Law Commons^™

Reforming Property Law To Address Devastating Land Loss, Thomas W. Mitchell

Thomas W. Mitchell

Tenancy-in-common ownership represents the most widespread form of common ownership of real property in the United States. Such ownership under the default rules also represents the most unstable ownership of real property in this country. Thousands of tenancy-in-common property owners, including members of many poor and minority families, have lost their commonly-owned property due to court-ordered, forced partition sales as well as much of their real estate wealth associated with such ownership as a result of such sales. Though some scholars and the media have highlighted how thousands of African-Americans have lost an untold amount of property and substantial real …

Rural Access To Justice In The Golden State, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

The Women Feminism Forgot: Rural And Working-Class White Women In The Era Of Trump, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

Legal Deserts: A Multi-State Perspective On Rural Access To Justice, Lisa R. Pruitt , Amanda L. Kool, Lauren Sudeall Lucas, Michele Statz, Danielle M. Conway, Hannah Haksgaard

Lisa R Pruitt

The Finney County, Kansas Community Assessment Process: Fact Book, Debra J. Bolton Phd, Shannon L. Dick M.S.

Dr. Debra Bolton

This multi-lingual/multi-cultural study was called, Community Assets Processt, by the groups that “commissioned” it: Finnup Foundation, Finney County K-State Research & Extension, Western Kansas Community Foundation, Finney County United Way, Finney County Health Department, United Methodist Community Health Center (UMMAM), Center for Children and Families, Garden City Recreation Commission, and the Garden City Cultural Relations Board, because we intend for this to be an ongoing discussion. An objective, for those promoting the study, was to connect foundation, state, and federal funding with activities or services that addressed the true needs of people living in Finney County. The group was looking …

A Case Study In Rural Community Economic Development: Hill County Health & Wellness Center, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

Urbanormativity, Spatial Privilege, And Judicial Blind Spots In Abortion Law, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

State laws regulating abortion have proliferated dramatically in recent years. Twenty-two states adopted 70 different restrictions in 2013 alone. Between 2011 and 2013, state legislatures passed 205 abortion restrictions, exceeding the 189 enacted during the entire prior decade. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit recently upheld as constitutional several such restrictions, parts of Texas H.B. 2 (2013), in Planned Parenthood of Texas v. Abbott. That court is currently considering the constitutionality of a similar Mississippi law. These and other recent cases raise issues likely to be heard soon by the U.S. Supreme Court. Among the regulations at …

Policing Masculinity In Small-Town America, Luke A. Boso

Luke A. Boso

This Article explores masculinity in rural areas, and it addresses bullying and harassment of gay, bisexual, transgender, and otherwise gender non-conforming boys and men. While all men are under constant pressure to perform masculinity correctly and act like a "real" man, rural boys and men experience unique forms and degrees of gender policing and victimization. The confluence of geographic, social, religious, and economic characteristics common in many rural areas results in few available options for exhibiting acceptable masculinity; even benign and seemingly gender neutral traits quickly become proxies for effeminacy. Moreover, the cultural salience of rurality in the construction of …

Urban Bias, Rural Sexual Minorities, And The Courts, Luke Boso

Luke A. Boso

Urban bias shapes social perceptions about sexual minorities. Predominant cultural narratives geographically situate sexual minorities in urban gay communities, dictate the contours of how to be a modern gay person, and urge sexual minorities to “come out” and assimilate into gay communities and culture. This Article contests the urban presumption commonly applied to all sexual minorities and focuses specifically on how it affects rural sexual minorities, who remain largely invisible in the public discourse about sexuality and equality.

This Article makes two important contributions. First, by exposing urban bias, it contributes to a broader discussion about how law and society …

Walking The Tightrope: Balancing Conservation, Local Growth, And The Uncertainty Of Rural Development, Michael A. Powell

Michael A Powell

Economic development is a complex issue, and placing it in a rural context complicates it further, primarily due to issues with local governance and the difficulty in defining the term “rural.” The result is that economic development policies often ignore development in rural areas, and development in those areas becomes uncoordinated and unproductive. One exception is the Growth Management Act (GMA) enacted by the State of Washington, which established a rural development regime that decentralized planning but retained regional and statewide oversight. This paper uses a lawsuit filed against one of the GMA’s regional boards as a case study to …

Deconstructing Cedaw’S Article 14: Naming And Explaining Rural Difference, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) is the first human rights instrument to recognize explicitly rural-urban difference. It does so by enumerating specific rights for rural women in Article 14 and also by mentioning their needs in relation to Article 10 on education. In this Essay, I examine the Convention’s Travaux Préparatoires to better understand the forces and considerations that led to the inclusion of Article 14 and its recognition of rural people and places. I also assess Article 14’s particular mandates in light of both that drafting history and CEDAW’s other provisions, …

Human Rights And Development For India's Rural Remnant: A Capabilities-Based Assessment, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

The cachet that India currently enjoys on the world stage is linked largely to the booming high-tech and service economies associated with its megacities. Yet in terms of sheer numbers, India is not an urban nation. About a third of India’s population lives in urban areas, though that figure is rising quickly. One projection indicates that thirty-one villagers will continue to show up in an Indian city every minute over the next forty-three years — 700 million people in all.

