Law Commons^™

Slapp Suits: An Encroachment On Human Rights Of A Global Proportion And What Can Be Done About It, Laura Lee Prather

Northwestern Journal of Human Rights

Freedom of expression is the underpinning of all other freedoms. Yet, increasingly, journalists, citizens, advocacy groups, whistleblowers, academics, and media organizations are being targeted and subjected to judicial harassment for informing the public about matters of public concern, denouncing authoritarian regimes, and exposing wrongdoing. These meritless lawsuits do not seek to right a wrong, but rather to silence and intimidate critics. They are known as “Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation” (“SLAPP” suits) and are on the rise globally. Because SLAPP suits are designed to inhibit ongoing investigations, stifle informed public debate, and prevent legitimate public interest reporting, they present a …

Black Liberty In Emergency, Norrinda Brown

Northwestern University Law Review

COVID-19 pandemic orders were weaponized by state and local governments in Black neighborhoods, often through violent acts of the police. This revealed an intersection of three centuries-old patterns— criminalizing Black movement, quarantining racial minorities in public health crises, and segregation. The geographic borders of the most restrictive pandemic order enforcement were nearly identical to the borders of highly segregated, historically Black neighborhoods.

The right to free movement is fundamental and, as a rule, cannot be impeded by the state. But the jurisprudence around state power in public health emergencies, deriving from the 1905 case Jacobson v. Massachusetts, has practically resulted …

Racism As A Threat To Financial Stability, Cary Martin Shelby

Northwestern University Law Review

This Article draws from several theoretical frameworks such as critical race theory, law and economics, and rule of law conceptions to argue that the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) should formally recognize racism as a threat to financial stability due to its interconnectedness with recent and projected systemic disruptions. This Article begins by first introducing a novel model created by the author through which to dissect this claim. This “Systemic Disruption Model” provides a theoretical depiction of how racism drives every phase along the life-cycle continuum of a systemic disruption.

First, with respect to the Model’s “Introduction” phase, this Article …

Enforcing Equity, Daiquiri J. Steele

Northwestern University Law Review

Federal administrative agencies that enforce workplace laws have dual responsibilities: (1) to prevent or remedy noncompliance with the underlying workplace law and (2) to prevent or remedy noncompliance with the law’s antiretaliation provisions. Disparities based on race, sex, and their intersection exist with respect to both of these types of employer noncompliance, as female workers and workers of color experience more violations of the substantive provisions and the retaliation provisions of these laws. While effective enforcement is vital to preserving workplace regulation as a whole, there is also an equity component to enforcement. Because workplace law violations disproportionately harm women …

Financial Inclusion, Cryptocurrency, And Afrofuturism, Lynnise Phillips Pantin

Northwestern University Law Review

As a community, Black people consistently face barriers to full participation in traditional financial markets. The decentralized nature of the cryptocurrency market is attractive to a community that has been historically and systematically excluded from the traditional financial markets by both private and public actors. As new entrants to any type of financial market, Black people have increasingly embraced blockchain technology and cryptocurrency as a path towards the wealth-building opportunities and financial freedom they have been denied in traditional markets. This Article analyzes whether the technology’s decentralized system will lead to financial inclusion or increased financial exclusion. Without reconciling the …

Climate Change, Corruption, And Colonialism: Solving The Conundrum With Regional Courts, Taylor Nchako

Northwestern University Law Review

It is no secret that climate change is the most pressing issue of our times. Global South countries, especially those in Africa, face challenges mitigating the worst impacts of climate change, adapting technological solutions, and continuing to develop their nation’s infrastructure and industry. Cameroon provides an archetypal example of the challenges many African countries face. Plagued by an economy that both exacerbates climate change and stands to collapse from it, Cameroon struggles with corruption that has roots in colonialism and neocolonialism. This corruption taints not only the forestry service and the executive branch, but the judiciary as well, leaving Cameroon’s …

Bending The Rules Of Evidence, Edward K. Cheng, G. Alexander Nunn, Julia Simon-Kerr

Northwestern University Law Review

The evidence rules have well-established, standard textual meanings—meanings that evidence professors teach their law students every year. Yet, despite the rules’ clarity, courts misapply them across a wide array of cases: Judges allow past acts to bypass the propensity prohibition, squeeze hearsay into facially inapplicable exceptions, and poke holes in supposedly ironclad privileges. And that’s just the beginning.

