Law Commons^™

A Constitutional Right Of Religious Exemption: An Historical Perspective, Philip A. Hamburger

Faculty Scholarship

Did late eighteenth-century Americans understand the Free Exercise Clause of the United States Constitution to provide individuals a right of exemption from civil laws to which they had religious objections? Claims of exemption based on the Free Exercise Clause have prompted some of the Supreme Court's most prominent free exercise decisions, and therefore this historical inquiry about a right of exemption may have implications for our constitutional jurisprudence. Even if the Court does not adopt late eighteenth-century ideas about the free exercise of religion, we may, nonetheless, find that the history of such ideas can contribute to our contemporary analysis. …

Impeachment Exception To The Exclusionary Rules: Policies, Principles, And Politics, The , James L. Kainen

Faculty Scholarship

The exclusionary evidence rules derived from the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments continue to play an important role in constitutional criminal procedure, despite the intense controversy that surrounds them. The primary justification for these rules has shifted from an "imperative of judicial integrity" to the "deterrence of police conduct that violates... [constitutional] rights." Regardless of the justification it uses for the rules' existence, the Supreme Court continues to limit their breadth "at the margin," when "the acknowledged costs to other values vital to a rational system of criminal justice" outweigh the deterrent effects of exclusion. The most notable limitation on …

When The Judge Is Not The Primary Official With Responsibility To Read: Agency Interpretation And The Problem Of Legislative History, Peter L. Strauss

Faculty Scholarship

As the other pages of this journal reflect, writing about statutory interpretation commonly builds on unarticulated assumptions about the occasion for interpretation, the identity of the interpreter, and the character of the interpreted text. In this paradigm, the occasion for interpretation is a litigated case – an episode has occurred for which the application of the statute is problematic. The interpreter is a judge, a person who resolves litigation – typically episodic, typically backwards – working outside of politics, and bearing no generic responsibility (that is, responsibility outside the decision of the case before her) for the statutory regime. And …

Religious Convictions And Political Choice: Some Further Thoughts, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

Let me start by putting my topic in a concrete context. Suppose a statute is offered to relieve animals of the oppressively cramped conditions of modern factory farming. Advocates claim that calves, lambs, pigs, and chickens should have a better quality of life before being slaughtered for food. Opponents argue that factory farming helps provide tasty, inexpensive meat and that farmers should be free to decide how to treat animals that they own. At stake in the decision whether to restrict farmers is some balancing of animal interests against human interests. In our relatively wealthy society the human interests are …

Implementing Brown In The Nineties: Political Reconstruction, Liberal Recollection, And Litigatively Enforced Legislative Reform, James S. Liebman

Faculty Scholarship

Opposed for a decade by a hostile national administration, faced with the prospect for decades to come of an unsympathetic federal judiciary, and amidst declarations of the Second Reconstruction's demise, civil rights organizations have undertaken recently to rethink their litigation agendas. I have two motivations for offering some thoughts in support of that task. First, the civil rights community has requested the assistance of the academy in reshaping the community's litigation agenda and, in my case, in identifying "new strategies for implementing Brown v. Board of Education." Second, my analysis of the principal "old" strategy for implementing Brown, …

Evaluating Child Care Legislation: Program Structures And Political Consequences, Lance Liebman

Faculty Scholarship

The American political system is not good at choosing among worthy goals and then adopting programs well designed to achieve the desired purposes. Scholars and activists continue to debate the success and failure of the last quarter century of efforts to reduce inequality and achieve other social reforms. But we have no well developed methodology for evaluating proposed programs and attempting to predict their likely consequences.

This Article asks what we know about choosing legal structures for programmatic efforts that seek social change. In particular, it asks whether we can predict relationships between different ways of pursuing public ends and …

Corruption, Legal Education And Change In West Africa: A Broader View Of Human Rights, Suzanne B. Goldberg

Faculty Scholarship

"Will we ever move again?" I wondered as I sat with my knees jammed into my chin, sore from the long and bumpy ride on the wooden plank which lined the back of a "bush taxi" – the only public transport between villages in Northern Mali. The "taxi" was actually a rusty and roadworn pickup truck packed with more than two dozen men, women and children, more than I ever imagined could fit in the small, flat space between the cab and the tailgate. "Why are we stopping now?" I smiled at myself as I felt a sense of exasperation …

Is Law Politics?, Philip Chase Bobbitt

Faculty Scholarship

Red, White, and Blue addresses the pervasive presence of five general theories of American constitutional law. These theories reflect particular jurisprudential ideologies governing, among other things, the legitimacy of certain arguments, the appropriateness of certain occasions for judicial intervention and the constitutional basis for judicial review. What makes this book interesting and important is that it provides an unwitting or at least unself-conscious example of the general theorizing it wishes to explain. For this reason, its descriptions of the particular family of theories that characterize American constitutional jurisprudence are distorted, while it disclaims any account of the particular set of …

