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State Responses To Task Force Reports On Race And Ethnic Bias In The Courts, Suellyn Scarnecchia

Articles

While several states have embarked on studies of race and ethnic bias in their courts, Minnesota is only the sixth to publish its report to date. As Minnesota joins the ranks of states with published reports, it is worthwhile to assess the impact of the five earlier published reports from other states. Final reports have been published in Michigan (1989), Washington (1990), New York (1991), Florida (1991) and New Jersey (1992). The published reports make findings and provide several specific recommendations for change. This article will review the published findings and recommendations of the task forces and will discuss the …

Judges On Judging: A Bibliography., Shirley S. Abrahamson, Susan M. Fieber, Gabrielle Lessard

St. Mary's Law Journal

Abstract Forthcoming.

Journeying Through The Valley Of Evil., Douglas O. Linder

Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

The Ambiguity Of Accountability: Relationships Of Corruption And Control, Mark Findlay

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Corruption is a relationship of power and influence, existing within, and taking its form from specific environments of opportunity. Opportunity is, in turn, designated by the aspirations for such a relationship, and structures and processes at work towards its regulation. Both the creation and blocking of corruption opportunities are consequences of corruption control. Corruption regulation does not progress from prevention ideology to operational strategies in terms of total control, and therefore the regulatory space within which corruption and control interact becomes a construction of dependence.

Reflections On The Talmudic And American Death Penalty, Bruce S. Ledewitz, Scott Staples

University of Florida Journal of Law & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

The Romance Of Revenge: Capital Punishment In America, Samuel R. Gross

Articles

On February 17, 1992, Jeffrey Dahmer was sentenced to 15 consecutive terms of life imprisonment for killing and dismembering 15 young men and boys (Associated Press 1992a). Dahmer had been arrested six months earlier, on July 22, 1991. On January 13 he pled guilty to the fifteen murder counts against him, leaving open only the issue of his sanity. Jury selection began two weeks later, and the trial proper started on January 30. The jury heard two weeks of testimony about murder, mutilation and necrophilia; they deliberated for 5 hours before finding that Dahmer was sane when he committed these …

Legitimating The Illegitimate: A Comment On 'Beyond Rape', Robin West

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Professor Dripps's provocative proposal, as I understand it, is that we think of sex as a commodity and rape as the theft of that commodity. Understood as such, the theft of sex accomplished through violence or the threat of violence is a twofold wrong: it violates our "negative" right to refuse to have sex with anyone for any or no reason, and violence or the threat of violence infringes our right to personal, physical security. Therefore, the violent expropriation of sex should be punished as a major felony, as is violent rape, at least in theory.
  
Furthermore, according to Dripps, …

The Great Speech Perspective., Jon Larsen Shudlick

St. Mary's Law Journal

Abstract Forthcoming.

Stories Versus Theories At The Cardozo Evidence Conference: It’S Just Another Metaphor To Me, L. H. Larue

Cardozo Law Review

Cardozo Law School was host to an evidence conference on March 24-26, 1991. The papers have been published, so the conference has been duly memorialized. However, the conference had a "subtext" that differed from the "text," that is, the theme of the conference, judging from the hallway gossip, differed from the officially proclaimed theme; if one reads the published text carefully, one can see the subtext within the text, the unofficial theme alongside the official theme. I asked the editors of this Review to let me record my evaluation of the unofficial theme, so that it may have equal status …

Do Courts Matter?, Stephen L. Carter

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Hollow Hope: Ca Courts Bring About Social Change? by Gerald N. Rosenberg

Victimization, The Poor, And Payne V. Tennessee, Richard Bender Abell

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

No abstract provided.

The War On Poverty: A Civilian Perspective, Edgar S. Cahn, Jean C. Cahn

University of the District of Columbia Law Review

This article does two things: it articulates a vision and it lays out a specific blueprint. The core of the vision regards legal representation as "a form of enfranchisement, as an attempt to institutionalize the functions of dissent and criticism, and as a means of revitalizing the democratic process." This explains why the article triggered a movement that was perceived as going beyond the orthodox delivery of legal aid. While others legislate or purport to breath life into the democratic process, lawyers, in their unique role as advocates, discharge a constitutionally protected role. And in light of the retaliation to …

Heat Of Passion And Wife Killing: Men Who Batter/Men Who Kill, Donna Coker

Articles

No abstract provided.

