Law Commons^™

Student Comment: “Love Is Patient, Love Is Kind”: A Comparative Study Helping The United States Reach Marriage Equality, Nicole Rush

University of Baltimore Journal of International Law

This paper evaluates same-sex marriage policies in three industrialized countries: the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Canada. In assessing the legislative and judicial history of same-sex marriage policies in each country, as well as other influential factors leading to these policies, this research helps to create a roadmap to reach a nationwide policy for the United States. By comparing the current history of the United States’ same-sex marriage policies to that of the aforementioned countries, it is possible to develop a plan to achieve marriage equality in the U.S.

Converge! Reimagining The Movement To End Gender Violence Symposium: Panel On Intersections Of Gender, Economic, Racial, And Indigenous (In) Justice, Margaret E. Johnson

All Faculty Scholarship

JOHNSON: This presentation envisions what a better domestic violence legal system might look like for persons subjected to domestic abuse who have not had their needs met or who have been harmed by the current legal system. The paper reframes the focus of the civil legal system from a paradigm of safety into a paradigm of security, including economic, housing, health, and relationship security. This reframing permits a focus on the domestic violence legal system and its intersecting systems of oppression such as race, gender, class, and ethnicity.

Currently, the domestic violence legal system targets short-term physical safety of the …

What Can Comparative Legal Studies Learn From Feminist Legal Theories In The Era Of Globalization, Dana Raigrodski

University of Baltimore Law Review

This article re-examines the field of comparative law and comparative legal studies through the lens of feminist legal theories/studies (FLT). It suggests that lessons learned from the development of FLT and insights from shared epistemology and methodology within FLT can inform the ongoing controversies within comparative legal studies and provide comparative legal scholars and practitioners with the tools to maximize the benefits of comparative legal studies in the era of increasing global interdependence.

Feminism, Democracy, And The "War On Women", Michele E. Gilman

All Faculty Scholarship

This article analyzes the social conservative attacks on women preceding the 2012 election cycle, known as the War on Women, and the ensuing feminist response. Combat was waged on many fronts, including abortion restrictions, access to contraception, funding for Planned Parenthood, welfare programs, and workplace fairness. The article discusses what this "war" means for the complex relationship between feminism and democracy. American democracy has had both liberating and oppressive effects for women, while feminism has sometimes struggled internally to appropriate the values of democracy and externally to harness its potential. Accordingly, the article explains the major political theories regarding feminism …

Myths About Women’S Careers In Law, Patricia M. Wald

University of Baltimore Journal of International Law

Judge Wald discusses several "myths" about women's careers in the law that she has encountered in hers, including the presence of hearty pioneers who despite obstacles and a cold climate pursued satisfying legal careers decades before the "women's movement" of the 1970's; the current status of women in the profession and the impediments to their further advancement, the enduring problems they confront in maintaining the "delicate balance" between marriage, motherhood and careers and the institutional reticence to accommodate their dual role, the need for vigilance to keep the gains they have already made from slipping away, whether men and women …

Symposium Dialogue: Keynote Speaker Senator Barbara Mikulski, Barbara Mikulski

University of Baltimore Law Review

MODERATED BY PROFESSOR MARGARET E. JOHNSON

The following is an adaptation of the Dialogue that took place on the campus of the University of Baltimore School of Law during the 2012 Applied Feminism and Democracy: 2012 Feminist Legal Theory Conference, on March 2, 2012. In an effort to present this dialogue in an academically appealing manner, minor formatting and grammatical adaptations were made, while maintaining the substance of the Dialogue. -EDS.