Demarginalizing The Intersection Of Race And Sex: A Black Feminist Critique Of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory And Antiracist Politics, Kimberlé W. Crenshaw

Faculty Scholarship

One of the very few Black women's studies books is entitled All the Women Are White; All the Blacks Are Men, But Some of Us are Brave. I have chosen this title as a point of departure in my efforts to develop a Black feminist criticism because it sets forth a problematic consequence of the tendency to treat race and gender as mutually exclusive categories of experience and analysis. In this talk, I want to examine how this tendency is perpetuated by a single-axis framework that is dominant in antidiscrimination law and that is also reflected in feminist theory and …

Politics Across Borders: Nonintervention And Nonforcible Influence Over Domestic Affairs, Lori Fisler Damrosch

Faculty Scholarship

It is time for a fresh look at the norm of nonintervention in domestic affairs, as applied to nonforcible efforts to influence another state's internal politics. The existence of such a norm is widely proclaimed, and it is commonly assumed to be a legal obligation rather than a mere practice of comity or aspirational objective. For governments, scholars and international organs alike, the "rule" against interference in internal politics seems to be an article of faith; but despite the frequency of its incantation in international discourse, how the norm applies to nonforcible conduct is inadequately understood.

This article considers the …

Warrior Bards, Kevin Mccarthy, Michael E. Tigar

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

A Theory Of Political Control And Agency Discretion, Randall L. Calvert, Mathew D. Mccubbins, Barry R. Weingast

Faculty Scholarship

A major issue in the study of American politics is the extent to which electoral discipline also constrains bureaucrats. In practice, executive agencies operate with considerable independence from elected officials. However,the entire process of policy execution is a game among legislators.the chief executive. and bureaucratic agents. It includes the initial delegation of authority, the choice of policy alternatives,and opportunities for oversight and control. A simple model of this process demonstrates an important distinction between bureaucratic authority and bureaucratic discretion. Indeed.in its simplest form, the model predicts a world in which bureaucrats are the sole active participants in policymaking, but in …

The Confirmation Process: Law Or Politics?, Henry Paul Monaghan

Faculty Scholarship

In testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, I argued (and still believe) that Judge Robert Bork possessed surpassing qualifications for an appointment to the Supreme Court. Subsequently, I became persuaded that my submission was incomplete. Additional argument was necessary to establish that my testimony, if accepted, imposed a constitutional duty on senators to vote for confirmation. To my surprise, further reflection convinces me that no such argument is possible.

Presidential Influence On Congressional Appropriations Decisions, D.Roderick Kiewiet, Mathew D. Mccubbins

Faculty Scholarship

We investigate the extent to which possession of the veto allows the president to influence congressional decisions regarding regular annual appropriations legislation. The most important implication of our analysis is that the influence the veto conveys is asymmetrical: it allows the president to restrain Congress when he prefers to appropriate less to an agency than Congress does; it does not provide him an effective means of extracting higher appropriations from Congress when he prefers to spend more than it does. This asymmetry derives from constitutional limitations on the veto, in combination with the presence of a de facto reversionary expenditure …

Social Theory And Political Practice: Unger's Brazilian Journalism, William H. Simon

Faculty Scholarship

Roberto Mangabeira Unger is a citizen of Brazil. While working on Politics, his large-scale treatise on social theory, he has been active in his country's politics. Among the fruits of these activities is a series of political and programmatic commentaries on Brazil published in the Brazilian press. The commentaries apply the style of political analysis and the general political program elaborated in Politics to the recent circumstances of Brazil. Thus, they give an extended illustration of Unger's general social theory. At the same time, they exemplify a form of political writing that attempts to combine ambitious critical social theory …

The Dialectic Of Rights And Politics: Perspectives From The Women's Movement, Elizabeth M. Schneider

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Rights And Redistribution In The Welfare System, William H. Simon

Faculty Scholarship

The term "right" has a wide variety of connotations. On a very general level, it connotes a social commitment to the dignity and autonomy of the individual, an "affirmation of free human subjectivity against the constraints of group life." On a somewhat more specific level, one can distinguish procedural and substantive connotations. Procedural connotations concern official enforcement institutions. For example, in American legal culture, "right" often connotes judicial enforceability. Substantive connotations concern benefits or powers, such as freedom of speech or ownership of property, in civil society.

