Law Commons^™

Habeas Corpus In The Age Of Guantánamo, Cary Federman

Cary Federman

The purpose of the article is to examine the meaning of habeas corpus in the age of the war on terror and the detention camps at Guantanamo Bay. Since the war on terror was declared in 2001, the writ has been invoked from quarters not normally considered within the federal courts’ domain. In this article, I set out to do two things: first, I provide an overview of the writ’s history in the United States and explain its connection to federalism and unlawful executive detention. I then set out to bridge the two meanings of habeas corpus. Second, then, I …

Gandhi’S Prophecy: Corporate Violence And A Mindful Law For Bhopal, Nehal A. Patel

Nehal A. Patel

AbstractOver thirty years have passed since the Bhopal chemical disaster began,and in that time scholars of corporate social responsibility (CSR) havediscussed and debated several frameworks for improving corporate responseto social and environmental problems. However, CSR discourse rarelydelves into the fundamental architecture of legal thought that oftenbuttresses corporate dominance in the global economy. Moreover, CSRdiscourse does little to challenge the ontological and epistemologicalassumptions that form the foundation for modern economics and the role ofcorporations in the world.I explore methods of transforming CSR by employing the thought ofMohandas Gandhi. I pay particular attention to Gandhi’s critique ofindustrialization and principle of swadeshi (self-sufficiency) …

Democracy And Torture, Patrick A. Maurer

Patrick A Maurer

September 11th spawned an era of political changes to fundamental rights. The focus of this discussion is to highlight Guantanamo Bay torture incidents. This analysis will explore the usages of torture from a legal standpoint in the United States.

Assessing The Velocity, Scale, Volume, Intensity And “Creedal Congruence” Of Immigrants In Setting A Nation’S Admissions Policy, David Barnhizer

David Barnhizer

Table of Contents Death of the “Melting Pot” The Rejection of Assimilation and the Rise of “Identity Sects” Western Europe and the US Face Significant Challenges to Their Creeds and Cultures The Radicalizing Search for Identity and Meaning The Velocity, Scale and Difference of Migrant Entry Into Dissimilar Cultures Assimilation Is Not Easy Under the Best of Circumstances ISIS, al-Qaeda and The Old Man of the Mountain What Are the Creedal Values For Which Western Nations Should Expect Commitment from Immigrants and Citizens? “Warning! Do Not Approach!” Beyond Non-Assimilation to Cultural Transformation The Right to Preserve a “Cultural Ecosystem” The …

Surveillance, Speech Suppression And Degradation Of The Rule Of Law In The “Post-Democracy Electronic State”, David Barnhizer

David Barnhizer

None of us can claim the quality of original insight achieved by Alexis de Tocqueville in his early 19th Century classic Democracy in America in his observation that the “soft” repression of democracy was unlike that in any other political form. It is impossible to deny that we in the US, the United Kingdom and Western Europe are experiencing just such a “gentle” drift of the kind that Tocqueville describes, losing our democratic integrity amid an increasingly “pretend” democracy. He explained: “[T]he supreme power [of government] then extends its arm over the whole community. It covers the surface of society …

Unexpected Insights Into Terrorism And National Security Law Through Children’S Literature: Reading The Butter Battle Book As Monstrosity, Nick J. Sciullo

Nick J. Sciullo

Legal knowledge often comes from unexpected encounters with legal theory. In this Essay, I critically analyze Dr. Seuss’s The Butter Battle Book as a source of international legal knowledge. Although this text was originally written as a criticism of the Cold War, I find modern parallels to the evolution of terrorism and national security law theorizing in the United States. As a result of this investigation, I provide a unique window onto civil society, and our continued fascination with the specter of terrorism.

U.S. Judicial Independence: Victim In The “War On Terror”, Wayne Mccormack

Wayne McCormack

One of the principal victims in the U.S. so-called "war on terror" has been the independence of the U.S. Judiciary. Time and again, challenges to assertedly illegal conduct on the part of government officials have been turned aside without addressing the merits, either because of overt deference to the Government or because of special doctrines such as state secrets and standing requirements. This paper catalogs the principal cases first by the nature of the government action challenged and then by the special doctrines invoked. The U.S. judiciary has virtually relinquished its valuable role of judicial review. In the face of …

Assimilation Anxiety: Islamic Migration As A Perceived Threat To Western Cultures, David Barnhizer

David Barnhizer

In this cynical age it is common to smirk at claims about what is sometimes called American Exceptionalism, a term standing for the conclusion that America is an historically distinct (and better) system. To some degree it does represent cultural arrogance founded on assumption rather than fact. It also ignores “exceptionally” dark chapters in American history, including slavery, seizing of lands from Native Americans and imprisoning of US citizens of Japanese descent. Nonetheless it seems that given the diversity of the population and the sheer enormity of the nation that, as stated by an Asian Indian friend who is a …

On The Language Of (Counter)Terrorism And The Legal Geography Of Terror, Nick J. Sciullo

Nick J. Sciullo

In this paper, I will discuss the difficulties in defining a place for the global war on terror and the implications this lack of terrestrial bounds has for the law. I will then discuss the way language impacts not only the idea of terrorism, but also the politics of place. On our journey will be philosophers Martin Heidegger and Jacques Derrida, discussed extensively below, who help flesh out the important politics of language and place. Ultimately, I will urge for a deconstructive approach to the global war on terror, which I hope will encourage a more thoughtful consideration of the …

Zizek/Questions/Failing, Nick J. Sciullo

Nick J. Sciullo

In this article I am primarily concerned with presenting Slavoj Žižek3 as a legal theorist. Žižek has been a valuable contributor to critical theory and deserves a place in the pantheon of legal thinkers.

While his diverse writings are often relegated to other disciplines, they also position him as an important contributor to law and public discourse. I seek to illuminate how he mediates and interrogates the law by demonstrating how his scholarship is important to the lives of legal thinkers, questions of success and the law, capitalism, political practice, and terrorism. Because Žižek’s work is interdisciplinary and expansive, this …

The Case Against National Security Courts, Stephen I. Vladeck

Stephen I. Vladeck

Since September 11, calls for a hybrid national security court to handle special terrorism cases have taken on a new-found prominence, as courts and policymakers alike have struggled with the complex series of legal and logistical problems posed by the U.S. government's detention of enemy combatants, especially the hundreds of non-citizens so detained at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. National security courts are, for many, an increasingly attractive compromise solution to the seemingly irreconcilable division between those who believe that terrorism suspects are not entitled to the traditional criminal process and those who believe not only that they are, but that any …