Reflections On Vawa's Strange Bedfellows: The Partnership Between The Battered Immigrant Women's Movement And Law Enforcement, Alizabeth Newman

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Luogo E Spazio, Place And Space: Gender Quotas And Democracy In Italy, Rachel A. Van Cleave

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Symposium Foreword: Applied Feminism And Democracy

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Comment: The Case Of Two Biological Intended Mothers: Illustrating The Need To Statutorily Define Maternity In Maryland, Catherine Villareale

University of Baltimore Law Review

Sam was born a happy and healthy baby boy, much to the delight of his mothers, Sarah and Jen. Although Jen gave birth to Sam, Jen has no genetic connection to her son. Biologically, Sarah is Sam's "ova mother"' because Sam was conceived through assisted reproductive technology using Sarah's ovum that was fertilized in vitro by an anonymous sperm donor and implanted in Jen. Both Sarah and Jen share a biological connection to Sam, Sarah through DNA and Jen through carrying him for nine months and giving birth. Consequently, Sam has two biological mothers. Yet, in Maryland, at the time …

Teaching Social Justice Lawyering: Systematically Including Community Legal Education In Law School Clinics, Margaret Martin Barry, A. Rachel Camp, Margaret E. Johnson, Catherine F. Klein, Lisa V. Martin

All Faculty Scholarship

There is a body of literature on clinical legal theory that urges a focus in clinics beyond the single client to an explicit teaching of social justice lawyering. This Article adds to this emerging body of work by discussing the valuable role community legal education plays as a vehicle for teaching skills and values essential to single client representation and social justice lawyering. The Article examines the theoretical underpinnings of clinical legal education, community organizing and community education and how they influenced the authors’ design and implementation of community legal education within their clinics. It then discusses two projects designed …

How The Expressive Power Of Title Ix Dilutes Its Promise, Dionne L. Koller

All Faculty Scholarship

Title IX is widely credited with shaping new norms for the world of sports by requiring educational institutions to provide equal athletic opportunities to women. The statute and regulations send a message that women are entitled to participate in sports on terms equal to men. For several decades, this message of equality produced dramatic results in participation rates, as the number of women interested in athletics grew substantially. Despite these gains, however, many women and girls, especially those of color and lower socio-economic status, still do not participate in sports, or remain interested in participating, in numbers comparable to their …

Cross-Dressers With Benefits: Female Combat Soldiers In The United States And Israel, Pamela Laufer-Ukeles

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Cedaw And Rural Development: Empowering Women With Law From The Top Down, Activism From The Bottom Up, Marta R. Vanegas, Lisa R. Pruitt

University of Baltimore Law Review

The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) is one of the most widely ratified human rights treaties in history, yet many view it as a failure in terms of what it has achieved for women. In spite of the lack of a meaningful enforcement mechanism and various other shortcomings, however, CEDAW has inspired feminist activism around the world and helped raise women's legal consciousness. While CEDAW itself is widely viewed as a product of feminist activism in the international arena, this essay explores the Convention's role as a source of-and tool for-grassroots feminist activism. …

Symposium Foreword: Applying Feminism Globally, Margaret E. Johnson

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Feminism In The Global Political Economy: Contradiction And Consensus In Cuba, Deborah M. Weissman

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Modern Hiv/Aids Epidemic And Human Rights In The United States: A Lens Into Lingering Gender, Race, And Health Disparities And Cutting Edge Approaches To Justice, Brook Kelly

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Sex On The Bench: Do Women Judges Matter To The Legitimacy Of International Courts?, Nienke Grossman

All Faculty Scholarship

This article seeks to advance our understanding of international courts' legitimacy and its relationship to who sits on the bench. It asks whether we should care that few women sit on international court benches. After providing statistics on women's participation on eleven of the world's most important courts and tribunals, the article argues that under-representation of one sex affects normative legitimacy because it endangers impartiality and introduces bias when men and women approach judging differently. Even if men and women do not think differently, a sex un-representative bench harms sociological legitimacy for constituencies who believe they do nonetheless. For groups …

Comments: Needlessly Fighting An Uphill Battle: Extensive Estate Planning Complications Faced By Gay And Lesbian Individuals, Including Drastic Resort To Adult Adoption Of Same-Sex Partners, Necessitate Revision Of Maryland's Intestacy Law To Provide Heir-At-Law Status For Domestic Partners, Madeleine N. Foltz

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Not Just One Of The Boys: A Post-Feminist Critique Of Title Ix's Vision For Gender Equity In Sports, Dionne L. Koller

All Faculty Scholarship

Title IX as applied to athletics is a high-profile, controversial public policy effort that has opened up the world of athletics to millions of girls and women. Yet as it is both celebrated for the opportunities it has created for women, and decried as going too far at the expense of men, a reality persists that women do not pursue or remain committed to sport in numbers comparable to men. This Article seeks to explore this phenomenon by moving the discourse beyond the debate over whether women are inherently as "interested" in sport as men to examine the conception of …

