Law Commons^™

Rethinking Harmless Constitutional Error, A. Kimberley Dayton

Faculty Scholarship

This article examines the increasing role of the Chapman Rule and its effect on the harmless error doctrine and outlines a coherent doctrine of constitutional error responsive to the purposes of the various constitutional protections afforded criminal defendants. Part I evaluates the Court's existing harmless error jurisprudence. Part II proposes a harmless error doctrine that, unlike the Court's approach, responds to constitutional values unrelated to truth determination. The last two parts of the Article address two problems precipitated by the use of outcome-oriented rules to define and remedy constitutional error. Part III discusses when such a rule should be used …

Admissibility Of Psychiatric Evaluations Under Miranda And The Right To Counsel: Satterwhite And Buchanan, Michael L. Perlin

Other Publications

No abstract provided.

An Essay On Constitutional Interpretation, Noel Lyon

Osgoode Hall Law Journal

The Article sets out a theory of interpretation where the Charter reflects an authoritative standard of public policy. It is not to be used only as a test of legality but as a test of legitimacy. Section 35 of the Constitution on aboriginal rights offers an opportunity in which the Charter's central concept of fundamental justice in the context of a free and democratic society can be applied to break out of sterile common law conceptions and interpretations. The questions of legitimacy and public policy are instrumental to the way we govern ourselves.

The Constitution Between Friends, Neal Devins

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Federal Funds To Religious Groups: Where Are The First Amendment Boundaries?, Neal Devins

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

U.S. Supreme Court: The 1987-88 Term (Part Ii), Paul C. Giannelli

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

In Praise Of Woodenness, Gary S. Lawson

Faculty Scholarship

Not long ago, I was a stalwart champion of judicial terrorism on behalf of economic liberty. In recent years, however, I have become a meek, mildmannered originalist whose favorite adjective is "wooden."' I still like economic liberty as much as the next person - in fact, more than at least one of the next two persons. Nonetheless, much as I would like to, I cannot agree that the Constitution requires a free market to the extent urged by, among others, Roger Pilon, Bernard Siegan,3 Steven Macedo, 4 Randy Barnett,5 and Richard Epstein.6 My aim here is not to criticize their …

Propaganda, Xenophobia, And The First Amendment, Rodney A. Smolla, Stephen A. Smith

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The President's Powers As Commander-In-Chief Versus Congress' War Power And Appropriations Power, Charles W. Bennett, Arthur B. Culvahouse, Geoffrey P. Miller, William Bradford Reynolds, William W. Van Alstyne

Faculty Publications

This joint work explores a variety of viewpoints all centered around the War Powers Resolution and its application to the situation in the Persian Gulf.

The Article Iii Judiciary In Its Third Century, Kenneth F. Ripple

Journal Articles

Tonight we celebrate the memory of one of the great American jurists of this century, Robert A. Ainsworth, Jr. In this bicentennial year of our Constitution, it seems most appropriate that we honor the memory of Judge Ainsworth by reflecting on that part of the Constitution to which he exhibited so much devotion—article III, the judicial article.

Economic Union As A Constitutional Value, Richard B. Collins

Publications

Professor Collins presents an in-depth defense of the dormant commerce power doctrine. He maintains that the text of the commerce clause, the original intent behind it, and a century of congressional acquiescence to broad judicial enforcement of the dormant commerce power lend sufficient legitimacy to the doctrine to support its continued existence. After examining the textual and historical bases for the doctrine, Professor Collins concludes that the primary purpose behind the commerce clause is the promotion of economic integration and interstate harmony. Based upon his discussion of the doctrine's origins and development, he contends that critics of the doctrine who …

The Role Of The Legislative And Executive Branches In Interpreting The Constitution, Robert Nagel

Publications

No abstract provided.

The Doctrine Of Accommodation In The Jurisprudence Of The Religion Clauses, Sarah Barringer Gordon, Arlin M. Adams

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Privacy, Surrogacy, And The Baby M Case, Anita L. Allen

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Federalist's Plain Meaning: Reply To Tushnet, Anita L. Allen

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Rule 11 In The Constitutional Case, Gary J. Saalman, Kenneth Ripple

Journal Articles

The 1983 amendments to the Rules of Civil Procedure arose from concern over the flood of litigation in recent years and its high costs to both litigants and the court system. Although the causes of this litigation explosion and the remedies are both many and complex, the pretrial stage of litigation and the standards governing attorney responsibility were considered major contributors to the problem and prime areas for reform. The drafters of the 1983 amendments sought to streamline the litigation process by increasing judicial oversight and deterring abusive or dilatory tactics by the bar. Some of the most significant changes …

Lessons Of The Iran-Contra Affair: Are They Being Taught?, Philip C. Bobbitt

Faculty Scholarship

The issues I am going to talk about today vary from the very straightforward to the somewhat complicated. One thing ties them together – my dismay at how little the fundamental constitutional issues of the Iran-contra affair seem to have been brought to the surface, either by the hearings, or by the commentary in the press, or even by the schools that led us to this affair in the first place.