Lack of sustainable development in rural areas is a major force behind the massive rural-to-urban migration across Asia. An enormous …

Judging Parents, Judging Place: Poverty, Rurality, And Termination Of Parental Rights, Lisa Pruitt, Janet Wallace

Lisa R Pruitt

Parents are judged constantly, by fellow parents and by wider society. But the consequences of judging parents may extend beyond community reputation and social status. One of the harshest potential consequences is the state’s termination of parental rights. In such legal contexts, the state assesses parents’ merits as parents in relation to a wide array of their characteristics, decisions and actions, including where the parents live.

Among those parents judged harshly in relation to geography are impoverished parents who live in rural places. We argue that such judgments are unjust because poor rural parents often do not have ready access …

The Geography Of The Class Culture Wars, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This Essay is a contribution to a colloquy about Joan C. Williams’s book, Reshaping the Work-Family Debate: Why Men and Class Matter (Harvard University Press 2010). Williams argues that class matters because socially conscious progressives need working class allies to achieve work-family reform for the benefit of all. Williams calls us not only to think about class and recognize it as a significant axis of stratification and (dis)advantage, but also to treat the working class with respect and dignity. Williams writes of the “class culture wars” between social progressives (mostly within the “professional/managerial class”) and the white working class. She …

Judging Parents, Judging Place: Termination Of Parental Rights In Rural America, Lisa R. Pruitt, Janet L. Wallace

Lisa R Pruitt

Parents are constantly judged, by fellow parents and by wider society. But the consequences of judging parents sometimes extend beyond community reputation and social status. When law and legal institutions get involved, such judgments may result in the termination of parental rights. In these legal contexts, parents’ merits as parents are typically assessed in relation to a wide array of their decisions and actions, including where they live.

Among those judged harshly in relation to geography are impoverished parents who live in rural places. Yet judgments of these parents are particularly unfair in that poor rural parents often do not …

Judging Parents, Judging Place: Poverty, Rurality And Termination Of Parental Rights, Lisa R. Pruitt, Janet L. Wallace

Lisa R Pruitt

Parents are constantly judged, by fellow parents and by wider society. But the consequences of judging parents sometimes extend beyond community reputation and social status. When law and legal institutions get involved, such judgments may result in the termination of parental rights. In these legal contexts, parents’ merits as parents are typically assessed in relation to a wide array of their decisions and actions, including where they live.

Among those judged harshly in relation to geography are impoverished parents who live in rural places. Yet judgments of these parents are particularly unfair in that poor rural parents often do not …

Judging Parents, Judging Place: Termination Of Parental Rights In Rural America, Lisa R. Pruitt, Janet L. Wallace

Lisa R Pruitt

Parents are constantly judged, by fellow parents and by wider society. But the consequences of judging parents sometimes extend beyond community reputation and social status. When law and legal institutions get involved, such judgments may result in the termination of parental rights. In these legal contexts, parents’ merits as parents are typically assessed in relation to a wide array of their decisions and actions, including where they live.

Among those judged harshly in relation to geography are impoverished parents who live in rural places. Yet judgments of these parents are particularly unfair in that poor rural parents often do not …

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

Lisa R Pruitt

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 …

Justice Deserts: Spatial Inequality And Local Funding Of Indigent Defense, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

Spatial Inequality As Constitutional Infirmity: Equal Protection, Child Poverty And Place, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This is the first in a series of articles that maps legal conceptions of (in)equality onto the socio-geographical concept of spatial inequality, with a view to generating legal remedies for those living in places marked by socioeconomic disadvantage. Written for a symposium on “rural law,” this article considers in particular whether the funding and delivery of government services at the county level in the state of Montana violate the state’s constitution because of the grossly disparate abilities among Montana counties to finance and provide such services. Pruitt’s analysis focuses on children as a particularly vulnerable and immobile population, many of …

How You Gonna’ Keep Her Down On The Farm, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

Migration, Development And The Promise Of Cedaw For Rural Women, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This Article explores the potential of international development efforts and human rights law to enhance the livelihoods of rural women in the developing world. In particular, the Article takes up the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), which enumerates in Article 14 specific rights for rural women as a class. Pruitt’s focus here is on Article 14’s guarantees in relation to land ownership, education, development planning, access to credit, marketing facilities and technology, and other rights that are linked closely to women’s role as the architects of food security. While CEDAW has attracted enormous …

Rural Families And Work-Family Issues, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This essay, an entry for the on-line Sloan Work and Family Encyclopedia, provides an overview of work-family challenges in the context of rural America. Among the issues addressed are lack of economic diversification and opportunity; deficits in human capital; the dearth of childcare, transportation and other services that facilitate employment; and the deeply entrenched character of gender roles in rural societies. The entry discusses not only concerns related to rural socioeconomic disadvantage, but also those arising from the distances that separate rural residents from work, educational opportunities, and services. The essay notes that rural families are sometimes disserved by policies …

Rural Rhetoric, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This Article investigates law’s constitutive rhetoric about rural people, places, and livelihoods. Specifically, it considers five categories of judicial opinions that discuss the legal relevance of rurality: judicial self-identification as rural; definitions of rural; line-drawing between rural and urban; taking judicial notice of rural characteristics; and idealized portrayals of the rural. Viewed together, these clusters of opinions reveal a comprehensive – if not entirely coherent – judicial portrait of rurality. They also provide an overview of the many instances when a rural setting is relevant to a legal outcome. Implicated are issues of tort, property, criminal, and constitutional law, among …