The evidence literature sees these misapplications as mistakes by inept trial judges. This Article takes a very different view. These “mistakes” are often not mistakes at all, but rather instances in which courts are intentionally bending the rules of evidence. Codified evidentiary …

Anti-Woke Capitalism, The First Amendment, And The Decline Of Libertarianism, Amanda Shanor, Sarah E. Light

Northwestern University Law Review

Firms across the globe, including financial institutions like banks, asset managers, and pension fund managers, are adopting strategies to account for the risks they face from climate change. These strategies include declining to invest in certain emissions-intensive projects or advising firms in their portfolios to report or reduce climate impacts and risks. These forms of private environmental governance can be characterized as one aspect of the “E” within a broader management strategy of “ESG,” or the management of environmental, social, and governance factors. Regulators in the United States and other countries are beginning to mandate that firms take some of …

Originalism After Dobbs, Bruen, And Kennedy: The Role Of History And Tradition, Randy E. Barnett, Lawrence B. Solum

Northwestern University Law Review

In three recent cases, the constitutional concepts of history and tradition have played important roles in the reasoning of the Supreme Court. Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization relied on history and tradition to overrule Roe v. Wade. New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n v. Bruen articulated a history and tradition test for the validity of laws regulating the right to bear arms recognized by the Second Amendment. Kennedy v. Bremerton School District looked to history and tradition in formulating the test for the consistency of state action with the Establishment Clause.

These cases raise important questions about …

Private Patrolling At The Boundaries Of Public Duty, Kathleen M. Naccarato

Northwestern University Law Review

In the shadow of contemporary debates over police functions, funding, and accountability, a new form of preventative policing has proliferated. Improvement districts, most commonly associated with downtown revitalization efforts, increasingly served a new purpose—crime control. Communities dissatisfied with public police services have found that they may leverage improvement district tax revenues to hire off-duty police officers to patrol their neighborhoods. This trend has not been without controversy. Critics have contended that these semiprivate, semipublic police patrols create a two-tier system of public safety, allowing wealthy residents to privately purchase powers that belong to the public as a whole.

This Note …

Fiduciaries In Priest's Clothing: Clergy Sexual Abuse And Fiduciary Duty, Sebastian Richardson

Northwestern University Law Review

This Note argues that clergypersons who offer religious guidance are fiduciaries in some limited circumstances and therefore liable for sexual contact that occurs between them and congregants. This Note will argue that clergypersons are most properly deemed fiduciaries through a fact-based definitional approach. As such, this Note departs from previous arguments that clergypersons are fiduciaries because they provide services analogous to secular counselors. Prospective fiduciary relationships involving clergy should be analyzed using a distinct conceptual account of fiduciary relationships rather than an analogical analysis based on apparent similarities between a clergyperson and other fiduciaries. Such an approach is preferable to …

Hocus Pocus: Modern-Day Manifestations Of Witch Hunts, Brie D. Sherwin

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

Witch hunts have never been about facts or evidence; rather they are about beliefs often fueled by fear. Witch hunts of the past persecuted the powerless – typically women or those who did not fit into “societal norms.” More recently, the term “witch hunt” has reappeared with great fervor in the political arena, used by the powerful to generate fear that serves a distinct political narrative that those in power are the true victims. Tweets, sound bites, and political speeches rife with accusations of a “witch hunt” reflect a modern usage which has served to delegitimize the historical context of …

Name Takings, Gregory S. Alexander

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

Personal names are an integral part of our identity. Names belong to us; they are ours. Names are a form of personal property and should be treated as such. Nevertheless, the state, both historically and still today, has perpetrated various forms of abuse of personal names, ranging from outright takings of personal names to official denials of preferred names. This Article surveys the variety of ways in which the state has committed these name-takings, as I call them. It includes historical examples of name denials such as African slaves and Canadian Indigenous school children. It then considers various forms of …

Belonging Matters: One School’S Strategy For Fostering Community And Confidence Among Students From Historically Excluded Groups, Alexi Freeman, Caley Carlson

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

For generations, law students from historically excluded and underrepresented groups—including but not limited to students of color, students with disabilities, gender diverse and gender non-conforming students, and students who identify as LGBTQIA+—have been expected to navigate their legal educations “successfully” despite the many challenges they encounter. This article describes Denver Law Ascent, a program at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law that is designed to provide critical supports to such students and cultivate a sense of belonging early on as well as throughout students’ educational journeys. Drawing from evidence-based research and best practices, Denver Law Ascent is one …

Third Coast Housing Solutions: The Case For Bringing Yimby Legal Activist Strategies To Chicago, Abigail Kuchnir

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

An insufficient supply of suitable housing stock is the root cause of issues like homelessness, overcrowding, and a cost burden on renters throughout the United States. A loose collective of activists and stakeholders comprise the YIMBY movement, an acronym for Yes In My Backyard. YIMBY advocates advance the perspective that additional housing stock is a necessary stratagem to improve housing availability and affordability, and they have used litigation as a tool towards developing new and diverse housing. This Comment examines the strategies currently used by legal activists in California, where impact litigation on this issue has been most prevalent. It …

The Doj Olc Transparency Act: Is Transparency Enough To Combat Problematic Norms In The Office Of Legal Counsel?, Sarah Patrick

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

Over the last two decades, the Office of Legal Counsel has come under scrutiny for controversial opinions that have advised the President on the constitutionality of his actions, from interrogation and detention of military detainees to presidential immunity from congressional investigation and subpoenas to testify. Its opinions tend to conform with the unitary executive theory and defer to the executive’s position—and that’s only the opinions the public knows about. The Office of Legal Counsel is not required to disclose its opinions, and often does not, citing concerns about national security and the need for confidentiality.