Admissibility Of A Rape Victim's Prior Sexual Conduct In Texas: A Contemporary Review And Analysis., James A. Vaught, Margaret Henning

St. Mary's Law Journal

The treatment of rape victims in criminal prosecutions has become and remains a matter of intense public and legal interest in America. The conventional use of evidence of a rape complainant's prior sexual history in rape prosecutions was a major focus of the rape reform movement. A major consequence of the movement for reform is the federal government and forty-nine states enacting rape shield laws limiting the admissibility of evidence concerning the complainant’s sexual history in rape prosecution. This article analyzes the admissibility of evidence of a rape complainant’s prior sexual conduct from its common law origins concentrating on the …

Reasonable Double Definitional Instruction Results In Abolishing Exclusion Of Outstanding Reasonable Hypothesis As Standard Of Review In Circumstantial Evidence Cases., John J. Lapham

St. Mary's Law Journal

Abstract Forthcoming.

Capital Punishment: A Critique Of The Political And Philosophical Thought Supporting The Justices' Positions., Samuel J.M. Donnelly

St. Mary's Law Journal

Since Gregg v. Georgia, the Supreme Court has developed what could be described as a subparadigm for capital punishment. This subparadigm is now at a point of crisis for two enduring and mutually supporting reasons. The dissents by Justice Brennan and Justice Marshall represent the convergence of the better modern thought in regard to capital punishment. Even with the retirement of both Justices, the criticism found in their dissenting opinions presents a continuing challenge to the plurality’s position. Those using the plurality’s rhetoric are now split into two groups. Justices Blackmun and Stevens regularly vote against capital punishment, while focusing …

Peremptory Jury Strike In Texas After Batson And Edmondson., Alan B. Rich

St. Mary's Law Journal

In Batson v. Kentucky, the United States Supreme Court overruled that portion of Swain v. Alabama, which had imposed a “crippling burden of proof” upon a person who wished to vindicate his right of equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment in the face of a racially motivated peremptory challenge. Under Batson, a defendant can raise an inference of discrimination and prove it using only evidence adduced at his own trial. Two fundamental questions needing resolution prior to involving the Batson procedures are: (A) who has standing to bring a Batson challenge; and (B) who must be challenged before the Batson …

Limiting Punitive Damages: A Placebo For America's Ailing Competitiveness., Jimmie O. Clements Jr.

St. Mary's Law Journal

This Comment will discuss Vice President Dan Quayle’s proposed legislation by reviewing the history of punitive damages and providing an overview of current state legislation. Thereafter, this Comment debunks the theory of an unruly punitive damage system and analyzes the impact of a punitive damages cap on competitiveness, quality, safety and the doctrine’s underlying goals. On August 13, 1991, Vice President Quayle, as head of the President’s Council on Competitiveness (the Council), addressed the American Bar Association’s annual meeting. He announced a fifty-point proposal designed to improve the civil justice system. Vice President Quayle proposed, inter alia, a cap on …

A Constitutional Right Of Religious Exemption: An Historical Perspective, Philip A. Hamburger

Faculty Scholarship

Did late eighteenth-century Americans understand the Free Exercise Clause of the United States Constitution to provide individuals a right of exemption from civil laws to which they had religious objections? Claims of exemption based on the Free Exercise Clause have prompted some of the Supreme Court's most prominent free exercise decisions, and therefore this historical inquiry about a right of exemption may have implications for our constitutional jurisprudence. Even if the Court does not adopt late eighteenth-century ideas about the free exercise of religion, we may, nonetheless, find that the history of such ideas can contribute to our contemporary analysis. …

Judgment And Reasoning In Adolescent Decisionmaking, Elizabeth S. Scott

Faculty Scholarship

Few people believe that five year olds and fifteen year olds think, act or make decisions in the same way. The question is whether and how the law should respond to developmental differences. Traditionally, childhood and adulthood have been two dichotomous legal categories, demarcated by the age of majority. This conception has been contested in recent years, as has the premise that all minors are incompetent to make decisions and function as legal actors. Fueled by the controversy over adolescent access to abortion, an advocacy movement has emerged that challenges the authority of parents and the state over the lives …

Implementing Corruption Prevention Strategies Through Codes Of Conduct, Mark Findlay, Andrew Stewart

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The concept of a code of conduct, as it appears in corruption prevention strategies, could be viewed as rather misleading. While dealing with conduct in some preferred or preemptive sense, these frameworks for "guidelines" bear little resemblance to prescriptive legal codes.

