Law Commons^™

An Exegesis Of The Meaning Of Dobbs: Despotism, Servitude, & Forced Birth, Athena D. Mutua

Journal Articles

The Dobbs decision has been leaked. Gathered outside of New York City's St. Patrick's Old Cathedral, pro-choice protesters chant: "Not the church, not the state, the people must decide their fate."

A white man wearing a New York Fire Department sweatshirt and standing on the front steps responds: "l am the people, l am the people, l am the people, the people have decided, the court has decided, you lose . . . . You have no choice. Not your body, not your choice, your body is mine and you're having my baby."

Despicable but not unexpected,³ this man's comments …

Book Review, Cindy Tian

Journal Articles

Reviewing:

Strum, Philippa. On Account of Sex: Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the Making of Gender Equality Law. Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 2022. 206p. $21.95.

Overqualified And Underrepresented: Gender Inequality In Pharmaceutical Patent Law, S. Sean Tu, Paul R. Gugliuzza, Amy Semet

Journal Articles

Pharmaceutical patents represent some of the most valuable intellectual property assets in the world: they can be worth billions of dollars if courts uphold their validity and find them infringed. But, if invalidated, generic drug manufacturers can get to market earlier, generating billions of dollars of revenue for themselves and creating enormous savings for consumers. Accordingly, drug patents are the product of careful, high-cost prosecution and are associated with high-stakes, bet-the-company litigation. But women lawyers are noticeably absent from pharmaceutical patent practice. This article reports an original empirical study finding that women comprise only one-third of the top pharmaceutical patent …

Topology Of The Closet, Michael Boucai

Journal Articles

Despite the closet’s centrality to queer culture and theory, the metaphor’s various meanings have yet to be disaggregated and defined. Following Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick’s identification of the closet with a “crisis of homo/heterosexual definition, indicatively male, dating from the end of the nineteenth century,” the present article uses an array of late-Victorian sources—especially The Memoirs of John Addington Symonds and Teleny, a pornographic novel sometimes attributed to Oscar Wilde—to describe and distinguish: (1) so-called latent homosexuality (“the unconscious closet”); (2) deliberate strategies of suppression, abstention, and reformation (“the conscious closet”); (3) clandestine pursuits of gay sex and sociability (“the double …

Menstrual Dignity And The Bar Exam, Marcy L. Karin, Margaret E. Johnson, Elizabeth B. Cooper

Journal Articles

This Article examines the issue of menstruation and the administration of the bar exam. Although such problems are not new, over the summer and fall of 2020, test takers and commentators took to social media to critique state board of law examiners’ (“BOLE”) policies regarding menstruation. These problems persist. Menstruators worry that if they unexpectedly bleed during the exam, they may not have access to appropriately sized and constructed menstrual products or may be prohibited from accessing the bathroom. Personal products that are permitted often must be carried in a clear, plastic bag. Some express privacy concerns that the see-through …

Dissenting From The Bench, Christine Venter

Journal Articles

This paper examines the oral dissents of Justices Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg from the year 2000 to the times of their respective deaths. It explores the concept and purpose of oral dissent and details the kinds of cases in which each justice was more likely to orally dissent. The paper analyzes the kinds of rhetoric that each justice used to refer to their subject matter, and argues that Scalia's rhetoric evinces a view of the law as "autonomous", operating independently of the facts of the case. In contrast, Ginsburg's view espouses a view of the law as responsive …

Sexual Lynching, Luis E. Chiesa

Journal Articles

Different groups of people experience rape in different ways. Empirical evidence confirms that women fear rape considerably more than men, that incarcerated males fear being sexually assaulted more than non-incarcerated males, and that transgender individuals are more fearful of being raped than cisgender individuals. In the case of women, fear of rape often conditions many decisions females make, including what to wear, where to go, and how much to drink. In the prison context, fear of rape leads many men to adopt overly aggressive behaviors as a way of safeguarding against being raped. Genderqueer people often follow a series of …

The Ground On Which We All Stand: A Conversation About Menstrual Equity Law And Activism, Marcy L. Karin, Bridget J. Crawford, Margaret E. Johnson, Laura Strausfeld, Emily Gold Waldman

