Law Commons^™

Challenging Race-Based Health Care Discrimination: A New Private Right Of Action, Aaron Pinkett

Northwestern University Law Review

The Hippocratic Oath calls on doctors to “do no harm.” Yet we know from extensive public health research that clinicians repeatedly cause harm to Black patients by dismissing their medical concerns, misdiagnosing them, and undertreating their pain. These practices of differential treatment for Black patients have led to steadily increasing racial disparities in health care outcomes throughout the United States. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits this type of disparate impact, but modern Supreme Court jurisprudence forecloses opportunities for affected parties to seek legal relief—despite the clearly established legislative intent of Title VI. However, another legal …

Reproductive Governance In China: National Policies, Human Rights, And Accountability Under International Law, Victoria Xuan Wang

Northwestern Journal of Human Rights

China’s reproductive policies, including the One-Child, Two-Child, and Three-Child Policies, have been widely criticized for violating women’s reproductive rights through coercive enforcement measures such as forced abortion, sterilization, and employment discrimination. This Article argues that these policies violate international human rights law, particularly the right to freely determine the number and spacing of children as protected under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).

Despite international scrutiny, China has largely resisted direct responses to criticisms from treaty-based and charter-based human rights monitoring bodies, including the CEDAW Committee, the Universal Periodic Review and Special Procedures …

The Enduring Genocide Against The Yazidis: How Iraq's Law On Religious Identity Violates The Human Rights Of Yazidi Survivors Of Isis Captivity And Their Children Born Of Sexual Violence, Michelle Xiao Liu

Northwestern Journal of Human Rights

2024 marked the ten-year anniversary of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) genocide against the Yazidis—an ethnoreligious minority community indigenous to northwest Iraq. Beginning in August 2014, ISIS executed between 3,000 and 5,000 Yazidi men and elderly Yazidi women and buried them in mass graves, kidnapped and converted young Yazidi boys to a radical form of Sunni Islam and pressed them into military service, and captured or trafficked over 6,800 Yazidi women and children, subjecting many of them to sexual violence. ISIS carried out its intent to eradicate the Yazidis through systematic murder, forced conversion, and sexual violence …

Statutes And Special Interests, Kirsten Matoy Carlson

Northwestern University Law Review

Who really decides what statutes say? Most Americans think that special interests play an outsized role in our lawmaking processes. Yet empirical studies have produced little evidence that special interests get everything, or even most of, what they ask for from Congress. This Article takes an innovative new approach to tackling the difficult question of how advocates influence legislation. It presents the first comprehensive empirical study of how advocates influence the law through amendments in the legislative process. The Article analyzes an original dataset of 2,137 witnesses and their testimony at referral hearings on 108 Indian-related bills in the 97th …

Constraining The Executive Branch: Delegation, Agency Independence, And Congressional Design Of Judicial Review, Jennifer L. Selin, Pamela J. Clouser Mccann

Northwestern University Law Review

While scholarship examining the relationship between Congress, federal agencies, and the judiciary reveals variation in the statutory details that affects administrative and judicial decision-making, few studies explore the extent to which congressional delegation decisions balance both the substantive and procedural independence of agencies against the possibility of the federal judiciary’s review of administrative action.

This Article enhances scholarly understanding of delegation by providing a qualitative, theoretical, and empirical account of the circumstances under which Congress manipulates federal agency exposure to the federal judiciary. Ironically, combined with statutory provisions dictating agency independence, increasing an agency’s exposure to unelected federal judges can …

Racial Discrimination In Retailers' Willingness To Accept Returns: A Field Study, Meirav Furth-Matzkin

Northwestern University Law Review

Black Americans have long faced discriminatory treatment while shopping in retail establishments, including, most notably, being subjected to increased surveillance, inconsistent pricing, and inferior customer service. Little attention, however, has been paid to other post-purchase aspects of retail transactions. Specifically, do Black Americans receive the same treatment as white customers when it comes to performing sellers’ formal policies or contracts? While it is understood that salespeople are often given discretion to deviate from standard form contracts, sometimes departing from the literal terms to satisfy consumers, there has been a notable absence of systematic exploration into how salespeople exercise this authority …

The Market Value Of Partisan Balance, Brian D. Feinstein, Daniel J. Hemel

Northwestern University Law Review

For the past century, Delaware’s constitution has provided that no more than a bare majority of judges on the state’s courts may hail from the same political party. Some scholars and jurists theorize that Delaware’s commitment to a politically balanced judiciary increases the state’s attractiveness to out-of-state corporations and adds value to Delaware-chartered firms. These claims echo a larger literature in law and the social sciences positing that ideological diversity improves decisional quality. Recently, a series of federal court decisions in the case of Adams v. Carney put these claims to the test. In December 2017, a federal district court …

