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Social Welfare Law Commons

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Articles 1 - 15 of 15

Full-Text Articles in Social Welfare Law

Women In Shareholder Activism, Sarah C. Haan Jan 2023

Women In Shareholder Activism, Sarah C. Haan

Seattle University Law Review

Even a cursory review of the history of American environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) shareholder activism reveals the presence of women leaders. This Article sketches some of this history and interrogates the role of women in the shareholder activism movement. That movement typically has involved claims by minority shareholders to corporate power; activists are nearly always on the margins of power, though minority shareholders may, collectively, represent a majority interest. This Article ascribes women’s leadership in shareholder activism to their longstanding position as outsiders to corporate organization. Women’s participation in shaping corporate policy—even from the margins—has provided women with …


The Thirteenth Amendment At The Intersection Of Class And Gender: Robertson V. Baldwin’S Exclusion Of Infants, Lunatics, Women, And Seamen, James Gray Pope May 2016

The Thirteenth Amendment At The Intersection Of Class And Gender: Robertson V. Baldwin’S Exclusion Of Infants, Lunatics, Women, And Seamen, James Gray Pope

Seattle University Law Review

In Robertson v. Baldwin, the Supreme Court held that merchant seamen under contract could be legally compelled to work notwithstanding the Thirteenth Amendment’s prohibition on slavery and involuntary servitude. According to the Court, seamen were “deficient in that full and intelligent responsibility for their acts which is accredited to ordinary adults,” and therefore could—along with children and wards—be deprived of liberty. Over the past few years, however, several courts have applied statutory bans on “involuntary servitude” and “forced labor” (a “species of involuntary servitude”) to protect women and children in domestic settings. These cases suggest that Robertson’s categorical exclusion is …


Flourishing Rights, Wendy A. Bach Apr 2015

Flourishing Rights, Wendy A. Bach

Michigan Law Review

There is something audacious at the heart of Clare Huntington’s Failure to Flourish. She insists that the state exists to ensure that families flourish. Not just that they survive, or not starve, or be able, somehow, to make ends meet—but that they flourish. She demands this not just for some families but, importantly, for all families. This simple, bold, and profoundly countercultural demand allows Huntington to make a tremendously convincing case that the state can begin to do precisely that. Failure to Flourish is a brave, rigorously produced, carefully researched, and politically astute book. Huntington seeks to persuade a wide …


Addressing The Tension Between The Dual Identities Of The American Prostitute: Criminal And Victim; How Problem-Solving Courts Can Help, Brynn N.H. Jacobson Sep 2014

Addressing The Tension Between The Dual Identities Of The American Prostitute: Criminal And Victim; How Problem-Solving Courts Can Help, Brynn N.H. Jacobson

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment focuses on the sexual exploitation of both adult women and girls in the life of prostitution. The primary purpose is to explore the difficulties faced by American citizens who are exploited in prostitution (as opposed to foreign nationals who are subject to exploitation). This Comment focuses only on state and local prostitution laws, as opposed to global or federal laws on prostitution. It takes the position that prostitution is not a chosen profession for the vast majority and that prostitution is sexual exploitation. This Comment discusses the experiment of legalization and decriminalization in the Netherlands and Sweden as …


Rights Of Belonging For Women, Rebecca E. Zietlow Jun 2013

Rights Of Belonging For Women, Rebecca E. Zietlow

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.


Migration, Development, And The Promise Of Cedaw For Rural Women, Lisa R. Pruitt Jan 2009

Migration, Development, And The Promise Of Cedaw For Rural Women, Lisa R. Pruitt

Michigan Journal of International Law

Part I of this Essay provides an overview of the rural-to-urban migration phenomenon, a trend the author calls the urban juggernaut. This Part includes a discussion of forces compelling the migration, and it also considers consequences for those who are left behind when their family members and neighbors migrate to cities. Part II explores women's roles in food production in the developing world, and it considers the extent to which international development efforts encourage or entail urbanization. Part III attends to the potential of human rights for this population, analyzing the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination …


Dependency By Law: Poverty, Identity, And Welfare Privatization, Frank Munger Jul 2006

Dependency By Law: Poverty, Identity, And Welfare Privatization, Frank Munger

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

Privatization of welfare reflects the political pressure to limit public responsibility for protection of social citizenship. Recent welfare reforms incorporate three classic market-like privatization mechanisms--contracting out services forcing allocation of a limited pool of benefits, and deregulation. Deregulation entails strategic diversion and disqualification of large numbers of would-be applicants who are left without alternatives to the labor market. In this article I discuss an empirical study of the effects of deregulation of welfare on the self-perceptions of recipients. Interviews with recipients and with low-wage health care workers, former recipients, show that, criticisms of welfare notwithstanding, they have embraced welfare reform's …


Whatever Happened To G.I. Jane?: Citizenship, Gender, And Social Policy In The Postwar Era, Melissa E. Murray Jan 2002

Whatever Happened To G.I. Jane?: Citizenship, Gender, And Social Policy In The Postwar Era, Melissa E. Murray

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

In this Article, it is argued that the GI Bill is consistent with the social welfare policies of the New Deal period, in particular the Social Security Act of 1935, and so should be examined within the analytical framework established by scholars like Linda Gordon and Theda Skocpol in their studies of the Social Security Act's social welfare programs. Although the Bill is gender-neutral on its face, it was framed by normative assumptions about military participation and work that ensured that it was socially understood to benefit male veterans.