Journal Articles

This essay grows out of a panel discussion among five lawyers on the subject of menstrual equity activism. Each of the authors is a scholar, activist, or organizer involved in some form of menstrual equity work. The overall project is both enriched and complicated by an intersectional analysis. This essay increases awareness of existing menstrual equity and menstrual justice work; it also identifies avenues for further inquiry, next steps for legal action, and opportunities that lie ahead. After describing prior and current work at the junction of law and menstruation, the contributors evaluate the successes and limitations of recent legal …

Gender Stereotypes And Gender Identity In Public Schools, Dara Purvis

Journal Articles

In recent years, claims brought by transgender students requesting accommodations from a public school have been framed under Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any educational program or activity that receives federal funding. Given the changing interpretation of Title IX from the Obama to Trump administrations, both statutory and constitutional arguments supporting the right of public school students to express their gender in any manner contrary to traditional gendered norms have renewed vitality. In the decades since Stonewall, students facing school discipline for nonconforming gender presentation that violated …

Fallen Woman Further (Re)Framed: Jewels And Travels, Tragedies And Secrets, Judge Hortense Norris, Mae Quinn

Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Youth Suffrage: In Support Of The Second Wave, Mae Quinn, Caridad Dominguez, Chelsey Omega, Abrafi Osei-Kofi, Carlye Owens

Journal Articles

The 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution is an appropriate moment to reflect on the history—and consider the future—of the right to vote in the United States. High school and college classes teach the nation’s suffrage story as integral to our identity, focusing on the enfranchisement of women under the 19th Amendment and African Americans pursuant to the 15th Amendment.1 Constitutional law courses also present the 15th Amendment as foundational knowledge for the legal profession.2 Critical legal theory and women’s legal history texts frequently cover the 19th Amendment as central to understanding the first wave …

Are We Economic Engines Too? Precarity, Productivity, And Gender, Martha T. Mccluskey

Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Compensatory Women's Rights Legal Education In Eastern Europe: The Women's Human Rights Training Institute, Isabel Marcus

Journal Articles

To compensate for the absence/minimization of women's rights in the law faculty curriculum in post-socialist states, in 2002 a coalition of women's rights NGOs, funded by OSI, developed a Women's Human Rights Training Institute (WHRTI) in Sofia, Bulgaria. Now embarking on its sixth cycle and having graduated more than 100 lawyers (mostly working in NGOs in post-socialist states), WHRTI has developed a women's rights legal education and training program triad consisting of feminist legal theory, women's rights legal practice, and feminist legal pedagogy. The goal of the program is to educate and train lawyers to understand and use various domestic, …

The Rules Of Maternity, Dara Purvis

Journal Articles

A diverse body of laws and regulations speaking to reproductive rights, healthcare, criminal punishment of drug use, termination of parental rights, and more creates the rules of maternity. These rules are guidance provided both obliquely and explicitly by the law's coercive power telling women both how to and who should mother. Rule one begins in pregnancy, with the message that "your body is your child's vessel." During pregnancy, women are counselled that doctor knows best. After the child's birth, the mother remains responsible for the people who enter a child's life, leading to rule 3: "mothers must always protect." …

Racial And Gender Justice In The Child Welfare And Child Support Systems, Margaret Brinig

Journal Articles

While divorcing couples in the United States have been studied for many years, separating unmarried couples and their children have proven more difficult to analyze. Recently there have been successful longitudinal ethnographic and survey-based studies. This piece uses documents from a single Indiana county’s unified family court (called the Probate Court) to trace the effects of race and gender on unmarried families, beginning with a sample of 386 children for whom paternity petitions were brought in four months of 2008. It confirms prior theoretical work on racial differences in noncustodial parenting and poses new questions about how incarceration and gender …

Result Inequality In Family Law, Margaret Brinig

Journal Articles

To the extent that family law is governed by statute, all families are treated as though they are the same. This is of course consistent with the equal protection guarantees of the US Constitution as well as those of the states. However, in our pluralistic society, all families are not alike. At birth, some children are born to wealthy, married parents who will always put the children’s interests first and will never engage in domestic violence. Many laws benefit these children, while, according to some academics, they either further disadvantage other children or at best ignore their needs.