Un©Ertainty And Dis©Omfort, Richard Chused

Northwestern Journal of Technology and Intellectual Property

This essay explores creative works that produce powerful reactions of discernment, hostility, or deep uncertainty from mysterious forms of “blankness.” They all use silence or similarly ineffable qualities to challenge the thoughtfulness and tolerance of audience members. They force us to understand that creativity sometimes manifests itself in strange and bizarre ways that test not only our viewing tolerance, but also our traditional notions of creativity and of intellectual property boundary lines. It is like forcing fully sensory-enabled people to think about creativity in ways that may mimic a small fragment of the daily experience of those with limited sight …

Quo Vadis, Fair Use? The Future Of Fair Use After The Warhol Decision, Vicenç Feliú, Josh Lida

Northwestern Journal of Technology and Intellectual Property

This article critically examines the recent Supreme Court decision in Warhol v. Goldsmith and its impact on fair use within the realm of visual art. The paper traces the historical development of fair use from its inception in Folsom v. Marsh in 1841 to its formal integration into the Copyright Act of 1976 and subsequent evolution through landmark Supreme Court rulings.

The article focuses on the Court’s scrutiny of the first factor of the fair use doctrine in Warhol v. Goldsmith, particularly the emphasis on commercial intent in determining fair use. It argues that the Court’s elevation of commercial …

A Supreme Sidestep: The Justices’ Artful Dodge On Platform Immunity, Leslie Garfield Tenzer

Northwestern Journal of Technology and Intellectual Property

The foiled ISIS plot to attack Taylor Swift concerts, coordinated by teens on social media platforms with a significant US presence, illustrates the dangerous consequences of unchecked online content. This incident, coupled with other tragic cases—such as the sexual exploitation of a minor lured through Facebook and Tyler Clementi’s suicide following a privacy violation on Twitter—highlights the urgent need to reassess 47 U.S.C. § 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Enacted in 1996, this law provides broad immunity to interactive computer services, including social media platforms, shielding them from liability for user-generated content. While initially celebrated as a catalyst for …

The Forgotten Fundamental Right To Free Movement, Noah Smith-Drelich

Northwestern University Law Review

There is a powerful fundamental right hiding in plain sight: the fundamental right to free movement. This right goes beyond the consistently acknowledged—though infrequently applied—fundamental right to interstate travel. The true scope of the Constitution’s protection of movement through substantive due process safeguards local, interstate, and international travel. Though overlooked today, the fundamental right to free movement has deep roots in history and tradition, and in the decisions of numerous state and federal courts, including the Supreme Court.

This Article is the first to examine freedom of movement using the history and tradition test for unenumerated fundamental rights. This Article …

Taking Back Control: Using The Takings Clause To Hold Animal Agriculture Responsible For Its Waste Problem, Rowan Aragon

Northwestern University Law Review

Between the mid-twentieth century and modern day, the animal-agriculture model has shifted from small farms to industrial operations. During that evolution, the negative externalities of animal-farming practices have intensified. One of those externalities—animal waste—has become particularly problematic. Because of the sheer number of animals raised in the United States for slaughter and dairy production, the magnitude of animal waste produced is overwhelming. To deal with this problem, animal farmers often liquefy the animal waste and then spray it onto open fields. In that spraying process, liquefied animal waste carries through the air and reaches nearby homes, coating those properties with …

The Healing Power Of Antitrust, Theodosia Stavroulaki

Northwestern University Law Review

Millions of Americans live in hospital deserts—communities where people lack geographic access to hospitals and primary care physicians. People living in these deserts often miss doctor appointments, delay necessary care, and stop adhering to their treatment. In this way, hospital deserts exacerbate the health disparities plaguing America. This Article demonstrates that hospital deserts are not inevitable but the result of several business strategies—including noncompete agreements and merging with competitors—and antitrust enforcers’ unwillingness to recognize these harmful practices as antitrust violations. To cure the issue of hospital deserts, this Article makes three proposals. First, antitrust enforcers and the courts should expand …

Do Ais Dream Of Electric Boards?, Robert J. Rhee

Northwestern University Law Review

When artificial intelligence (AI) acquires self-awareness, agency, and unique intelligence, it will attain ontological personhood. Management of firms by AI would be technologically and economically feasible. The law could confer upon AI the status of legal personhood, as it did upon traditional business firms in the past, thus dispensing with the need for inserting AI as property within the legal boundary of a firm. As a separate and distinct entity, AI could function independently as a manager in the way that legal or natural persons do today: i.e., AI as director, officer, partner, member, or manager. Such a future is …

Peeping Town: Drone Surveillance And The Exclusionary Rule In Long Lake Township V. Maxon, Stuart Massa

