Law Commons^™

Prisoners And Habeas Privileges Under The Fourteenth Amendment, Lee Kovarsky

Vanderbilt Law Review

The U.S. Reports contain no answer to a million-dollar question: are state prisoners constitutionally entitled to a federal habeas forum? The Supreme Court has consistently ducked the basic constitutional issue, and academic work on the question idles on familiar themes. The strongest existing argument that state prisoners are constitutionally entitled to a federal habeas forum involves a theory of incorporation under the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause. I provide a new and different account: specifically, that the Fourteenth Amendment's Privileges and Immunities Clause ("PI Clause") guarantees a habeas privilege as a feature of national citizenship, and that the corresponding habeas …

The Right To Vote Under State Constitutions, Joshua A. Douglas

Vanderbilt Law Review

This Article provides the first comprehensive look at state constitutional provisions explicitly granting the right to vote. We hear that the right to vote is "fundamental," the "essence of a democratic society," and "preservative of all rights." But courts and scholars are still searching for a solution to the puzzle of how best to protect voting rights, especially because the U.S. Supreme Court has underenforced the right to vote. The answer, however, is right in front of us: state constitutions. Virtually every state constitution includes direct, explicit language granting the right to vote, as contrasted with the U.S. Constitution, which …

Mistaken Identity: Unveiling The Property Characteristics Of Political Money, Spencer A. Overton

Vanderbilt Law Review

This Article argues that money contributed to and spent on political campaigns ('political money") possesses many of the traits that explain judicial respect for regulation of property, and that courts reviewing restrictions on political money should consider doctrines associated with the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment Property Clauses. As evidenced by the different degrees of respect afforded to regulations of property and speech, judicial treatment of a particular liberty interest can be explained by the presence and particular posturing of distinct functional issues such as distrust, scarcity, distribution, and interference with others' interests. Campaign finance jurisprudence, however, has categorized political money …

Reflections On "Buchanan V. Warlcy," Property Rights, And Race, James W. Ely, Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

The landmark decision of Buchanan v. Warley' has long deserved greater attention from scholars. Decided during the so-called Progressive Era, when segregationist attitudes were at full tide, Buchanan combined judicial protection of individual property rights with solicitude for racial minorities. Indeed, Buchanan represents both the resolute defense of property owners' rights against regulation and the most significant judicial victory for civil rights during the early decades of the twentieth century.

One can only speculate about the lack of scholarly interest in Buchanan. Possibly, the dual nature of Buchanan has made it difficult for scholars to assess. Perhaps the property-centered focus …

State Restrictions On Violent Expression: The Impropriety Of Extending An Obscenity Analysis, Jessalyn Hershinger

Vanderbilt Law Review

A group of minors allegedly attacked a nine-year-old girl at a San Francisco beach and "artificially raped" her with a bottle. The minors attacked the girl after watching and discussing a television network movie that portrayed a similar rape. The victim sued the network, claiming that it was negligent in airing the program.' In Miami Beach, a teenage boy shot and killed his eighty-three- year-old neighbor. Following his conviction, the minor sued three television networks for damages, alleging that a decade of viewing extensive television violence had incited him to imitate the acts that he had seen. Nineteen-year-old John McCollum …

The Hunter Doctrine: An Equal Protection Theory That Threatens Democracy, Robert H. Beinfield

Vanderbilt Law Review

Referenda effect basic constitutional objectives by allowing individuals to participate equally in the governing process. The Supreme Court recently relied on the equal protection clause of the fourteenth amendment' to invalidate a referendum procedure in Washington v. Seattle School District No. 1. A state initiative,which received support from a majority of the voting electorate,effectively forbade local school boards from implementing mandatory student reassignment programs aimed at eliminating de facto racial imbalance in state schools unless the electorate approved the proposed program. In finding an equal protection violation, the Court for the first time relied on a doctrine that it developed …

Prosecutorial Vindictiveness: An Examination Of Divergent Lower Court Standards And A Proposed Framework For Analysis, John J. Cross, Iii

Vanderbilt Law Review

The judicial response to the problems posed by the conduct of a prosecutor who brings increased charges against a criminal defendant for exercising his legal rights has not been adequate.Lower federal courts have adopted divergent standards, focusing on whether there exists an appearance of prosecutorial vindictiveness, a realistic likelihood of prosecutorial vindictiveness, or actual prosecutorial vindictiveness. By couching their analyses in terms of the prosecutor's motivations, these courts have ignored the overriding principle of substantive due process, which holds that fundamental constitutional rights should be afforded greater due process protection than nonfundamental rights. This Recent Development submits that courts must …

