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Full-Text Articles in Law
Renegotiating The Social Contract, Jennifer S. Hendricks
Renegotiating The Social Contract, Jennifer S. Hendricks
Michigan Law Review
Despite an economic recession and record levels of personal bankruptcy filings due to healthcare costs, President Obama's healthcare reform initiative sparked a season of protests. A "public option"-not to mention a single-payer system-was off the table even before the discussion began. As the question of the reform package's constitutionality wound its way to the Supreme Court, it became clear that a substantial number of American people do not want their government helping them stay alive. In this climate, it is difficult to imagine an America in which the state is an accepted partner in meeting the challenges and responsibilities of …
The Family Law Doctrine Of Equivalence, Amy L. Wax
The Family Law Doctrine Of Equivalence, Amy L. Wax
Michigan Law Review
Students of patent law learn the doctrine of equivalents. According to the doctrine, a patent protects an invention that does "the same work in substantially the same way, and accomplish[ es] substantially the same result," as the device described in the patent, even if it differs "'in name, form, or shape." In her new book, Nancy Polikoff has fashioned something like a parallel doctrine for families. Let's call it (with a slight play on words) the family law Doctrine of Equivalence. In today's world, according to Polikoff, a broad set of relationships now plays the same role as marriage and …
Unshackling Black Motherhood, Dorothy E. Roberts
Unshackling Black Motherhood, Dorothy E. Roberts
Michigan Law Review
When stories about the prosecutions of women for using drugs during pregnancy first appeared in newspapers in 1989, I immediately suspected that most of the defendants were Black women. Charging someone with a crime for giving birth to a baby seemed to fit into the legacy of devaluing Black mothers. I was so sure of this intuition that I embarked on my first major law review article based on the premise that the prosecutions perpetuated Black women's subordination. My hunch turned out to be right: a memorandum prepared by the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project documented cases brought against pregnant women …