This presentation …

Expectant Fathers, Abortion, And Embryos, Dara Purvis

Journal Articles

One thread of abortion criticism, arguing that gender equality requires that men be allowed to terminate legal parental status and obligations, has reinforced the stereotype of men as uninterested in fatherhood. As courts facing disputes over stored pre-embryos weigh the equities of allowing implantation of the pre-embryos, this same gender stereotype has been increasingly incorporated into a legal balancing test, leading to troubling implications for ART and family law.

'Truth And Reconciliation': A Critical Step Toward Eliminating Race And Gender Violations In Tenure Wars, Angela Mae Kupenda, Tamara F. Lawson

Journal Articles

In this Article, the co-authors confront one of the next generation issues for underrepresented groups in legal education: what happens after tenure victories, especially for the victors in a war wrought with gender and racial inequities? Even if all is fair in love, war, and tenure battles, it remains most troubling when, even in this century, acts of racial and/or gender aggression are targeted at qualified tenure candidates. These violations of the "tenure rules of engagement" based on implicit or explicit racial or gender bias preserve discriminatory practices that impact underrepresented groups and maintain the status quo in the academy …

From Turkey Trot To Twitter: Policing Puberty, Purity, And Sex-Positivity, Mae C. Quinn

Journal Articles

For over one hundred years, American social structures have largely embraced two central principles—the innocence of children and the omniscience of adults. But as we now know from behavioral and development experts, adolescents—neither children nor adults—challenge such simplistic categories. In resisting binaries, adolescents represent a threat to the standard world order. But rather than simply accepting the fluid nature of adolescents and adolescence, American adults continually try to manage, regulate and control teens in ways that deny their agency, encroach upon their personhood, and impede social change. From outward appearance, to physical presence, to intimate communications and engagements, young people …

20 Years Of Domestic Violence Advocacy, Collaborations, And Challenges: Reflections Of A Clinical Law Professor, Suzanne E. Tomkins

Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Challenging Presumed (Im)Morality: A Personal Narrative, Angela Mae Kupenda

Journal Articles

This narrative essay is about presumptions of (im)morality in academic settings. Such biased presumptions affect our abilities, even as educators, to work together and foster a society built on principles of justice that could help us work, live, and play better together. Learning to understand, work with, live near, and care about others are goals to which many of us would say we aspire. As law professors, we consider collegiality to be one of the factors we use in evaluating candidates for hiring and promotion decisions. However, these evaluations may rest not on the worthiness or respected humanity of others, …

Reflections On Presumed Incompetent: The Intersections Of Race And Class For Women In Academia Symposium--The Plenary Panel, Maritza I. Reyes, Angela Mae Kupenda, Angela Onwuachi-Willig, Stephanie M. Wildman, Adrien K. Wing

Journal Articles

Presumed Incompetent was produced thanks to the vision and commitment of its editors: Dr. Gabriella Gutiérrez y Muhs, Dr. Yolanda Flores Niemann, Carmen G. González, and Angela P. Harris. This symposium came to fruition because the Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice invited the two law professor editors, Professor Harris and Professor González, to convene a distinguished group of scholars from Canada and the United States to expand and deepen the conversation initiated by the book. The very successful day-long symposium and the publication of the resulting articles were made possible by the resources, time, and dedication provided by …

Promoting The General Welfare: Legal Reform To Lift Women And Children In The United States Out Of Poverty, Jill C. Engle

Journal Articles

American women and children have been poor in exponentially greater numbers than men for decades. The problem has historic, institutional roots which provide a backdrop for this article’s introduction. English and early U.S. legal systems mandated a lesser economic status for women. Despite numerous legal changes aimed at combating the financial disadvantage of American women and children, the problem is worsening. American female workers, many in low-paying job sectors, earn roughly twenty percent less than their male counterparts. Nearly forty percent of single mothers and their children subsist below the poverty level. The recession exacerbated this problem, mostly because unemployment …

'May It Please The Court?': A Short Story, Angela Mae Kupenda

Journal Articles

This story tells a fictional account of a black woman lawyer who is about to try the biggest case of her life. While many black women lawyers seek to express their individuality and bring the best of themselves into their work and lives, conventions and norms about race and gender force them to give huge attention to things that likely matter little in the long run. In this story, we go on a journey of self-discovery with the protagonist, Angel, in hopes that she will be able to please the court in this—her trial of a lifetime.