The Sexual Regulation Dimension Of Contemporary Welfare Law: A Fifty State Overview, Anna Marie Smith Jan 2002

The Sexual Regulation Dimension Of Contemporary Welfare Law: A Fifty State Overview, Anna Marie Smith

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

In this article, Smith will attempt to demonstrate that welfare policy has become a prominent site of sexual regulation; that the rights of poor single mothers are at stake in this respect; and that given the precise structure of contemporary American welfare reform, we must pay especially close attention to the laws and regulations adopted at the state level. First, Smith will place contemporary sexual regulation-oriented welfare law in an historical context by considering its precedents in English and American public policy traditions (Part I). Using original qualitative analyses of the states' statutory codes and administrative regulations, Smith will then …


Weaving A Safety Net: Poor Women, Welfare, And Work In The Chicken And Catfish Industries, Sherrilyn A. Ifill Jan 2001

Weaving A Safety Net: Poor Women, Welfare, And Work In The Chicken And Catfish Industries, Sherrilyn A. Ifill

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.


A Case For Pregnancy-Based Unemployment Insurance, Mark R. Brown Jan 1996

A Case For Pregnancy-Based Unemployment Insurance, Mark R. Brown

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Professor Brown argues that unemployment insurance laws should be amended to provide coverage to otherwise eligible, pregnant claimants. Under current law, women who quit because of pregnancy are either disqualified from receiving unemployment benefits altogether or qualify only after childbirth. Those who are fired, meanwhile, often either cannot prove the motivation for their discharge or discover that they are disqualified because of their unavailability for work. Professor Brown uses a case study to illustrate the problems posed by pregnancy and unemployment insurance. He proposes model legislation that extends coverage to all pregnant claimants who temporarily separate from their employment.


The Two-Parent Family In The Liberal State: The Case For Selective Subsidies, Amy L. Wax Jan 1996

The Two-Parent Family In The Liberal State: The Case For Selective Subsidies, Amy L. Wax

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

This Article seeks to explore in a preliminary way some questions that would be raised by the adoption of such a program. The initial issue raised by the proposal is: does the government ever have any legitimate business favoring some family forms over others? The first-pass answer would appear to be "yes." The law recognizes marriage, restricts it to persons of the opposite sex (at least for now), and confers upon married couples comparative rights and privileges-although fewer than have been enjoyed in the past. The more difficult questions are: what exactly is the nature of the government's interest in …


Stepping Into The Projects: Lawmaking, Storytelling, And Practicing The Politics Of Identification, Lisa A. Crooms Jan 1996

Stepping Into The Projects: Lawmaking, Storytelling, And Practicing The Politics Of Identification, Lisa A. Crooms

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

In her article, "The Black Community," Its Lawbreakers, and a Politics of Identification, Professor Regina Austin proposes a paradigm to move the Black community beyond a "manifestation of a nostalgic longing for a time when blacks were clearly distinguishable from whites and concern about the welfare of the poor was more natural than our hairdos.” Austin's politics of identification provides the conceptual framework through which the Black community can reconstitute itself in accordance with its own principles, which may or may not be those embraced by the mainstream. This article considers Professor Regina Austin’s politics of identification as practiced by …


Pregnancy And Unemployment: Problems And Solutions?, Mark R. Brown Mar 1995

Pregnancy And Unemployment: Problems And Solutions?, Mark R. Brown

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Abstract for a piece in the 1995 Unemployment Compensation: Continuity and Change symposium presented by the Advisory Council on Unemployment Compensation and the University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform.


The Impact Of Public Abortion Funding Decisions On Lndigent Women: A Proposal To Reform State Statutory And Constitutional Abortion Funding Provisions, Carole A. Corns Jan 1991

The Impact Of Public Abortion Funding Decisions On Lndigent Women: A Proposal To Reform State Statutory And Constitutional Abortion Funding Provisions, Carole A. Corns

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Note argues that state legislatures should relax funding restrictions on abortions for indigent women and proposes specific mechanisms to ensure the equal protection of indigent women in the abortion context. Part I briefly recounts the history of federal funding for abortions, from the liberal post-Roe funding scheme to the restrictive funding arrangements that have prevailed since the early 1980s. Part II surveys the existing literature and discusses patterns of state funding and the impact of funding restrictions on indigent women seeking abortions. This literature shows that the tightening of state funding policies subsequent to the federal Medicaid restrictions has …