This essay is about the substantive connotations of the notion of "right" that …

Revolutionary Constitutionalism In The Era Of The Civil War And Reconstruction , Robert J. Kaczorowski

Faculty Scholarship

The meaning and scope of the fourteenth amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1866 remain among the most controversial issues in American constitutional law. Professor Kaczorowski contends that the issues have generated more controversy than they warrant, in part because scholars analyzing the legislative history of the amendment and statute have approached their task with preconceptions reflecting twentieth century legal concerns. He argues that the most important question for the framers was whether national or state governments possessed primary authority to determine and secure the status and rights of American citizens. Relying on records of the congressional debates as …

To Whom Does The Government Lawyer Owe The Duty Of Loyalty When Clients Are In Conflict, William Josephson, Russell G. Pearce

Faculty Scholarship

This Article focuses on the continuing debate on the ethical obligations of government lawyers: do government lawyers represent the people or do they represent a client? The Article explains that the dominant conception that government lawyers represent the people actually results in government lawyers representing themselves. After examining alternative approaches to determining the identity of the government lawyer’s client, the Article concludes that only one approach is consistent with both the ethical rules and our republican system of government. The government lawyer’s client properly understood is an elected official or, in certain cases, an agency head with legal authority independent …

Religious Convictions And Lawmaking, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

In this Article, presented as the 1985-86 Thomas M. Cooley Lectures at the University of Michigan School of Law on March 10-12, 1986, Professor Greenawalt addresses the role that religious conviction properly plays in the liberal citizen's political decisionmaking in a liberal democratic society. Rejecting the notion that all political questions can be decided on rational secular grounds, Professor Greenawalt argues that the liberal democratic citizen may rely on his religious convictions when secular morality is unable to resolve issues critical to a political decision. The examples of animal rights and environmental protection, abortion, and welfare assistance illustrate situations where …

Legal Informality And Redistributive Politics, William H. Simon

Faculty Scholarship

Until recently, one of the most consistent themes in both right and left critiques of the legal system has been the repudiation of procedural formality, that is, of specialized, rule-bound procedures. The left critique portrayed formality as facilitating the manipulation of the legal system by the privileged to the disadvantage of others. Both right and left critiques portrayed formality as expressing and fostering alienation and antagonism.

In recent years, however, attitudes toward formality on the left have become increasingly complex and ambivalent. This development may be partly a reaction to the rising prominence of a conservative rhetoric that links proposals …

The Federal Election Campaign Act And The 1980 Election, Richard Briffault

Faculty Scholarship

During the 1970's Congress and the Supreme Court paid the most sustained attention in American history to the financing of federal election campaigns. Congress passed a succession of measures, known collectively as the Federal Election Campaign Act ("FECA" or the "Act"), closely regulating the activities of candidates, parties, private organizations, and individuals in raising and spending campaign money.

Prior to FECA, election finance was largely an extension of the private marketplace. Campaigns were funded through private, voluntary contributions to parties and candidates, with donors contributing to the extent of their interest and wealth, and private economic inequalities were replicated in …

The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act And The Pursued Refugee: Lessons From Letelier V. Chile, Michael E. Tigar

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Constitutionalism, Bureaucracy, And Corporatism, Lawrence G. Baxter

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Judicial Review And The National Political Process: A Functional Reconsideration Of The Role Of The Supreme Court, Henry Paul Monaghan

Faculty Scholarship

Imagine a cold morning early in February. Slowly sipping coffee in an effort to awaken fully, you are reading through the Supreme Court advance sheets. You come across the following brief opinion:

PER CURIAM. Fisher v. Rye Co., No. 81-1, and First Savings Bank v. Smith, No. 81-2. These petitions for certiorari have been consolidated for disposition in a single opin-ion. No. 81-1 challenges an Executive Order that, in an effort to combat gender-based discrimination, requires government contractors to adopt affirmative action programs. No argument is made that the Executive Order is authorized by statute. Concluding that the …

The Burger Court And "Our Federalism", Henry Paul Monaghan

Faculty Scholarship

Dicey derided federal government as "weak government;" others have found genius lurking in its institutional arrangements. But most students, as Professor S. R. Davis's illuminating little book makes clear, have considerable difficulty in identifying what federal government is, whether the concept is approached analytically, legally, descriptively or normatively. American lawyers are not inclined to pursue such inquiries too far. For, like Justice Black, they are concerned only with "Our Federalism" and, like Justice Stewart and obscenity, they know it when they see it. Moreover, American lawyers have, in large measure, confined their attention to one specific component of "Our Federalism;" …

The Mccarthy Era: History As Snapshot, Michael E. Tigar

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Militants, Moderates, And Social Change, Michael I. Sovern

Faculty Scholarship

The thesis of this paper is a simple generalization: To the extent that social protest draws attention to its form rather than to the grievance it seeks to redress, it is likely to be unproductive. I add a quick qualification. In offering this generalization, I am assuming that the protester is genuine in seeking to redress one or more grievances and that he is not using the grievance as a subterfuge to pick a fight. If the purpose of the protest is in fact to provoke a repressive response, then, of course, my generalization is inapplicable.

We obviously have a …