Law Commons^™

Put The Town On Notice: School District Liability And Lgbt Bullying Notification Laws, Yariv Pierce

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Congress could mitigate the problem of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) student bullying by requiring that teachers and school officials report all bullying incidents to their school district administrators. Many school districts are not aware of the prevalence of LGBT bullying and the extent to which each school protects, or fails to protect, its LGBT students compared to other harassed students. LGBT students often encounter difficulty demonstrating that their school district has a policy or custom of deliberate indifference toward their equal treatment when a school does not equally protect an LGBT student from peer-to-peer bullying because of the …

Parental-Status Employment Discrimination: A Wrong In Need Of A Right?, Peggie R. Smith

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article evaluates strategies to challenge employment discrimination based on parental status. Specifically, it examines proposals put forth by some commentators to establish parental status as a protected class. While such a suggestion is attractive, the Article argues that it ultimately offers few practical advantages and remains wedded to a limited conception of equality, requiring only that employment decisions not reflect differences based on parenthood. Consequently, such a strategy would satisfy anti-discrimination legislation so long as both men and women with parental obligations are equally ill-treated. The Article concludes that a shift in perspective from gender to parental status will …

The Individuals With Disabilities Education Act: A Parent's Perspective And Proposal For Change, Martin A. Kotler

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

For two years, beginning in the fall of 1991, I was involved in an ongoing legal battle with the Delaware County, Pennsylvania Intermediate Unit No. 25 regarding the "appropriateness" of preschool programming for my son. To a large degree, the following Article has its origin in that battle.

Nevertheless, the point of this Article is neither to get even for wrongs, real or imagined, nor to utilize these pages to supplement the already extensive briefs and formal arguments made in that case. Rather, I believe that my position as a law professor, lawyer, litigant, and parent of a disabled child …

Exclusion Of Families With Children From Housing, George Palmer Schober

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Note attempts to resolve the most significant problems raised by discrimination against children in housing. Part I briefly analyzes the prevalence of child exclusion in different types of housing. It also provides a statistical analysis of the rental housing market to enable the reader to gauge the extent of the problem in one type of housing. Part II discusses policy arguments supporting both those who seek to exclude children and those who advocate government policies forbidding exclusion. Part III then examines the various approaches that states have adopted in this area, as well as federal implications of the issue. …

Illegitimates And Equal Protection, David Hallissey

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Illegitimates often have been discriminated against by legislatures in the enactment of statutes, as well as by courts which have sanctioned such legislation. This article will examine the judicial response to legislative treatment of the illegitimate in social insurance, loss compensation, and intestacy statutes. Emphasizing the Supreme Court's analysis of the legal status of illegitimates in terms of the equal protection clause, it will also discuss how the principle of equal protection may be applied in order to reduce the number of illegitimates denied the benefit and protection of the law.

Legislative Notes: The Education Of All Handicapped Children Act Of 1975, Donald W. Keim

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Part I reviews the landmark judicial decisions which have established the right of handicapped children to participate in free, public education. The basic provisions of the Education of All Handicapped Children Act of 1975 are then presented in Part II. The funding provisions are discussed in Part III with particular emphasis upon the tension between the promise of federal largesse and the expense of compliance with statutory and judicial requirements. Part IV reviews prior efforts to obtain judicial recognition of a substantive right to an appropriate education and suggests some ways in which the 1975 Act may alter the framework …

Legal Rights In A Juvenile Correctional Institution, Matthew L. Myers

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This article focuses on the effect on juvenile correctional institutions of the erosion of the "hands-off" doctrine and the introduction of procedural safeguards in the juvenile justice system. In so doing, the article examines the difficulties inherent in any attempt to reform institutional practices and procedures to accommodate the goals of the juvenile correctional model. In the juvenile context, the extent to which fundamental rights need or may be abrogated to allow the institution freedom to rehabilitate and treat its inmates is crucial. Therefore, this article examines three areas involving fundamental constitutional rights: imposition of punitive segregation, freedom of communication, …