Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Law Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 22 of 22

Full-Text Articles in Law

Postmodern Constitutionalism As Materialism, Francis J. Mootz Iii Dec 1992

Postmodern Constitutionalism As Materialism, Francis J. Mootz Iii

Michigan Law Review

Professor J.M. Balkin's recent essay in the Michigan Law Review assesses the implications that postmodernism holds for constitutional law. Although I agree with Balkin about many of the specific issues that he believes must be addressed in a postmodern constitutionalism, I find that his manner of talking about postmodernism is unproductive in an important way. Balkin quite correctly argues that a postmodern constitutionalism should not mimic the fragmented and superficial culture of postmodernity, nor should it devolve simply to normative claims that postmodernity is desirable and should be embraced or adopted within the law. However, Balkin's thesis that a postmodern …


The Meaning Of "Under Color Of" Law, Steven L. Winter Dec 1992

The Meaning Of "Under Color Of" Law, Steven L. Winter

Michigan Law Review

The argument proceeds as follows. In Part I, I examine why the conceptual problem of who or what is "the State" is so intractable. In Part II, I present the historical evidence that establishes beyond doubt the pedigree and meaning of the phrase under color of law. I explain why Frankfurter would have indulged in such an obvious historical error to take the position he did. I suggest that, as was the case with the invention of modem standing doctrine, Frankfurter was here engaged in a stealthy, anachronistic campaign against the jurisprudence of the Lochner era - attempting to …


A Failed Critique Of State Constitutionalism, David Schuman Nov 1992

A Failed Critique Of State Constitutionalism, David Schuman

Michigan Law Review

James A. Gardner begins The Failed Discourse of State Constitutionalism with a story describing "the experience of a great many lawyers in this country." The protagonist is an attorney whose client has an unlawful discrimination claim that for some reason cannot succeed under the U.S. Supreme Court's current equal protection jurisprudence. The attorney decides to present an argument based on her state constitution's equality guarantee, only to discover that the universe of material from which a plausible argument, not to mention a rich discourse, might emerge - existing case law and scholarship, "useful tidbits" of constitutional history and philosophy from …


Justifiably Punishing The Justified, Heidi M. Hurd Aug 1992

Justifiably Punishing The Justified, Heidi M. Hurd

Michigan Law Review

Contemporary moral philosophy, political theory, and jurisprudence have converged to create a quite baffling dilemma. This dilemma is generated by the apparent incompatibility of three principles, each of which grounds features of our system of law and government, and each of which carries substantial normative weight. The first I shall call the punishment principle - a moral principle, doctrinally entrenched in American criminal and civil law, which holds that individuals who are morally justified in their actions ought not to be blamed or punished for those actions. The second is the principle of the rule of law - a complex …


Legal Interpretation And A Constitutional Case: Home Building & Loan Association V. Blaisdell, Charles A. Bieneman Aug 1992

Legal Interpretation And A Constitutional Case: Home Building & Loan Association V. Blaisdell, Charles A. Bieneman

Michigan Law Review

The approaches of Hughes and Sutherland are but two extremes in constitutional interpretation. Though only two results were possible in the case - either the Act was constitutional or it was not - there are more than two methods by which an interpreter could reach those results. This Note explores possible ways of deciding Blaisdell, using the case as a vehicle for delimiting the boundaries of a positive constitutional command. As a sort of empirical investigation of legal philosophy, the Note examines how various interpretive theories affect an interpreter's approach to the case, and the results these theories might …


A Critical Reexamination Of The Takings Jurisprudence, Glynn S. Lunney Jr Jun 1992

A Critical Reexamination Of The Takings Jurisprudence, Glynn S. Lunney Jr

Michigan Law Review

To provide some insight into the nature of these disagreements, and to suggest a possible solution to the compensation issue, this article undertakes a critical reexamination of the takings jurisprudence. It focuses on the two bases which the modem Court has articulated as support for its resolution of the compensation issue: (1) the articulated purpose of using the just compensation requirement "to bar Government from forcing some people alone to bear public burdens"; and (2) the early case law. Beginning with the Court's first struggles with the compensation issue in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, this article traces …


Deliberating About Deliberation, Frederick Schauer May 1992

Deliberating About Deliberation, Frederick Schauer

Michigan Law Review

A Review of We the People: 1: Foundations by Bruce Ackerman


On Reading The Constitution, Bruce Fein May 1992

On Reading The Constitution, Bruce Fein

Michigan Law Review

A Review of On Reading the Constitution by Laurence H. Tribe and Michael C. Dorf


The Age Of Rights, Stephen D. Sencer May 1992

The Age Of Rights, Stephen D. Sencer

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Age of Rights by Louis Henkin


The Supreme Court As Constitutional Interpreter: Chronology Without History, Herbert Hovenkamp May 1992

The Supreme Court As Constitutional Interpreter: Chronology Without History, Herbert Hovenkamp

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Constitution in the Supreme Court: The Second Century, 1888-1986 by David P. Currie


Memoirs Of A General In The Inglorious Revolution, Lawrence G. Sagar May 1992

Memoirs Of A General In The Inglorious Revolution, Lawrence G. Sagar

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Order and Law: Arguing the Reagan Revolution: A First-Hand Account by Charles Fried


Zero-Sum Madison, Thomas W. Merrill May 1992

Zero-Sum Madison, Thomas W. Merrill

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Private Property and the Limits of American Constitutionalism by Jennifer Nedelsky