Exempting The Mentally Retarded From The Death Penalty: A Comment On Florida's Proposed Legislation, V. Stephen Cohen

Florida State University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Legal Images Of Battered Women: Redefining The Issue Of Separation, Martha R. Mahoney

Michigan Law Review

Part I of this article discusses violence in the ordinary lives of women, describing individual and societal denial that pretends domestic violence is rare when statistics show it is common, and describing the ways in which motherhood shapes women's experience of violence and choices in response to violence. Part II examines definitions of battering and evaluates their effectiveness at disguising or revealing the struggle for control at the heart of the battering process. I then describe in Part III the pressures that self-defense and custody cases place on legal and cultural images of battered women and contrast the development of …

Shame, Culture, And American Criminal Law, Toni M. Massaro

Michigan Law Review

The purpose of this Article is to analyze whether this link is one that American criminal court judges can, or should, exploit. I begin with a description of the new shaming sanctions and the possible justifications for this type of penalty. I then identify both psychological and anthropological aspects of the phenomenon of shame, or "losing face." I describe several cultures in which shaming practices are, or were, significant means of sanctioning behavior, and outline the shared features of these cultures.

These psychological and anthropological materials, taken together, suggest that shaming practices are most effective and meaningful when five conditions …

Corruption Control And Monstering: Government Agendas, Community Expectations And The Icac Solution, Mark Findlay

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In 1818, the Governor of the Chinese province of Shansi reported the case of Chan Lin who, while gatekeeper for the district magistrate, maintained "external criminal connections". Using his position he endeavoured to get a money changer to accept for exchange more than 300 ounces of sub-standard silver. Upon being rebuffed he took steps to have the money changer locked up. The Board of Punishments (which was a senior court of appeal in China during that period) held that because the act differed in no way from extortion as practised by rapacious government underlings, it would be improper to show …

The Ethics Of Emergency Lawyering, Barbara Glesner Fines

Faculty Works

The fast pace of modern law practice increasingly requires emergency lawyering: client situations that demand immediate attention and solution. Unlike medicine, however, the legal profession does not yet consider itself as having an emergency specialty. Yet, observation of today's law practice readily reveals that the analogy is accurate. The pressure of today's rapidly changing business climate, the complexity of legal regulations and relationships and the widening application of law to address a host of problems, all contribute to an increasing need for an immediate, available legal response: what I term here "emergency lawyering."

Viewing the delivery of legal services through …

Operation Rescue And The Necessity Defense: Beginning A Feminist Deconstruction, Susan B. Apel

Washington and Lee Law Review

No abstract provided.

Towards A Recognition Of The Necessity Defense For Political Protesters, Matthew Lippman

Washington and Lee Law Review

No abstract provided.

Legal Images Of Battered Women: Redefining The Issue Of Separation, Martha R. Mahoney

Articles

No abstract provided.

An Independent And Adequate Procedural Rule Bars A State Prisoner, Who Has Defaulted His Entire Appeal, From Asserting A Federal Claim Unless The Prisoner Demonstrates Cause For, And Actual Prejudice Resulting From, The Procedural Default, Or In The Alternative, Proves A Fundamental Miscarriage Of Justice Will Result If The Federal Habeas Court Fails To Hear The Claim., Jared R. V. Woodfill

St. Mary's Law Journal

The current jurisprudential regime accepts a blanket procedural default policy which denies the federal habeas court its proper constitutional role. An ideological coup d’etat is needed which reappraises the modern procedural default doctrine and supplants it with a rule in the spirit of Fay v. Noia. Such a revolution would emphasize the federal habeas court’s role as a defender of constitutional rights. In an era of multifarious litigation and sociological jurisprudence, a habeas prisoner should not lose his life because a negligent public defender failed to preserve the right in procedural formaldehyde. On April 23, 1982, a court convicted Roger …