Law Commons^™

Alaska Equal Protection: Constitutional Law Or Common Law?, Paul E. Mcgreal

Alaska Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Right To Participate, Samuel Issacharoff, Pamela S. Karlan, Richard H. Pildes

Law Quadrangle (formerly Law Quad Notes)

The following essay is excerpted and adapted from The Law of Democracy: Legal Structure of the Political Process, © The Foundation Press, Inc., Westbury, NY (1998). Publication is by permission.

Constitutions are often viewed today as constraints on majoritarian power in the service of minority interests. But constitutional ground rules also create the possibility of ongoing democratic self-government; constitutions establish relatively stable and non-negotiable precommitments that enable generally accepted structures of political competition to emerge and endure.

Despite the centrality of this role for the American Constitution , however, there is paradoxically little that the text or its history offers …

La Preuve Pénale Et Des Tests Génétiques: United States Report, Christopher L. Blakesley

Scholarly Works

A major problem for those analyzing U.S. criminal law and procedure is that it does not fit the Continental or British mold. There is no one single system, but parallel federal and 50 state systems each with its own legislature, laws, courts (including trial, appellate, and supreme courts), police, prosecutors and prisons. The authorities who enact and implement these laws are sovereign within their respective jurisdictions. Each state has police power over its people. The 10th amendment to the U.S. Constitution controls allocation of federal and state authority. It provides that whatever the Constitution has not designated as being within …

Striking The Rock: Confronting Gender Equality In South Africa, Penelope E. Andrews

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

This Article analyzes the status of women's rights in the newly democratic South Africa. It examines rights guaranteed in the Constitution and conflicts between the principle of gender equality and the recognition of indigenous law and institutions. The Article focuses on the South African transition to democracy and the influence that feminist agitation at the international level has had on South African women's attempts at political organization. After dissecting the historical position of customary law in South Africa and questioning its place in the new democratic regime. The author argues that, although South African women have benefited from the global …

Children's Rights And Family Autonomy In The South African Context: A Comment On Children's Rights Under The Final Constitution, Tshepo L. Mosikatsana

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

This Article investigates the nature and extent of the protection granted to children's rights in the South African Constitution. It concludes that the child-centered approach of the Constitution entitles children, as independent actors, to certain fundamental rights. Acknowledging both the parent-centered nature of the existing South African legal framework and the entrenched support for practices, many rooted in indigenous law and tradition, that contribute to the oppression of children, the author argues that the constitutionalization of these rights will contribute to the betterment of children in South Africa, proving to be more than mere moral exhortation. Under apartheid in South …