The Implications Of "Resegregation" For Judicially Imposed School Segregation Remedies, Charles T. Clotfelter

Vanderbilt Law Review

This Article examines the implications of changing racial patterns--particularly those tending to resegregate schools--as they bear on the formulation of judicial remedies for school segregation. The Article considers both the effect of changing residential racial patterns upon racial patterns in schools and the effect of school desegregation upon the level of white enrollment. A third question that also may be relevant in this connection concerns the extent to which the possible existence of such resegregation constitutes a legitimate consideration in school desegregation cases. For example,fourteenth amendment requirements may render white flight a wholly irrelevant factor in some desegregation cases. This …

Recent Equal Protection Decisions--Fundamental Right To Travel Or "Newcomers" As A Suspect Class?, Thomas R. Mccoy

Vanderbilt Law Review

The thesis of this article is two-fold. First, the Court's acceptance and application of the Shapiro-Dunn reasoning in Maricopa unintentionally demonstrated the intellectual inadequacy of that much-discussed line of reasoning. Read together, the Court's opinions in Shapiro, Dunn, and Maricopa establish a set of theoretical principles whose derivation is logically defective, whose consistent application would require unacceptable results in many other cases,and whose existence now forces the Court to distinguish arbitrarily other cases that, in terms of those theoretical principles, simply are not distinguishable from Shapiro, Dunn, and Maricopa. Secondly, despite the logical inadequacy and practical disutility of the theoretical …

Abortion After Roe And Doe: A Proposed Statute, Mark B. Anderson, H. Michael Bennett, Andrew D. Coleman, Peter Weiss, Richard K. Wray (Chairman)

Vanderbilt Law Review

On January 22, 1973, the United States Supreme Court ruled in Roe v. Wade' that the Texas criminal abortion statute, which proscribed all abortions except "for the purpose of saving the life of the mother,' 'violated the constitutional right of privacy. Justice Blackmun, delivering the opinion of the Court, declared that the concepts of personal liberty and restrictions on state action provided by the fourteenth amendment supported a right of privacy "broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy."' In a companion case, Doe v. Bolton,' the Court noted several impermissible procedural as well …

Recent Cases, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

Black citizens of Tate County, Mississippi, brought suit' seeking rescission of the County Board of Education's sale of a public school to a foundation that used the property to establish a private, segregated academy. Respondent, Tate County Board of Education, had determined that the continued operation of the dilapidated school would be uneconomical and had conveyed the property to a private citizen without knowing the purpose for which the school was to be used. The purchaser later conveyed the property to the Tate County Foundation, which established a private, segregated academy. Petitioners contended that the sale violated the equal protection …

Sex Discrimination In Employment Under Title Vii Of The Civil Rights Act Of 1964, Anthony R. Mansfield

Vanderbilt Law Review

On July 2, 1964, President Johnson signed into law the Civil Rights Act of 1964,' the most far-reaching civil rights legislation in history.Much has been written about the act, but almost without exception the writers have been concerned with the ban of discrimination in employment on the basis of race or color. But the most radical and troublesome characteristic of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act is its outlawing of employment discrimination based on sex. It is the purpose of this note to examine this largely ignored aspect of the act. The inquiry will first examine the regulation of …

The Waite Court And The Fourteenth Amendment, Howard J. Graham

Vanderbilt Law Review

Underscoring so much while leaving so much unsaid, this book is a powerful plea for post-1937 trends and constructions--not merely in the Supreme Court, but now in Congress. How does the nation, the Court, the Congress, make good a lost century? Chief Justice Waite's triumph--decidedly more modest in my estimation than in Dr. Magrath's--was that he dared, tried, succeeded--at least by half. The country's failure was that it so long did not--has not yet--even by half. Twenty years and three constitutional amendments after emancipation too many of our forebears, including all members of this Court except the former Union colonel …

Recent Constitutional Developments On Eminent Domain, John L. Bowers Jr., J. L. Boren Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

Although the provisions of both state and federal law that cruel and unusual punishments shill not be imposed are considered popularly to relate only to those punishments which exist solely in the books, the provisions are not useless today. Recent cases have shown a tendency to expand the scope of the prohibition, especially with regard to excessive punishment, and to incorporate the proscription within the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution. As respect, that which likely will be deemed cruel and unusual, little can be done beyond noting those situations in which the limitation has been applied. If a generalization …