Digital Commons Network^™

Retrying Race, Anthony V. Alfieri

Michigan Law Review

This Essay investigates the renewed prosecution of long-dormant criminal and civil rights cases of white-on-black racial violence arising out of the 1950s and 1960s. The study is part of an ongoing project on race, lawyers, and ethics within the criminal-justice system. Framed by this larger project, the Essay explores the normative and sociolegal meaning of that resurgent prosecution. My hope in pursuing this inquiry is to better understand, and perhaps begin to refashion, the prosecutor's redemptive role in cases of racial violence. Both descriptive and prescriptive in nature, the inquiry addresses race in relation to law and community. Grappling with …

American Racial Jusice On Trial - Again: African American Reparations, Human Rights, And The War On Terror, Eric K. Yamamoto, Susan K. Serrano, Michelle Natividad Rodriguez

Michigan Law Review

Much has been written recently on African American reparations and reparations movements worldwide, both in the popular press and scholarly publications. Indeed, the expanding volume of writing underscores the impact on the public psyche of movements for reparations for historic injustice. Some of that writing has highlighted the legal obstacles faced by proponents of reparations lawsuits, particularly a judicial system that focuses on individual (and not group-based) claims and tends to squeeze even major social controversies into the narrow litigative paradigm of a two-person auto collision (requiring proof of standing, duty, breach, causation, and direct injury). Other writings detail the …

Cleansing Moments And Retrospective Justice, Margaret M. Russell

Michigan Law Review

We live in an era of questioning and requestioning long-held assumptions about the role of race in law, both in criminal prosecutions specifically and in the legal process generally. Certainly, the foundational framework is not new; for decades, both legal literature and jurisprudence have explored in great detail the realities of racism in the legal system. Even among those who might prefer to ignore the role of race discrimination in more than two centuries of American law, denial is no longer a viable or intellectually defensible option. Rather, debate now centers upon whether or not the extensive history of American …

Living "Off-Stage": The Semiotic Potential Of Narrative In Paula Johnson's Inner Lives: Voices Of African-American Women In Prison, Emily Houh

Faculty Articles and Other Publications

The hopelessness and hopefulness in the voices of the women profiled in Inner Lives exemplify a semiotic response to the racism that permeates the criminal justice and prison systems in the United States. This article asks how, in the telling of their stories and living of their lives, the incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women profiled in the book engage in a working semiotics. The extraordinary thing about the narratives collected by Johnson is that they describe how women who have been placed at the very bottom of the American social consciousness are successfully constructing their own image-repertoires rather than accepting …

Statutory Limitations On Civil Rights Of People With Criminal Records, Debbie A. Mukamal, Paul N. Samuels

Fordham Urban Law Journal

State and federal statutory restrictions limit the civil rights of individuals with criminal records and create a barrier to reentry into society. The article explores eight specific areas of restriction: (1) ability to obtain employment, (2) eligibility for public housing, (3) eligibility for public assistance and food stamps, (4) eligibility for student loans, (5) access to records for non-criminal justice purposes, (6) voting rights, (7) drivers' licenses privileges, and (8) rights to be foster and adoptive parents. Finally, the article argues that the government has an obligation ensure fairness and opportunities to reenter society for people with such records.

In The Supreme Court Of The United States Barbara Grutter, Petitioner, V. Lee Bollinger, Et Al., Respondents. On Writ Of Certiorari To The United States Court Of Appeals For The Sixth Circuit, Jerome S. Hirsch, Joseph N. Sacca, Scott D. Musoff, Mark Lebovitch, Linda M. Wayner

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

Brief of the University of Michigan Asian Pacific American Law Students Association, the University of Michigan Black Law Students' Alliance, the University of Michigan Latino Law Students Association, and the University of Michigan Native American Law Students Association as Amici Curiae in Support of Respondents

Expressivism, Empathy And Equality, Rachel D. Godsil

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this article, Professor Godsil argues that the Supreme Court should not limit its application of heightened scrutiny to facially neutral government actions motivated by discriminatory intent, but rather, that the Court should apply such scrutiny when the challenged government action expresses contempt or hostility toward racial, ethnic, and gender groups or constitutes them as social inferiors or stigmatized classes. This article builds upon recent scholarship seeking to transplant this form of expressivism from the Establishment Clause to the Equal Protection context. However, this article contends that this scholarship has misconceived the test to be applied. For any expressive theory, …

Bête Noire: How Race-Based Policing Threatens National Security, Lenese C. Herbert

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

This Article asserts that race-based policing, enabled and exacerbated by race-blind judicial review, creates an ire with a purpose that promises, especially after September 11, to make us all less safe. The illegitimate marginalization of American citizens aggravates an already alienated population and primes them for cooperation with those who seek to harm the United States. Race-based policing guts the expectation of fair-dealing, legitimacy, and justice in the criminal justice system, creating marginalized populations, especially of African Americans. Lack of judicial redress in the face of such policing irrevocably stains already beleaguered African Americans (and others so policed) as inferior …