Revisiting Mary Ann Glendon: Abortion, Divorce, Dependency, And Rights Talk In Western Law, Margaret F. Brinig, Linda C. Mcclain

Journal Articles

This essay revisits Mary Ann Glendon’s comparative law study, Abortion and Divorce in Western Law and her subsequent book, Rights Talk: The Impoverishment of Political Discourse. Glendon’s comparative study actually included a third topic: “forms of dependency which are connected with pregnancy, marriage, and child raising.” The topic of dependency has obvious relevance to consideration of intergenerational obligations and the interplay between family responsibility and societal responsibility for addressing dependency needs. A central claim Glendon made in both books is that the U.S. legal tradition is “libertarian,” views individuals as “lone rights bearers,” and exalts the “right to be …

Feminist Legal Realism, Mae C. Quinn

Journal Articles

This Article begins to rethink current conceptions of two of the most significant legal movements in this country1—Legal Realism and Feminist Jurisprudence. The story of Legal Realism has been retold for decades. Authors have dedicated countless books,2 law review articles,3 and blog posts4 to the subject. Legal and other scholars repeatedly have attempted to define better the movement and ascertain its adherents. Although the usual suspects— Karl Llewellyn, Roscoe Pound, and Jerome Frank—are almost always a part of the conversation, surprisingly few agree on the totality of Realism’s personage or parameters. The lists of those considered realists— and there are …

A Female Disease: The Unintentional Gendering Of Fibromyalgia Social Security Claims, Dara Purvis

Journal Articles

Social Security disability claims are not supposed to be decided based on the gender of the applicant. Reliance on the apparently neutral mechanism of clinical medical evidence, however, has a disproportionate impact on women bringing disability claims based on fibromyalgia. Recognizing and identifying disability has been delegated by Congress and the Social Security Administration almost entirely to physicians, based upon a misguided and mistaken belief that clinical medical evidence evaluated by a trained physician will answer with certainty whether an individual claimant is capable of working. Fibromyalgia, a diffuse syndrome characterized by excess pain that is overwhelmingly diagnosed in women …

Female Law Students, Gendered Self-Evaluation, And The Promise Of Positive Psychology, Dara Purvis

Journal Articles

For the last several decades, studies and surveys have shown that female law students perform worse and feel worse about their experiences in law school than do male students. Hidden in average figures, however, is a subgroup of female students who thrive. Positive psychology, focusing on what traits make people happy rather than how to alleviate depression, provides novel ideas of how to improve legal education for women without making accommodations specifically targeting gender.

Motherhood And The Constitution: (Re)Thinking The Power Of Women To Facilitate Change, Angela Mae Kupenda

Journal Articles

Women face many barriers in the journey toward equality. Participants at American Association of Law Schools' ("AALS") recent "Workshop on Women Rethinking Equality" addressed the structural, and perhaps sometimes intentional, barriers constructed by societal forces and by the law against women's struggles for various types of equality. At the workshop, many of us pointed to all of the things "they," meaning others, should do to help dismantle these barriers and to help women forge equality. I agree many barriers remain that must be dismantled, and there is much "they" should do to rectify the generations of obstacles and limitations placed …

Academic War Strategies For Nonviolent Armies Of One, Angela Mae Kupenda

Journal Articles

To engage the legal system in necessary critical action, critical actors are required. The law cannot be uprooted, re-sowed, and re-cultivated, unless future legal professionals engage in such action. And for future legal professionals to engage in such action, generally, they must first be engaged in critical thought during their legal educations. Moreover, for such thought to occur, the legal academy must include a diverse group of voices, minds, and experiences to engage with those seeking such a critical education. These critical voices may be in short supply in the academy for multiple reasons. One specific reason, though, is that …