Northwestern University Law Review

For years, legal commentators have pondered the effect of the Fourth Amendment on drones, but purely as an academic exercise. No court had ever considered drone surveillance under the Fourth Amendment––until now. In Long Lake Township v. Maxon, a northern Michigan township flew a drone over a local resident’s home to gather photographic evidence of an alleged zoning violation. Relying on that evidence, the township sued to enforce its zoning ordinance. The resident moved to suppress the evidence, arguing that the drone’s warrantless surveillance violated the Fourth Amendment. The case made it all the way up to the Michigan …

Louboutin Lawfare: Exploring Conceptions Of Sanctions' Utility Through Export Controls On Luxury Goods, Vinita R. Singh

Northwestern University Law Review

There is widespread consensus amongst scholars that sanctions—the deliberate withdrawal of customary trade and financial relations—do not work. Despite this perception, states are deploying sanctions at an increasing rate. This Article explains this paradox by arguing the predominant notion of sanctions’ utility employed by scholars is unduly constrained, narrowly focusing on the ability of such measures to modify the behavior of sanctioned parties while disregarding the alternative benefits this instrument can deliver. To support this argument, this Article uses export controls on luxury goods deployed in connection with the Russo–Ukraine War as a case study. Under prevailing perceptions of sanctions’ …

Battered Woman Syndrome: A Legal Defense To Homicide, Savannah Plaisted

Northwestern Law Journal des Refusés

No abstract provided.

Calling Lawyers In, Instead Of Out: The Role Of The Conscious Lawyer, Siwatu-Salama Ra

JCLC Online

No abstract provided.

What Does Npep Mean To Us?, Northwestern Prison Education Program

JCLC Online

The Northwestern Prison Education Program (NPEP) provides currently incarcerated individuals across Illinois an undergraduate education from Northwestern University. At Stateville and Logan Correctional Centers, admitted NPEP students work toward a Bachelor of Science degree, taking a full course load taught by Northwestern professors within the prisons’ walls. On November 14, 2023, the inaugural cohort of NPEP students at Stateville graduated from the program, making history as the first incarcerated students in the United States to earn a bachelor’s degree from a top ten university as ranked by U.S. News and World Report. This piece is a collection of personal reflections …

The Meaning Of Life, In Michigan: Mercy From Life Sentences Under The State Constitution, Molly Bernstein, David Shapiro

JCLC Online

Properly understood, the “cruel or unusual” punishment clause of the Michigan Constitution grants every person sentenced to life in prison a meaningful right to obtain release through rehabilitation. Today, however, Michigan has among the nation’s largest populations of people serving both formal and de facto life sentences without any meaningful possibility of release.

In 1850, Michigan revised its state constitution to prohibit “cruel or unusual punishment,” creating a contrast with the conjunctive “cruel and unusual punishments” clause of the federal Eighth Amendment. This disjunctive prohibition, which subsequent Michigan constitutional conventions retained, prohibits both “cruel” sentences and “unusual” sentences. We argue …

For Official Violence, The Devil's In The Dehumanizing Details, Rachel Kincaid

JCLC Online

In Excessive Force in Prison, Professor Sharon Dolovich tackles the shortcomings of the Eighth Amendment’s cruel and unusual punishment doctrine to govern uses of official violence against prisoners. She argues that law enforcement officers owe a duty of care and protection to incarcerated people, but that duty of care and protection is undermined by the dehumanization and demonization of prisoners. Professor Dolovich thus advocates for shifting the doctrinal standard for excessive force under the Eighth Amendment to one based on objective reasonableness, paired with jury instructions explicitly reminding jurors of incarcerated victims’ humanity. To counteract the vagaries of such an …

From Oppenheimer To Trump: An Exploration Of The American History Of Prosecution And Persecution In Classified Information Dissemination, Samuel Bevenour

JCLC Online

Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb, was stripped of his security clearance before documents were properly classified and without access to exculpatory evidence in what amounted to a show trial. The modern, peace-time classification system has expanded into an arguably uncontrollable leviathan that has proven unable to be curtailed by either political party despite bipartisan support. The usage of the related Espionage Act to enforce the ever-growing secrecy state has a problematic history of being utilized in politically motivated prosecutions in which defendants still face an uphill battle to gain access to exculpatory information. These prosecutions, under the …

Juvenile Drug Offenses: Rethinking Criminal Justice Approaches And Intervention Strategies, Lucas Kelly

JCLC Online

Juveniles, whose offending nature fundamentally differs from that of adults, should not be subjected to the traditional criminal justice system for drug offenses. Juvenile drug offenders warrant heightened attention due to their diminished capacity for reasoned judgment, increased susceptibility to the effects of drugs, the profound impact that criminal drug charges have on their future, and the possible presence of Substance Use Disorder. This Comment breaks down ways in which the U.S. has handled, and currently handles, juvenile drug offenders. I will also explore the long-term and short-term effects of drug convictions for juveniles, the issue of culpability and susceptibility …

A Practitioner's Response To "Excessive Force In Prison": The Real-World Implications Of Professor Dolovich's Proposed 8th Amendment Standard, Alan Mills

JCLC Online

In Excessive Force in Prison, Professor Sharon Dolovich has proposed a new standard for liability in excessive force cases brought by prisoners against prison officials, shifting the Eighth Amendment analysis from its current deference to correctional officers’ judgment to a “morally robust reasonableness standard.”