Dying Twice: Incarceration On Death Row, Michael B. Mushlin

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Dying Twice is an important report. The work is a collaboration between the Corrections Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, which I chaired, and the Committee on Capital Punishment of the Association chaired by Norman Greene. The working group that researched and wrote the report was drawn from members of both committees. The attorneys and the physician who served on the committee are wonderful, talented, dedicated people. It was a pleasure to work with professionals of this caliber on such an important effort. Dying Twice was endorsed as the position of the Association …

Proxies For Loyalty In Constitutional Immigration Law: Citizenship And Race After September 11, Victor C. Romero

Faculty Scholarship

The purpose of this article is to share some thoughts about using citizenship and race as proxies for loyalty in constitutional immigration discourse within two contexts: one historical and one current. The current context is the profiling of Muslim and Arab immigrants post-September 11, and the historical context is the distinction the Constitution draws between birthright and naturalized citizens in the Presidential Eligibility Clause.

African-Americans Within The Context Of International Oppression, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Barred From The Vote: Public Attitudes Toward The Disenfranchisement Of Felons, Brian Pinaire, Milton Heumann, Laura Bilotta

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This article explores public attitudes toward the disenfranchisement of felons. Using survey research methods -- Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing of 503 randomly selected adults -- the authors posed questions related to the purpose of the criminal justice system, public attitudes about treatment and punishment of felons, and public support for the disenfranchisement of felons. The data is aggregated and sorted based on ethnicity, gender, political affiliation, and education. The data demonstrates that the American public does not support permanent disenfranchisement of convicted felons but that it does support some limitations. The authors first review state laws and legal/political issues implicated, …

Women Of Color-What Their Voices Teach Us, Jacqueline Mertz

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The article argues that white feminists must learn from the experiences of women of color to build a more inclusive and effective feminist movement. It emphasizes the importance of addressing the multiple oppressions faced by women of color, including racism, sexism, and national oppression, and critiques the historical failure of the white feminist movement to support women of color.

Critical Race Theory In Three Acts: Racial Profiling, Affirmative Action, And The Diversity Visa Lottery, Victor C. Romero

Faculty Scholarship

The usual debates surrounding multiculturalism pit individual rights against group grievances in a variety of contexts including racial profiling, affirmative action, and the diversity visa lottery, often with seemingly contradictory results. Liberals often favor affirmative action but decry both racial profiling and the diversity visa lottery, while many conservatives hold the opposite view. Critical race theory provides a unique alternative to stock liberal and conservative arguments, allowing one to draw meaningful and persuasive distinctions among these seminal issues surrounding law enforcement, education, and immigration policy.

The New Mccarthyism: Repeating History In The War In Terrorism, David Cole

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This Essay will argue that the government has invoked two methods in particular in virtually every time of fear. The first, discussed in Part I, involves a substantive expansion of the terms of responsibility. Authorities target individuals not for what they do or have done but based on predictions about what they might do. These predictions often rely on the individuals' skin color, nationality, or political and religious associations. The second method, the subject of Part II, is procedural-the government invokes administrative processes to control, precisely so that it can avoid the guarantees associated with the criminal process. In hindsight, …

(Racial) Profiles In Courage, Or Can We Be Heroes, Too?, Robert S. Chang

Faculty Articles

This article begins with the controversy over a proposed monument based on a widely disseminated photograph of three firefighters raising the American flag over the ruins of the World Trade Center. The three firefighters were White. The proposed monument would have had one White firefighter, one Black, and one Hispanic. This article argues that the controversy over the proposed monument serves as a microcosm for the larger and more important struggle over racial and gender diversity within fire departments, generally.

The Shaping Of Chance: Actuarial Models And Criminal Profiling At The Turn Of The Twenty-First Century, Bernard Harcourt

Faculty Scholarship

The turn of the twentieth century marked a new era of individualization in the field of criminal law. Drawing on the new science of positivist criminology, legal scholars called for diagnosis of the causes of delinquence and for imposition of individualized courses of remedial treatment specifically adapted to these individual diagnoses. "[M]odern science recognizes that penal or remedial treatment cannot possibly be indiscriminate and machine-like, but must be adapted to the causes, and to the man as affected by those causes," leading criminal law scholars declared. "Thus the great truth of the present and the future, for criminal science, is …

From The Ne'er-Do-Well To The Criminal History Category: The Refinement Of The Actuarial Model In Criminal Law, Bernard Harcourt

Faculty Scholarship

Criminal law in the United States experienced radical change during the course of the twentieth century. The dawn of the century ushered in an era of individualization of punishment. Drawing on the new science of positive criminology, legal scholars called for diagnosis of the causes of delinquency and for imposition of individualized courses of remedial treatment specifically adapted to these diagnoses. States gradually developed indeterminate sentencing schemes that gave corrections administrators and parole boards wide discretion over treatment and release decisions, and by 1970 every state in the country and the federal government had adopted a system of indeterminate sentencing. …