A recent legislative effort, the …

One-Way Ticket To Mars: The Privatization Of The Space Industry And Its Environmental Impact On Earth And Beyond, Yuree Nam

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

In the 21^st century, the space industry has changed from a government-focused practice to a rapidly growing private sector. Billionaires like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos operate private companies for the advance of space travel and exploration. Other companies like Lunar Outpost, ispace, and Masten Space Systems were selected by NASA to collect lunar resources back in 2020. The concern is that current international space law is insufficient to regulate private actors who play a significant role in exacerbating environmental problems. Whether it be rocket emissions and environmental justice concerns on Earth, or commercial resource extraction in outer space, …

The Rejection Of The Anti-Corruption Principle And Its Effect On Human Rights At Home, Juliet S. Sorensen

Northwestern Journal of Human Rights

21st century scholarship analyzing the Framers’ treatment of corruption asserts that their incorporation of anti-corruption means in the Constitution should be interpreted as a framework to inform contemporary judicial review and jurisprudence. Led by Zephyr Teachout’s article “The Anti-Corruption Principle,” this school of thought asserts that the anti-corruption principle should be on par with separation of powers and freedom of expression, a guiding lodestar in interpreting the Constitution.

This article submits that the anti-corruption principle of constitutional interpretation is, in fact, a rights-based approach to corruption, equating freedom from corruption with the other rights and liberties enshrined in the Constitution. …

Promises And Pitfalls In Un Regulation Of Judicial Independence, Martha Kiela

Northwestern Journal of Human Rights

This article investigates the current mechanisms and power of the UN to ensure judicial independence in the UN Member States. First, it surveys the UN bodies which play a role in creating international regulations for judicial independence and monitoring Member States’ compliance with them. Second, it analyzes the responses of these bodies to challenges to judicial independence by conducting case studies of Venezuela and Poland, and how these actions compare to those of other international organizations and tribunals. The central questions it seeks to answer are which mechanisms of review and enforcement have so far been the most effective in …

Toward A Multilevel Sociology Of Fraud, Brooke Harrington, Camilo Arturo Leslie

Northwestern University Law Review

This Essay applies a distinctively sociological multilevel analysis to fraud to provide novel insights and recommendations on an old problem. Rather than treating fraud as a problem of “criminogenic environments” or of individual psychologies and motivations, this multilevel analysis investigates the ways in which individuals (the micro level) interact with organizations (the meso level) and institutional systems (the macro level) to produce fraud. We illustrate these interactions and the insight that an interactive analysis can provide by using ethnographic data from an in-depth case study of the R. Allen Stanford offshore financial fraud. The case, which occurred in the Caribbean …

America's Anti-Fraud Ecosystem And The Problem Of Social Trust: Perspectives From Legal Practitioners, Edward J. Balleisen

Northwestern University Law Review

This contribution revives an autobiographical genre present in law reviews roughly a half-century ago, in which seasoned legal practitioners offered perspective on vital issues. Here, a senior deputy attorney general, a former federal prosecutor, a corporate defense attorney, and a legal aid lawyer each draw on their career experience to explore what they see as significant problems related to the law of consumer and investor fraud and the nature of consumer and investor trust. Their reflections emphasize the significance of law in action—how key actors seek to deploy legal mechanisms related to fraud and adjust their strategies in light of …

Health Care Fraud And The Erosion Of Trust, Katrice Bridges Copeland

Northwestern University Law Review

In health care, trust is a foundational concept. Patients must trust that their medical practitioners are competent to treat them. The trustworthiness of medical practitioners encourages patients to disclose intimate facts about their medical issues. Further, patients must trust health care providers to demonstrate impartial concern for the patients’ well-being, also known as fidelity. In providing care, the needs of the patients, rather than financial incentives, must drive medical practitioners. Without this trust, patients may not cooperate with diagnosis and treatment. In addition to trusting providers, care outcomes are better if patients trust the health care system as a whole. …