While Professor Dolovich’s argument is righteous and compelling, its potential to practically impact prison litigation is lacking. This Article responds to Professor Dolovich’s recent piece from the perspective of a practitioner with decades of experience litigating prisoners’ rights cases in state and federal court. Based on this experience, this Article suggests that Professor Dolovich’s new …

On Blockchain As A Tool Against Corporate Corruption, Yannis Normand

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

Over the last decades domestic and international legal frameworks have successfully coalesced to limit corrupt behavior worldwide. However, despite their success, current regulatory tools are not sufficiently well-equipped to address corruption in modern economic settings. These mechanisms can often be too costly to implement, too cumbersome to induce compliance, politically manipulatable, and may disincentivize foreign investment and internal corporate monitoring efforts. To address such drawbacks, policymakers should consider the introduction of blockchain-based tools in developing future anti-corruption efforts.

Blockchain can serve as a foundation for structures that can make it more attractive, easier and cost-efficient to monitor economic transactions, to …

The War On Trade: Applying The Wto Security Exceptions To Economic Security Measures, Ian Allen

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

This article examines the efficacy of the WTO treaties’ security exception provisions in curbing abusive appeals to national security to justify otherwise impermissible trade measures. It specifically explores whether GATT Article XXI and its sister provisions establish objectively discernible prerequisite conditions for their invocation, how far Member discretion extends in defining “essential security interests,” and whether the WTO dispute system offers sufficiently objective legal standards to prevent abuse of the security exceptions.

Building on existing scholarship, this article employs a comprehensive interpretive analysis of all available means under the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT) and integrates not …

The Clash Of Security And Commerce: Analyzing The Impact Of U.S. Foreign Trade And Investment Regulations Through The Lens Of The Tiktok Controversy, Xuemao Zhang

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

This Article examines the evolving tension between national security and economic globalization in U.S. foreign trade and investment regulation. Using the TikTok controversy as a focal point, it argues that American trade regulation has undergone a decisive transformation—from promoting international integration to prioritizing the protection of strategic technologies, data, and supply chains against perceived adversaries, particularly China. The analysis traces this shift from early tariff legislation, through the liberalizing trade era of the mid-twentieth century, to recent measures such as the Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act of 2018 and President Biden’s executive orders on inbound and outbound investment. The …

Due Diligence Obligations Over State Economic Entities In International Investment Law, Kevin Clement

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

The growing importance and sophistication of State capitalism and associated implementation of governmental policies through State economic entities, such as State-owned banks, State-owned enterprises, monopolies, and other entities close to the government, has given rise to a perception that existing international law rules are inadequate to effectively accommodate the activities of such entities. Sole reliance on customary international law principles of attribution has proven particularly problematic where governments maintain links with their economic entities that create a risk of the latter being used as conduits for governmental action. Such links may exist in a variety of forms beyond mere ownership, …

Forum Shifting To Regulate Data Privacy: The Creation And Evolution Of Eu Data Protection Law, Raymond Yang Gao

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

Currently, the European data protection regime has become one of the most influential legal frameworks regulating data privacy protection and cross-border personal data transfers. Despite a burgeoning body of scholarship on EU data protection law, the questions of why and how the EU adopted this regulatory approach remain understudied. Contrary to conventional wisdom, European data protection regulation is neither preordained by Europe’s historical or cultural legacies, nor simply a result imposed by powerful EU member states out of national economic interests. Instead, this work argues that this legal regime is the result of contentious lawmaking processes aimed at addressing regulatory …

“There Is No Fashion On A Dead Planet:”1 How A Mandatory Reporting Directive Shared By The Us And The Eu And Centered On Transparency Could Be The First Step To Increased Sustainability In The Fashion Industry, Adrienne Redman

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

The fashion industry hangs on self-expression and individualism, yet our methods of consumption and their resulting environmental impacts are far from an individualistic concern. This paper examines the global fashion industry’s substantial contribution to pollution, resource-depletion, and waste as evidence that the self-regulation model is insufficient to curb the environmental footprint of the industry. Self-regulation presumes that consumer awareness and the desire to purchase sustainably will be enough to limit the industry’s environmental impact. However, this presumption is undermined by a lack of standardized and enforceable regulations necessary for consumer-decision making. Instead, greenwashing and deceptive environmental claims have pervaded the …