Security And Freedom: Are The Governments' Efforts To Deal With Terrorism Violative Of Our Freedoms?, David Cole

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

One of the most common things that is said about September 11th is that it changed everything. In some respects, that is true. In the most important respects it would be more accurate to say it has changed everything for some, far more than it has for others. One instance of that can be seen in a pole that National Public Radio did one year after September 11th. They asked people to what extent their life had changed. They asked them whether they had to give up any important rights or freedoms in the war on terrorism. Only seven percent …

Civil Rights Plaintiffs And John Doe Defendants: A Study In § 1983 Procedure, Howard M. Wasserman

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Brown V. Board Of Education: 50 Years Later, Dana M. Malkus

All Faculty Scholarship

In Brown v. Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously concluded that the doctrine of “separate but equal” had no place in public education. That decision on May 17, 1954 initiated educational reform throughout the country and was a catalyst in launching the modern Civil Rights movement. Though Brown signaled the beginning of the end of de jure segregation in the United States, events since reveal that – one-half century later – the work is far from complete. On Friday, October 10, 2003, scholars, students, and practitioners joined together at Saint Louis University School of Law for a full-day …

Road Work: Racial Profiling And Drug Interdiction On The Highway, Samuel R. Gross, Katherine Y. Barnes

Michigan Law Review

Hypocrisy about race is hardly new in America, but the content changes. Recently the spotlight has been on racial profiling. The story of Colonel Carl Williams of the New Jersey State Police is a wellknown example. On Sunday, February 28, 1999, the Newark Star Ledger published a lengthy interview with Williams in which he talked about race and drugs: "Today . . . the drug problem is cocaine or marijuana. It is most likely a minority group that's involved with that. " Williams condemned racial profiling - "As far as racial profiling is concerned, that is absolutely not right. It …

Race, Crime And The Pool Of Surplus Criminality: Or Why The "War On Drugs" Was A "War On Blacks", Kenneth B. Nunn

UF Law Faculty Publications

The War on Drugs has had a devastating effect on African American communities nationwide. The concept of the pool of surplus criminality may explain the drug war's focus on African Americans. Faced with a perceived drug problem, White Americans naturally identified African American people as the source of that threat and targeted them for police harassment and penal control. There are ways in which the drug war may be construed as a race war. The disproportionate impact on the African American community, evidence that policy makers anticipated the drug war would disproportionately harm the African American community, and the historic …

Selective Strict Scrutiny – A New Way To Use Suspect Classifications, Bruce Comly French

Buffalo Public Interest Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Forfeiting "Enduring Freedom" For "Homeland Security": A Constitutional Analysis Of The Usa Patriot Act And The Justice Department's Anti-Terrorism Initiatives , John W. Whitehead, Steven H. Aden

American University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Traffic Stop Practices Of The Louisville Police Department: January 15 - December 31, 2001, Terry D. Edwards, Elizabeth L. Grossi, Gennaro F. Vito, Angela D. Crews

Criminal Justice Faculty Research

This report summarizes the findings of a study conducted using data collected by the Louisville Division of Police between January 15, 2001 and December 31, 2001. These data resulted from 48,586 interactions between law enforcement officers and citizens during traffic-related contacts.

Information was collected about the driver, the officer, and the stop event. Driver demographics included race, sex, age, residency, license number, and vehicle registration. The only information collected about the officer was officer badge number. Finally, data collected about the stop event include the date, time of day, reason for stop, activities during the stop, number of passengers, and …

Reparations For Slavery: A Dream Deferred, Watson Branch

San Diego International Law Journal

When the year began, the prediction was that 2001 was going to be the "Year of Reparations." Both internationally and in the United States, the consensus held that the time had finally come for governments around the world to face up to racism and apologize for the harm brought about by slavery and its aftermath harm in the past, to those long dead, and in the present, to those who, because of the color of their skin, still suffer from racism. Governments were expected to make amends for that harm through restitution and compensation, whether individual or collective. This willingness …

The Selective Deportation Of Same-Gender Partners: In Search Of The "Rara Avis", Victor C. Romero

University of Miami Law Review

No abstract provided.

Chambers V. Mississippi: The Hearsay Rule And Racial Evaluations Of Credibility, Andrew Elliot Carpenter

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Habeas Review Of Perfunctory State Court Decisions On The Merits, Scott Dodson

Faculty Publications

This article discusses the appropriate standard of review a federal habeas court should use to review a state-court determination of federal law unaccompanied by a federally-based rationale. In other words, what standard of review does the federal court employ when the state court’s opinion is wholly composed of the phrases: “The claims are without merit. Denied.”? The Supreme Court has not explicitly resolved the issue, and various federal judges around the country have reached different opinions. This article argues that a close scrutiny of the controlling habeas corpus statute, relevant case law, and policy considerations leads to the conclusion that …