Law Commons^™

The Music Of Mass Incarceration, Andrea L. Dennis

Scholarly Works

Intellectual property law reaches every aspect of the world, society, and creativity. Sometimes, creative expression is at the very crux of societal conflict and change. Through its history, rap music has demonstrated passionate creative expression, exploding with emotion and truths. Now the most popular musical genre in America, rap has always shared—and consistently critiqued—disproportionate effects of the criminal legal system on Black communities. The world is increasingly hearing these tunes with special acuity and paying more attention to the lyrics. Virtually every music recording artist would consider the following numbers a major career achievement: 500 percent increase; 222 percent growth; …

Deadbeats, Deadbrokes, And Prisoners, Ann Cammett

Scholarly Works

Historically, child support policy has targeted absent parents with aggressive enforcement measures. Such an approach is based on an economic resource model that is increasingly irrelevant, even counterproductive, for many low-income families. Specifically, modern day mass incarceration has radically skewed the paradigm on which the child support system is based, removing millions of parents from the formal economy entirely, diminishing their income opportunities after release, and rendering them ineffective economic actors. Such a flawed policy approach creates unintended consequences for the children of these parents by compromising a core non-monetary goal of child support system – parent-child engagement – as …

Expanding Collateral Sanctions: The Hidden Costs Of Aggressive Child Support Enforcement Against Incarcerated Parents, Ann Cammett

Scholarly Works

Legal barriers or "collateral consequences" arising from criminal convictions came to the forefront of the legal and policy discourse at the dawn of the twenty-first century, as the population of people with criminal convictions skyrocketed. These barriers act as restrictions to post-incarceration reentry into society, including the resumption of employment, occupational licensing, access to housing and public benefits, driving privileges, educational loans, immigration, voting rights, and other means of economic survival and civic re-engagement.

What is barely examined are the ways in which these barriers affect family law, specifically in the area of child support and the debt accrued by …