Law Commons^™

The Voice Of Reason—Why Recent Judicial Interpretations Of The Antiterrorism And Effective Death Penalty Act’S Restrictions On Habeas Corpus Are Wrong, Judith L. Ritter

Judith L Ritter

By filing a petition for a federal writ of habeas corpus, a prisoner initiates a legal proceeding collateral to the direct appeals process. Federal statutes set forth the procedure and parameters of habeas corpus review. The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) first signed into law by President Clinton in 1996, included significant cut-backs in the availability of federal writs of habeas corpus. This was by congressional design. Yet, despite the dire predictions, for most of the first decade of AEDPA’s reign, the door to habeas relief remained open. More recently, however, the Supreme Court reinterpreted a key portion …

The Constitutional Infirmity Of Warrantless Nsa Surveillance: The Abuse Of Presidential Power And The Injury To The Fourth Amendment, Robert M. Bloom, William J. Dunn

Robert Bloom

In recent months, there have been many revelations about the tactics used by the Bush Administration to prosecute their war on terrorism. These stories involve the exploitation of technologies that allow the government, with the cooperation of phone companies and financial institutions, to access phone and financial records. This paper focuses on the revelation and widespread criticism of the Bush Administration’s operation of a warrantless electronic surveillance program to monitor international phone calls and emails that originate or terminate with a United States party. The powerful and secret National Security Agency heads the program and leverages its significant intelligence collection …

How Much Religious Freedom Can An Arab Muslim Expect In Europe?, Marcel Stuessi

Marcel Stüssi

How much religious freedom can an Arab Muslim expect in Europe?

Arab Muslims who come to the West for work and security are often strong believers. Reli-gious law requires them to follow specific religious practices that may appear unusual to the average European observer. This situation has caused strained relations between the local (mainstream) population and Muslim migrants.

To make the position of Arab Muslims living in Europe more tangible, imagine the following situation. Assume that Mahmoud, a devout young Muslim, left Damascus to live in Zurich, Switzerland. As a young professional he was fed up with both Syria’s political …

Fifteen Years And Death: Double Jeopardy, Multiple Punishments, And Extended Stays On Death Row, Michael J. Johnson

Michael P. Johnson

Fifteen Years and Death is a Note that considers a completely novel application of the Double Jeopardy Clause to excessive time on death row. Traditionally, death penalty opponents have attacked the now fifteen-year average wait time on death row as a violation of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments, but this argument has fallen flat time and time again as courts have been reluctant to find merely living in prison to be “cruel” or “unusual.” Most courts do admit, however, that such time on death row does constitute some sort of punishment. As originally imagined, the Double …

Constitutional Standing In Singapore: A Comment On Tan Eng Fong V Attorney General, Shubhankar Dam

Shubhankar Dam

No abstract provided.

Popular Authorship And Constitution Making: Comparing And Contrasting The Drc And Kenya, James Thuo Gathii

James T Gathii

No abstract provided.

Religions As Sovereigns: Why Religion Is "Special", Elizabeth A. Clark

Elizabeth A. Clark

Criminal Wrongs And Constitutional Rights: A View From India, Shubhankar Dam

Shubhankar Dam

This essay offers an overview of how ideas of constitutionalism, rule of law and fundamental rights contributed to the development of criminal law in India. Various courts, and the Supreme Court in particular, have summoned these broad constitutional concepts to understand, interpret and develop criminal law doctrines. But they are also drawing on these concepts to increasingly address “structural” issues of the criminal justice system - the very apparatus responsible for implementing the doctrines.

Desafíos Para Los Derechos De La Persona Ante El Siglo Xxi: Ciencia Y Vida / Sfide Per I Diritti Della Persona Nel Xxi Secolo: Vita E Scienza / Challenges Of Individual Rights In The Xxi Century: Life And Science, Antonio Pérez Miras, Germán M. Teruel Lozano, Edoardo C. Raffiotta

Germán M. Teruel Lozano

Scientific advances often go beyond the classic thoughts of Law. Rapidly, new discoveries and the development of new techniques question fundamental aspects of human existence and the future of our species. So the law and legal operators cannot stand still when faced with the challenges posed by new discoveries and techniques, especially applied to humans. In this book the reader will find many works that examine these challenges, which arise with respect to constitutionalism, and in particular to the rights of the individual; intense debates, sometimes difficult to reconcile from the moral, but that cannot be ignored in the law.

Rational Basis With Bite In Minnesota: Unemployment Benefits And Personal-Care Assistants, Mel Cousins

Mel Cousins

The Minnesota court of appeals has recently come to an interesting decision on equal protection and insurability of workers, ruling – in Weir v ACCRA Care - that the exclusion of certain personal care assistants (PCA) from the unemployment insurance scheme was in breach of the Minnesota equal protection guarantee. This note examines this recent decision, contrasting it with the approach under the federal equal protection clause. The case is one of a number in different jurisdictions in which less favorable treatment of ‘family member’ carers has been struck down under equal protection and human rights law.

A Triumph Of Ill Conceived Language: The Linguistic Origins Of Guantamo’S “Rough Justice”, Brian Christopher Jones

Brian Christopher Jones

Throughout the years, the Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay has witnessed an abundance of intriguing linguistic words and phrases. For example, “Freedom Vanilla” replaced French Vanilla ice cream in the mess hall, and the area where journalists and others were often sequestered during their visits to the base was re-named “Camp Justice.” The list goes on. However, the language that has had the most significant impact throughout the years has been the words and phrases used in the administration of justice regarding the detainees being held on terrorism charges.Wall St. Journal Supreme Court reporter Jess Bravin’s book, The Terror Courts: …