedness, but not because of belonging to the same “race.” Factually, the defendant claims to believe in being remotely genealogically related to the plaintiff. This is not unworthy of credence, because it is academically recognized that modern genealogy and root tracing can be an imaginative, forged exercise. Legally, this argument is supportable because …

Black And Blue Police Arbitration Reforms, Michael Z. Green

Faculty Scholarship

The racial justice protests that engulfed the country after seeing a video of the appalling killing of a Black male, George Floyd, by a Minnesota police officer in 2020 has led to a tremendous number of questions about dealing with racial issues in policing. Similar concerns arose a little more than fifty years ago when police unions gained power to respond to the civil rights protests occurring during those times by establishing strong protections for their officers in light of brutality claims. This rhythmic progression of protests and union responses is destined to continue without any lasting reforms focused on …

Law School News: Joyce And Bill Cummings Of Cummings Foundation To Deliver Keynote Address At Rwu Commencement 4-20-2023, Jill Rodrigues

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Pov: Yes, Filling Out The Race Box On Forms Is Tiresome, But Here’S Why It Matters, Jasmine Gonzales Rose, Neda Khoshkhoo

Shorter Faculty Works

Filling out your race and ethnicity on a form may feel tiresome, and even uncomfortable. You have been checking these boxes for years, as has everyone else, and the questions may seem irrelevant.

“What does race have to do with my doctor’s appointment?” you might ask. Or a form may be inaccurate: “I’m Middle Eastern, why don’t I get a box to check?” Perhaps it feels intrusive: “How is this information going to be used?” And you may wonder, “Why are we always talking about race?”

The truth is, we need to keep talking about race. Even more than we …

Sticky Situations: Understanding The Law And Life, Krystal Banks

National Youth Advocacy and Resilience Conference

Law and life go hand in hand. Understanding the law and how it connects to life can be an effective tool in teaching youth and adults the value of making good decisions when it comes to life and the law. Sticky Situations places real-world situations in the context of learning how to apply the law and effectively respond to life's sticky situations.

Towards An Understanding Of Critical Race Theory: Dispelling False Claims And Misrepresentations, Shiv Narayan Persaud

University of Massachusetts Law Review

The Article discusses critical race theory as a paradigm shift, and further dispels the notion that it promotes a form of Marxism. With the rise of political attitudes toward seeking legislation to denounce CRT, it is incumbent upon those in legal studies to investigate and bring the value of CRT into the forefront. The purpose of this Article is to open a new discussion on these issues, rooted in promoting cultural competency in the legal profession.

Law School News: Roger Williams University School Of Law Withdraws From Us News Rankings 1-17-2023, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Property And Sovereignty In America: A History Of Title Registries & Jurisdictional Power, K-Sue Park

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This Article tells an untold history of the American title registry—a colonial bureaucratic innovation that, though overlooked and understudied, constitutes one of the most fundamental elements of the U.S. property system today. Prior scholars have focused exclusively on its role in catalyzing property markets, while mostly ignoring their main sources in the colonies -- expropriated lands and enslaved people. This analysis centers the institution’s work of organizing and “proving” claims that were not only individual but collective, to affirm encroachments on tribal nations’ lands and scaffold colonies’ tenuous but growing political, jurisdictional power. In other words, American property and property …

Race, Space, And Place: Interrogating Whiteness Through A Critical Approach To Place, Keith H. Hirokawa

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

Drawing from George Lipsitz’s notion that whiteness is “not so much a color as a condition,” this Article embarks on the project of framing the manner and methods through which whiteness continues to dominate space and place. Wherever whiteness dominates space, space carries rules and expectations about the identity and characteristics of people who are present—visitors and jaunters, owners and occupiers—and the types of activities and cultural practices that might occur there. Occasionally, spaces are racialized because of intentional practices of discrimination and segregation. In others, less intentional methods produce racialized space. In both, American spaces tell their own histories …

Fighting For Whiteness In Ukraine, Marissa Jackson Sow

Law Faculty Publications

Teri McMurtry-Chubb’s Race Unequals: Overseer Contracts, White Masculinities, and the Formation of Managerial Identity in the Plantation Economy offers groundbreaking insights into the gendered economic hierarchies internal to the body politic of whiteness through its examination of the limitations that plantation overseers’ contracts in the American Deep South placed on their ability to exercise the proprietorship and contracting authority prerequisite to white identity. This Essay uses the Ukrainian campaign to be recognized as a liberal white nation, and formally become a member of the West, as a contemporary case study of how whiteness remains hegemonized and subject to the ability …

Hair Me Out: Why Discrimination Against Black Hair Is Race Discrimination Under Title Vii, Alexis Boyd

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

In May 2010, Chastity Jones sought employment as a customer service representative at Catastrophe Management Solutions (“CMS”), a claims processing company located in Mobile, Alabama. When asked for an inperson interview, Jones, a Black woman, arrived in a suit and her hair in “short dreadlocks,” or locs, a type of natural hairstyle common in the Black community. Despite being qualified for the position, Jones would later have her offer rescinded because of her hair. CMS claimed that locs “tend to get messy” and violated the “neutral” dress code and hair policy requiring employees to be “professional and business-like.” Therefore, CMS …

Two Approaches To Equality, With Implications For Grutter, Keith N. Hylton

Faculty Scholarship

The question “what is equality?”, applied to the distribution of resources across races, suggests the following answer: when there appears to be no need for a policy that focuses on improving the welfare of one race relative to another. There is another way to approach the same question: equality is when traditionally-recognized paths to advancement do not give preference to or disadvantage an individual because of his race. Notice the difference here is between end-state and process-based notions of equality, a distinction Nozick emphasized in his examination of justice in distribution. Nozick rejected end-state theories of justice in distribution. I …