Law Commons^™

Modern-Day Slavery Ring Discovered On Georgia Farms: When Will It End?, Lizet Palomera Torres

GGU Law Review Blog

Although all people in the United States have fundamental human rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), not everyone can enjoy them equally. Many people, such as employers, blatantly disregard these core human rights and exploit their migrant workers. However, despite migrant workers being disproportionately vulnerable to abuse, it is not uncommon for migrant workers to be reluctant to report employers because of their fear of retaliation and their relatively poor position. These workers often do not speak the language, are in remote and segregated areas and are exploited through their immigration …

The Fashion Industry's Inner Beauty: Does The Uk's Fight Against Modern Slavery Measure Up To Its Ilo Obligations?, Olivia Landrum

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Can I Touch Your Hair?: Business Diversity, Slavery, Disparate Outcomes, And The Crown Act, Ashley Jones

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

This comment will begin by looking at why hair in the United States is related to issues of race. This comment will then look at how businesses’ rules for appearance and hair disproportionately affect Black employees. Next, this paper will look at Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to point out how the vague language has created loopholes, which allow businesses to lawfully discriminate against people with natural hair. We will then move to explore what role some city and state governments have had in creating natural hair-safe workspaces for employees in their respective boundaries. Lastly, we …

The Thirteenth Amendment And One Hundred And Fifty Years Of Struggle To Criminalize Slavery: A First Amendment Challenge To The Forced Labor Act (18 U.S.C. § 1589), Niles Stefan Illich

St. Mary's Law Journal

Abstract forthcoming.

Wearing My Crown To Work: The Crown Act As A Solution To Shortcomings Of Title Vii For Hair Discrimination In The Workplace, Margaret Goodman

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

On The Presence Of The Past In The Future Of International Labour Law, Adelle Blackett

Dalhousie Law Journal

Professor Blackett presented this talk as the Invited Speaker at the Schulich School of Law’s Horace E Read Memorial Lecture on 9 October 2019.

*This contribution has not been peer-reviewed.

Racial Prejudice In The Criminal Justice System, Tori Cooper

Jessie O'Kelly Freshman Essay Award

Racial prejudice against African Americans has been the leading cause of high incarceration rates amongst the African American community. Within the United States, the census reported that African Americans make up about 17.9 percent of the population, with one-third of the people making up the incarcerated population in America. The disparity in those numbers highlights the current situation that is plaguing the nation. Blatant cases of racial profiling that have received media attention are a true testament of the broken law enforcement system from coast to coast. Racial prejudice cases have affected the black American community since the beginning of …

The Thirteenth Amendment, Prison Labor Wages, And Interrupting The Intergenerational Cycle Of Subjugation, Josh Halladay

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment argues that meager or no compensation for prisoners, who are disproportionately black and other persons of color, entraps them and their children in a cycle of subjugation that dates back to the days of slavery, and this Comment proposes to interrupt this cycle by setting a minimum wage for prisoners and creating college savings accounts for their children. As part of the cycle, when people enter prisons and the doors behind them close, so do their families’ bank accounts and the doors to their children’s schools. At the same time, the cells next to them open, ready to …

The Birth Of A Nation: A Study Of Slavery In Seventeenth-Century Virginia, Randolph M. Mclaughlin

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Race based slavery in North America had its origins in seventeenth-century Virginia. Initially, the position of the African worker was similar to that of the indentured servants from England. During the early to mid-seventeenth century, both African and English indentured servants served for a period of years and received the protections to which a servant was entitled. However, during the 1640s there appeared examples of Africans also being held as slaves. Thus, during the seventeenth century there existed a dual system of servitude or bondage for the African worker. One basis for this duality was the common law practice that …

Connecting Nineteenth-Century Antislavery And Labor Movements With Twenty-First-Century Workers’ Rights, Anne M. Lofaso

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Thirteenth Amendment At The Intersection Of Class And Gender: Robertson V. Baldwin’S Exclusion Of Infants, Lunatics, Women, And Seamen, James Gray Pope

Seattle University Law Review

In Robertson v. Baldwin, the Supreme Court held that merchant seamen under contract could be legally compelled to work notwithstanding the Thirteenth Amendment’s prohibition on slavery and involuntary servitude. According to the Court, seamen were “deficient in that full and intelligent responsibility for their acts which is accredited to ordinary adults,” and therefore could—along with children and wards—be deprived of liberty. Over the past few years, however, several courts have applied statutory bans on “involuntary servitude” and “forced labor” (a “species of involuntary servitude”) to protect women and children in domestic settings. These cases suggest that Robertson’s categorical exclusion is …