The Failed Discourse Of State Constitutionalism, James A. Gardner Feb 1992

The Failed Discourse Of State Constitutionalism, James A. Gardner

Michigan Law Review

In this article, I approach these questions in two steps. First, I examine the status of state constitutional law as it is practiced today. I conclude that, contrary to the claims of New Federalism, state constitutional law today is a vast wasteland of confusing, conflicting, and essentially unintelligible pronouncements. I argue that the fundamental defect responsible for this state of affairs is the failure of state courts to develop a coherent discourse of state constitutional law that is, a language in which it is possible for participants in the legal system to make intelligible claims about the meaning of state …


Abstract Democracy: A Review Of Ackerman's We The People, Terrance Sandalow Jan 1992

Abstract Democracy: A Review Of Ackerman's We The People, Terrance Sandalow

Reviews

We the People: Foundations is an ambitious book, the first of three volumes in which Professor Ackerman proposes to recast conventional understanding of and contemporary debate about American constitutional law. Unfortunately, the book's rhetoricinflated, self-important, and self-congratulatory-impedes the effort to come to terms with its argument. How, for example, does one respond to a book that opens by asking whether the reader will have "the strength" to accept its thesis? Or that announces the author's intention of "engaging" two of the most influential works of intellectual history of the past several decades-and then discusses one in two and one-half pages …


Devolution Or Deconstruction Czecho-Slovak Style, Eric Stein Jan 1992

Devolution Or Deconstruction Czecho-Slovak Style, Eric Stein

Michigan Journal of International Law

This essay is a part of a broader study entitled "Post-communist Constitution-making: Confessions of a Comparatist" which focuses on Czechoslovakia.


Constitutional Interpretation, Terrance Sandalow Jan 1992

Constitutional Interpretation, Terrance Sandalow

Book Chapters

"[W]e must never forget," Chief Justice Marshall admonished us in a statement pregnant with more than one meaning, "that it is a constitution we are expounding." Marshall meant that the Constitution should be read as a document "intended to endure for ages to come, and, consequently, to be adapted to the various crises of human affairs." But he meant also that the construction placed upon the document must have regard for its "great outlines" and "important objects." Limits are implied by the very nature of the task. There is not the same freedom in construing the Constitution as in constructing …


Administrative Agencies, Joseph Vining Jan 1992

Administrative Agencies, Joseph Vining

Book Chapters

Administrative agencies, often called the ‘‘fourth branch,’’ are entities of government that make decisions within particular substantive fields. Although these fields range over the full spectrum of public concern, the specificity of agencies’ focus distinguishes them from other decision making entities in the constitutional structure—the judiciary, the presidency, the Congress, indeed the individual citizen—each of which can be taken to have a scope of interest as broad as imagination will allow.


Eminent Domain (Update), James E. Krier Jan 1992

Eminent Domain (Update), James E. Krier

Book Chapters

One of the most challenging and enduring puzzles in American constitutional law is how one distinguishes a compensable taking of power from a legitimate and noncompensable exercise of the police power. To suggest the Supreme Court’s approach to the question, Harry N. Scheiber, author of the Encyclopedia’s principal article on eminent domain, looked back and away from the Court to Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw of Massachusetts.


Labor, Theodore J. St. Antoine Jan 1992

Labor, Theodore J. St. Antoine

Book Chapters

Labor relations present three principal kinds of constitutional issues. First, to what extent does the first amendment protect employees’ efforts to organize labor unions and solicit support, and to what extent does it limit the power of unions over their members? Second, how does the doctrine of federal preemption restrict the states in regulating union and management activities? Third, what due process guarantees may employers and employees invoke in response to federal and state laws establishing new substantive rules and remedies in employment? Although the Supreme Court has never squarely?


Sex Discrimination (Update 1), Christina B. Whitman Jan 1992

Sex Discrimination (Update 1), Christina B. Whitman

Book Chapters

During the 1980s and early 1990s intense disagreement has arisen over the appropriate strategy for eliminating sex discrimination. Some courts and commentators argue for gender-neutral rules that define categories in purely functional terms. Others, who point out that gender-neutral rules promise equality only for women who can meet a ‘‘male standard,’’ think that legal distinctions between the sexes are not only appropriate but necessary, at least in cases involving perceived biological differences. Still others refuse to think in terms of sameness and difference. They analyze each issue by asking whether the disputed rule furthers the domination of men and the …


State Regulation Of Commerce (Update), Donald H. Regan Jan 1992

State Regulation Of Commerce (Update), Donald H. Regan

Book Chapters

In the period covered by this supplementary article, the Supreme Court has decided a case or two a year on state regulation of commerce. Considered individually, none of the cases through mid-1989 seems destined to become a landmark in DORMANT COMMERCE CLAUSE doctrin. Collectively, however, the cases may indicate a decreasing emphasis on "balencing" and an increasing focus on preventing states from intentionally discriminating against out-of-state interests.


The Constitution As Literature, James Boyd White Jan 1992

The Constitution As Literature, James Boyd White

Book Chapters

Although presumably no one would say that the Constitution offers its readers an experience that cannot be distinguished from reading a poem or a novel, there is nonetheless a sense in which it is a kind of highly imaginative literature in its own right (indeed its nature as law requires that this be so), the reading of which may be informed by our experience of other literary forms. But to say this may be controversial, and the first step toward understanding how such a claim can be made may be to ask what it is we think characterizes imaginative literature …