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Full-Text Articles in Social Welfare Law
The Thirteenth Amendment, Human Trafficking, And Hate Crimes, Jennifer Mason Mcaward
The Thirteenth Amendment, Human Trafficking, And Hate Crimes, Jennifer Mason Mcaward
Seattle University Law Review
The two most recent federal statutes passed pursuant to Congress’s Thirteenth Amendment enforcement power are the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA) and the Shepard-Byrd Hate Crimes Act of 2009. While the Thirteenth Amendment basis of the TVPA has never been questioned in court, the constitutionality of the Shepard-Byrd Act has been challenged (albeit unsuccessfully) in a series of recent cases. This Essay will consider this disparity and suggest that it tells us something about the parameters of the Thirteenth Amendment enforcement power. In particular, it suggests that congressional power is at its apex when the conduct regulated—like human …
A New Peonage?: Pay, Work, Or Go To Jail In Contemporary Child Support Enforcement And Beyond, Noah D. Zatz
A New Peonage?: Pay, Work, Or Go To Jail In Contemporary Child Support Enforcement And Beyond, Noah D. Zatz
Seattle University Law Review
Child support enforcement is one of several contemporary contexts in which the state threatens to incarcerate people if they fail to work. This symposium essay explores whether this practice violates the Thirteenth Amendment’s ban on involuntary servitude. At first glance, such threats fall squarely within the ambit of the early 20th century peonage cases. There, the Supreme Court struck down criminal enforcement of legal obligations to work off a debt. Several modern courts have declined to reach a similar conclusion when child support enforcement puts obligors to a choice between paying, working, and going to jail. To do so, these …