The Paradox Of The Right To Contract: Noncompete Agreements As Thirteenth Amendment Violations, Ayesha Bell Hardaway

Seattle University Law Review

Employers in a variety of fields are increasingly imposing noncompete agreements on their workers as a condition of the workers’ at-will employment. These employees are working at or near minimum wage, in positions that require little or no advanced technical skills. Major news sources have highlighted this issue while covering recent employment litigation between Jimmy Johns and a pair of its former employees. In this litigation, two plaintiffs filed suit in federal court seeking injunctive relief and declaratory judgment invalidating the noncompete and confidentiality agreements that they signed with the sandwich maker. Granting defendant’s motion to dismiss, the Illinois District …

Is Modern Day Slavery A Private Act Or A Public System Of Oppression?, Maria L. Ontiveros

Seattle University Law Review

The government focuses on trafficking as the definitive form of modern day slavery. In doing so, it portrays modern day slavery as a private act with identifiable wrongdoers and views the Thirteenth Amendment through the lens of forced labor. Workers’ advocates, on the other hand, portray modern day slavery as a systemic form of oppression, supported by governmental policies on immigration and occupational exclusions. These groups focus on the Thirteenth Amendment through the lens of class. A historical analysis suggests that the proper approach views the Thirteenth Amendment through the lens of both class and labor.

Introduction: The Thirteenth Amendment Through The Lens Of Class And Labor, Maria L. Ontiveros

Seattle University Law Review

The articles in this Symposium are arranged in three clusters. One cluster focuses on the definition of slavery and involuntary servitude and the reach of the Thirteenth Amendment in prohibiting oppressive labor relationships. Another cluster analyzes several positive class-based rights that emanate from the Thirteenth Amendment. The final cluster examines contemporary examples of oppressive labor that could violate the Thirteenth Amendment’s proscription against slavery and involuntary servitude.

The Constitution And Slavery Overseas, George Rutherglen

Seattle University Law Review

This Article examines the resources available under American law to address the issues raised by extraterritorial enforcement of one of the most widely recognized human rights—to be free from physical coercion and the loss of liberty. Part I reviews the history of adoption, interpretation, and enforcement of the Thirteenth Amendment. The scope of the Amendment gradually expanded through the joint efforts of Congress and the Supreme Court, resulting in a prohibition that now goes beyond involuntary servitude to all forms of peonage, whether supported by state or private action. Part II then looks to other sources of congressional power—the Commerce …

The Last Legally Beaten Servant In America: From Compulsion To Coercion In The American Workplace, Lea Vandervelde

Seattle University Law Review

Historically, the law of master-servant allowed corporal punishment. Today it seems strange to contemplate that intentionally inflicted violence was ever an acceptable method of compelling workers to labor in America. Strange as it seems, the practice of striking servants to discipline them was considered a legitimate, implicit part of the relationship between masters and servants. Servants, as well as slaves, could be subjected to cuffings and even severe beatings as means of “correction” and compulsion to labor. Menial servants, apprentices, and domestic servants could be beaten with hands, fists, straps, sticks, and sometimes whips, all in the name of correction …

A Positive Right To Free Labor, Rebecca E. Zietlow

Seattle University Law Review

This Article seeks to resurrect a lost thread in our civil rights tradition: the idea that workers have a positive right to free labor. A positive right to free labor includes the right to work for a living wage free of undue coercion and free from discrimination based on immutable characteristics. Not merely the negative guarantee against the state’s infringement on individual equality and liberty, a positive right to free labor is immediately enforceable against state and private parties. A positive right to free labor is rooted in the Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution, which prohibits slavery and involuntary servitude …

The Lawyer's Obligation To Correct Social Injustice!, James F. Gill

Fordham Urban Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The Wages Of Human Trafficking, Rana M. Jaleel

Brooklyn Law Review

This article asks a deceptively straightforward question: What is the wrong of human trafficking? If the answer seems obvious, a closer look at anti-trafficking law reveals a doctrinal crisis. Human trafficking law has traditionally concerned itself with movement and how compelled or chosen migration estranges vulnerable people from the locales, customs, and resources that might otherwise shield them from exploitation. According to the U.S. State Department, however, movement is no longer a central element of human trafficking. Instead, “many forms of enslavement” are thought to comprise the core of the crime. The revocation of the movement requirement and the equation …

The Resurgence Of Forced Labor: How The Sixth Circuit's Decision In United States V. Toviave Endorses The Exploitation Of Children, Sophia K. Niazi

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

Comment arguing that the Sixth Circuit decision in United States v. Toviave was erroneous because the court failed to determine that the alleged forced labor was used as a means to control the children in the case. The comment looks at the reasoning in Toviave and explores the Sixth Circuit's reasoning in the case as well as the Federal Forced Labor Statute, the Federal Involuntary Servitude Statute and Michigan's current child abuse laws.