Sex Representation On The Bench: Legitimacy And International Criminal Courts, Nienke Grossman

All Faculty Scholarship

This essay examines the relationship between legitimacy and the presence of both male and female judges on international criminal court benches. It argues that sex representation – an approximate reflection of the ratio of the sexes in the general population – on the bench is an important contributor to legitimacy of international criminal courts. First, it proposes that sex representation affects normative legitimacy because men and women bring different perspectives to judging. Consequently, without both sexes, adjudication is inherently biased. Second, even if one rejects the proposition that men and women "think differently", sex representation affects sociological legitimacy because sex …

Balancing Liberty, Dignity And Safety: The Impact Of Domestic Violence Lethality Screening, Margaret E. Johnson

All Faculty Scholarship

This Article undertakes the first ever analysis of the consequences of the justice and legal system’s extensive use of lethality assessment tools for women subjected to abuse. An increasing number of states are now requiring their police, prosecutors, civil attorneys, advocates, service providers, and court personnel to assess women in order to obtain a score that indicates the woman’s lethality risk because of domestic violence. The mandated danger assessment screen of all women subjected to violence focuses only on the risk of homicide and thereby limits the definition of what is domestic violence. In addition, the accompanying protocol for the …

Returning Home: Women In Post-Conflict Societies, Naomi Cahn, Dina Haynes, Fionnuala Ní Aoláin

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Symposium Foreword: Applied Feminism And Marginalized Communities, Michele E. Gilman

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reflections On Judging Mothering, Chris Gottlieb

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

"Substantially Limited:" The Reproductive Rights Of Women Living With Hiv/Aids, Lisa M. Keels

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Comments: In Light Of Crawford V. Washington And The Difficult Nature Of Domestic Violence Prosecutions, Maryland Should Adopt Legislation Making Admissible Prior Acts Of Domestic Violence In Domestic Violence Prosecutions, Jay A. Abarbanel

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Stop The Killing: Potential Courtroom Use Of A Questionnaire That Predicts The Likelihood That A Victim Of Intimate Partner Violence Will Be Murdered By Her Partner, Amanda Hitt, Lynn Mclain

All Faculty Scholarship

Judges in domestic cases often underestimate the risk to a mother and her children that an angry and abusive father or other intimate partner poses. In a recent Maryland case, for example, two judges refused to deny a father visitation or require that visitation be supervised, despite the fact that the father had threatened suicide. During the father’s unsupervised visitation, he drowned all three of his children, then attempted to kill himself.

The Danger Assessment tool (the D.A.) developed by a Johns Hopkins Nursing professor and validated by herself and other social scientists shows how much the father’s thoughts of …

Bloodstains On A "Code Of Honor": The Murderous Marginalization Of Women In The Islamic World, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

In the real world of the Twenty-first Century, deep biases against women are prevalent in much of Muslim society. Although there is no explicit approval of honor killing in Islamic law (Sharia), its culture remains fundamentally patriarchal. As unfathomable as it is to Western minds, "honor killing" is a facet of traditional patriarchy, and its condonation can be traced largely to ancient tribal practices. Justifications for it can be found in the codes of Hammurabi and in the family law of the Roman Empire. Unfortunately, honor killings in the Twenty-first Century are not isolated incidents, nor can they be regarded …

Redefining Harm, Reimagining Remedies And Reclaiming Domestic Violence Law, Margaret E. Johnson

All Faculty Scholarship

Civil domestic violence laws do not effectively address and redress the harms suffered by women subjected to domestic violence. The Civil Protective Order (“CPO”) laws should offer a remedy for all domestic abuse with an understanding that domestic violence subordinates women. These laws should not remedy only physical violence or criminal acts. All forms of abuse — psychological, emotional, economic, and physical — are interrelated. Not only do these abuses cause severe emotional distress, physical harm, isolation, sustained fear, intimidation, poverty, degradation, humiliation, and coerced loss of autonomy, but, as researchers have demonstrated, most domestic violence is the fundamental operation …