Fraud In A Land Of Plenty, Jonathan R. Macey

Northwestern University Law Review

This Essay discusses the regulation of fraud in a developed economy and offers some explanations for why fraud appears to be on the increase. Ironically, regulation designed to combat fraud can actually increase fraud by attracting economic activity to fraud-ridden industries. In other words, regulation can create problems of its own by fostering the false perception that fraud is being addressed even when it is not. This analysis is relevant in the context of the current surge in sentiment to regulate cryptocurrencies in the wake of the FTX and Sam Bankman-Fried debacle. Such regulation threatens to attract more resources to …

Square-Peg Frauds, Miriam H. Baer

Northwestern University Law Review

The square-peg fraud is a kind of case that until very recently enjoyed the widespread support of prosecutors, jurists, and the general public. Rather than punishing a scheme that rids a victim of her money or property, the square-peg prosecution has long focused on deprivations of intangible property. For years, enforcement actors have employed this concept to pursue innumerable varieties of corruption.

Nowhere has the square peg been more essential than in the government’s prosecution of higher education scandals. From the Varsity Blues parents who wrongfully secured elite college slots for their children, to the business school dean who shaped …

Consumer Fraud, Home Financing, And The Erosion Of Trust, Linda E. Fisher

Northwestern University Law Review

Consumer fraud is a civil violation of a remedial statute not requiring specific intent to deceive. Most consumer fraud statutes define violations as unconscionable, misleading, or deceptive practices irrespective of intent, in derogation of the principle of caveat emptor. They do not apply to business-to-business transactions. Trust plays a central role in business-to-consumer transactions. Because consumers are individuals, there is often an inherent inequality in consumer transactions. Sophisticated marketing techniques—especially target marketing that follows potential customers all over the internet—hound consumers’ online lives and manipulate purchasing decisions. The increasing monetization of almost everything exacerbates these effects. This transactionalism itself erodes …

The Persistent Limits Of Fraud Prevention In Historical Perspective, Emily Kadens

Northwestern University Law Review

Fraud has been ubiquitous throughout history, and so have the methods of fraud prevention. History demonstrates that no anti-fraud measures have fully succeeded in eliminating deceptive market behavior. Instead, this Essay uses evidence from premodern England to argue that societies and individual contracting parties balance tolerating a certain amount of fraud against the costs of fraud prevention.

Gender And Deception: Moral Perceptions And Legal Responses, Gregory Klass, Tess Wilkinson-Ryan

Northwestern University Law Review

Decades of social science research has shown that the identity of the parties in a legal action can affect case outcomes. Parties’ race, gender, class, and age all affect decisions of prosecutors, judges, juries, and other actors in a criminal prosecution or civil litigation. Less studied has been how identity might affect other forms of legal regulation. This Essay begins to explore perceptions of deceptive behavior—i.e., how wrongful it is, and the extent to which it should be regulated or punished—and the relationship of those perceptions to the gender of the actors. We hypothesize that ordinary people tend to perceive …

Auditing Overseas: How The United States Can Learn From Recent Financial Audit Reform In The United Kingdom, Daniel Damitio

Northwestern University Law Review

Financial auditing is one of the cornerstones of an effective capital market structure. When performed correctly, an independent financial audit provides investors with the security they need to effectively transact based on company disclosures. When this system fails, however, the results for investors and the economy as a whole can be devastating. In recognition of this danger, the market for financial auditing in the United States is regulated by a number of governmental and nongovernmental bodies charged with maintaining its health and effectiveness. But stakeholders within the U.S. market and government have criticized these regulators for failing to adequately respond …

Debt And Dependence: Foreign Interference In Haiti And The Importance Of Non-State Actor Accountability, Sandra Wisner, Brian Concannon

Northwestern Journal of Human Rights

Colonialist policies and lending practices by foreign states and non-state actors have led to serious and wide-spread violations of Haitian individuals’ fundamental human rights. In particular, a series of loan conditions imposed by international financial institutions and their members states left Haiti vulnerable to increased food insecurity and a severely diminished social sector. This paper proposes that the imposition of such loan conditions constitutes a violation of foreign actors’ obligations under international law respecting economic, social, cultural, and political rights, as well as their extra-territorial obligations (ETOs) to take joint and separate action to promote and respect human rights beyond …

Treaties As A Tool For Native American Land Reparations, Hannah Friedle

Northwestern Journal of Human Rights

"The only compensation for land is land."¹

Hundreds of treaties signed. Hundreds of treaties broken. The juvenile United States grew in size as independent Native nations ceded their territory through treaties. Thirsting for more land, the United States broke its promises and continued its manifest destiny westward. And what of tribes’ treaty rights to land? Some Native nations received financial compensation for treaty violations. But money is crumbs to many whose traditional homelands are still colonized.

Tribes are entitled to the land promised to them under treaties—instruments supposedly carrying the force of federal law. Land reparations are a partial …