Slides: “Human Sustainability” In Natural Resources Industries: The New Frontier In Compliance, Social Responsibility, Disclosure, And Transparency, T. Markus Funk

Natural Resource Industries and the Sustainability Challenge (Martz Winter Symposium, February 27-28)

Presenter: T. Markus Funk, Partner, Perkins Coie

21 slides

Slavery And Information, Giuseppe Dari-Mattiacci

Giuseppe Dari-Mattiacci

This article shows how asymmetric information shaped slavery by determining the likelihood of manumission. A theoretical model explains the need to offer positive incentive to slaves working in occupations characterized by a high degree of asymmetric information. As a result, masters freed (and, more generally, rewarded) slaves who performed well. The model’s implications are then tested against the available evidence: both in Rome and in the Atlantic world, slaves with high-asymmetric-information tasks had greater chances of manumission. The analysis also sheds light on the master’s choices of carrots versus sticks and of labor versus slavery.

Victoria's Little Secret, Joe Lawless

MICCSR Case Studies

This mini-case outlines a series of articles that ran in Bloomberg outlining the use of child slave labor in the fair trade cotton fields of Burkina Faso that had been used exclusively in Victoria’s Secret products. Giving students and opportunity to develop strategies and tactics that respond to a real-world public relations issue, this case also lets students explore the CSR issues inherent in a firm’s supply chain. Although trying to do the “right thing” Victoria’s Secret got caught up in the certification dilemma that many firms face.

Forced Labor In The United States: A Contemporary Problem In Need Of A Contemporary Solution, Chrissey Buckley

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Legal slavery ended in the United States in 1865, yet the practice of forcing individuals to work against their will, oftentimes in inhumane conditions, continues today. Currently there are around 50,000 people working in forced labor situations in the United States (Bales 47). Although this number is smaller than it was during the 18th century, finding and freeing these individuals is difficult because they are hidden away and exploited. The United States is now at a critical juncture in its struggle to end forced labor. In 2000, the U.S. Government enacted legislation that holds perpetrators of forced labor accountable, and …

Property, Contracts, And Politics, Mark Tushnet

Michigan Law Review

Rebecca Scott is a historian, not an economist. Describing how a dispute over a mule's ownership was resolved, Professor Scott reproduces a receipt two claimants left when they took the mule from the plantation whose manager claimed it as well (p. 185). By contrast, analyzing property relations in the pre-Civil War American South, economic historian Jenny Wahl observes, "[E]conomic historians tend to [use] ... frequency tables, graphs, and charts." The differences in visual aids to understanding indicate the various ways historians and economists approach a single topic-the relation between markets and politics, the latter defined to include the deployment of …

The Thirteenth Amendment And Slavery In The Global Economy, Tobias Barrington Wolff

All Faculty Scholarship

The globalization of industry has been accompanied by a globalization of labor exploitation. With increasing frequency, U.S.-based multinational corporations are carrying on their foreign operations through the deliberate exploitation of involuntary or slave labor. This development in the foreign labor practices of U.S. entities heralds a new era of challenge and transformation for the Thirteenth Amendment and its prohibition on the existence of slavery or involuntary servitude. It has become necessary to reexamine the range of activities in American industry - and American participation in global industry - that the amendment reaches. I begin that reexamination here. In this article, …

Caste, Class, And Equal Citizenship, William E. Forbath

Michigan Law Review

There is a familiar egalitarian constitutional tradition and another we have largely forgotten. The familiar one springs from Brown v. Board of Education; its roots lie in the Reconstruction era. Court-centered and countermajoritarian, it takes aim at caste and racial subordination. The forgotten one also originated with Reconstruction, but it was a majoritarian tradition, addressing its arguments to lawmakers and citizens, not to courts. Aimed against harsh class inequalities, it centered on decent work and livelihoods, social provision, and a measure of economic independence and democracy. Borrowing a phrase from its Progressive Era proponents, I will call it the social …