I want to talk about three issues which represent the failure of civics education in this country. The three questions are: 1) what is wrong with pursuing secret …

Management And Marketing Of Indian Water: From Conflict To Pragmatism, David H. Getches

Publications

No abstract provided.

Cannibal Moves: An Essay On The Metamorphoses Of The Legal Distinction, Pierre Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

Civil Liberties Guarantees When Indian Tribes Act As Majority Societies: The Case Of The Winnebago Retrocession, Charles F. Wilkinson

Publications

No abstract provided.

Some Modest Proposals On The Vice-Presidency, Richard D. Friedman

Articles

There are many good things in the Constitution, but the vice-presidency isn't one of them. In Part I of this essay, I will argue that there are three basic problems with the vice-presidency: the method of nomination, the method of election, and the office itself. That just about covers the waterfront.' If we had to do it all over again, we almost certainly would not" create the system we currently have. We cannot undo history, but we do have a very strong incentive to develop a better system of succession to the presidency. Whom we choose as vice-president is a …

Rights Discourse And Neonatal Euthanasia, Carl E. Schneider

Articles

Hard cases, they say, make bad law. Hard cases, we know, can also make revealing law. Hard cases identify the problems we have not found a way of solving. They reveal ways the law's goals conflict. They force us to articulate our assumptions and to examine our modes of discourse and reasoning. If there was ever a hard case for the law, it is the question of whether, how, and by whom it should be decided to allow newborn children who are severely retarded mentally or severely damaged physically to die. For many years, the law has not had to …

The Authoritarian Impulse In Constitutional Law, Robin L. West

University of Miami Law Review

No abstract provided.

Gideon's Shelter: The Need To Reorganize A Right To Counsel For Indigent Defendants In Eviction Proceedings, Andrew Scherer

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

Restoring The Confrontation Clause To The Sixth Amendment, Randolph N. Jonakait

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

The First Amendment And The Ideal Of Civic Courage: The Brandeis Opinion In Whitney V. California, Vincent A. Blasi

Faculty Scholarship

"[T]he working class and the employing class have nothing in common ....” So began the Preamble to the Constitution of the I.W.W., the Industrial Workers of the World. "Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the World organize as a class, take possession of the earth, and the machinery of production and abolish the wage system." Nicknamed the Wobblies, this group advocated a form of militant unionism built around the ideal of One Big Union embracing all industries. The I.W.W. enjoyed its strongest appeal among the miners, loggers, agricultural laborers, and construction workers of …

Deferring To The Judgment Of Mental Health And Related Professionals In Striking The Constitutional Balance Between Individual Liberty And The Interests Of The State, Patrick Wiseman

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

Taking The Framers Seriously, William Michael Treanor

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article reviews Taking the Constitution Seriously by Walter Berns (1987).

This review focuses on three of the key historical points that Walter Berns makes: his arguments that the Declaration of Independence is a Lockean document; that the Constitution encapsulates the political philosophy of the Declaration; and that the framers viewed the commercialization of society as a salutary development and were unambivalent champions of the right to property. Examination of these issues suggests that the ideological universe of the framers was far more complex than Berns indicates. While the revolutionary era witnessed a new concern with individual rights and a …

The Committee On The Constitutional System Proposals: Coherence And Dominance, Philip Chase Bobbitt

Faculty Scholarship

I have been a fellow traveler of the Committee on the Constitutional System virtually since its inception; indeed, I believe I was present when Mr. Cutler first made the speech at the University of Texas that became, "To Form a Government." During all this time I have never been able to quite free myself from the conviction that his concerns were absolutely right and fundamental to our era. Nor have I been able to persuade myself that the reforms that he recommends justify a departure from the framers' conception. I suppose this is why I was selected to give a …

Communities, Texts, And Law: Reflections On The Law And Literature Movement, Robin West

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

How do we form communities? How might we form better ones? What is the role of law in that process? In a recent series of books and articles, James Boyd White, arguably the modern law and literature movement's founder, has put forward distinctively literary answers to these questions. Perhaps because of the fluidity of the humanities, White's account of the nature of community is not nearly as axiomatic to the law and literature movement as is Posner's depiction of the "individual" to legal economists. Nevertheless, White's conception is increasingly representative of the literary-legalist's world view. Furthermore, with the exception of …