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Full-Text Articles in Law

Empathy And Reasoning In Context: Thinking About Anti-Gay Bullying, Kris Franklin Jan 2014

Empathy And Reasoning In Context: Thinking About Anti-Gay Bullying, Kris Franklin

Articles & Chapters

“Empathy” has negative connotations for many legal theorists, who may conceive of it as subjective, lacking in intellectual rigor, and emphasizing sensitivity over reason. Even those legal scholars who have embraced the importance of empathy in legal work have emphasized its affective dimensions: pointing out that empathy is central to human relations and motivations, and is therefore a crucial lawyering skill. This paper builds on social science literature that identifies both cognitive and affective dimensions to empathy, and recasts empathy as in part a central component to higher-order thinking in law. It draws examples from empathetic reasoning in foundational cases …


'Baton Bullying': Understanding Multi-Aggressor Rotation In Anti-Harassment Cases, Kris Franklin Jan 2013

'Baton Bullying': Understanding Multi-Aggressor Rotation In Anti-Harassment Cases, Kris Franklin

Articles & Chapters

Schools are increasingly expected to intervene to prevent the sorts of bullying behavior that can interfere with education. If they do so inadequately, as a number of recent cases show, school districts may be held liable under Title IX for their “deliberate indifference” to harassment that effectively prevents the victim from receiving the benefits of public education. In popular imagination, “bullying” usually consists of one aggressor terrorizing one victim, sometimes with the assistance or tacit approval of other students. But least with respect to the many cases of students being targeted because they were, or were perceived to be, gay, …


Marriage Rights And The Good Life: A Sociological Theory Of Marriage And Constitutional Law, Ari Ezra Waldman Jan 2013

Marriage Rights And The Good Life: A Sociological Theory Of Marriage And Constitutional Law, Ari Ezra Waldman

Articles & Chapters

This is the first in a series of three Articles investigating the underappreciated role that the social theory of Emile Durkheim plays in the quest for the freedom to marry for gay Americans. To that end, this Article begins the discussion by examining the Durkheimian legal arguments that go unnoticed in equal protection and due process claims against marriage discrimination. This Article challenges two assumptions: first, that the most effective legal argument for marriage rights is a purely liberal one, and second, that the substance and rhetoric of liberal toleration cannot exist symbiotically in the marriage discrimination debate with a …


The Authoritative Moment: Exploring The Boundaries Of Interpretation In The Recognition Of Queer Families, Kris Franklin Jan 2006

The Authoritative Moment: Exploring The Boundaries Of Interpretation In The Recognition Of Queer Families, Kris Franklin

Articles & Chapters

This article examines the boundaries of judicial interpretation as courts struggle to define the families formed by lesbians, gay men and transexuals. It compares the jurisprudence of numerous state courts examining queer families in different contexts. The article identifies three interwoven components of judicial reasoning: "lex" reasoning, grounded in the jurisdiction's binding and persuasive law; factual reasoning in which the courts must categorize queer families as analogous to those the law already recognizes or instead as something quite new and distinct; and finally methodological reasoning, in which courts self-consciously examine the boundaries of their own interpretive authority. Showing that in …


Homophobia And The 'Mathew Shepard Effect' In Lawrence V. Texas, Kris Franklin Jan 2004

Homophobia And The 'Mathew Shepard Effect' In Lawrence V. Texas, Kris Franklin

Articles & Chapters

This paper explores the significance of shifting cultural understandings of gay men and lesbians in the Supreme Court's majority, concurring and dissenting opinions in the landmark sodomy case Lawrence v. Texas. By examining the legal authorities in which the case's various opinions are grounded, the article shows that the differing positions taken by the Court reflect radically diverging views on the significance of homosexuality in contemporary culture.

Beyond the rather easy observation that the Supreme Court justices are speaking different languages in the Lawrence opinion, the article contends that the rhetoric of the majority and dissent converge on at least …


The (Queer) Revolution Will Not Be Liberalized, Sarah E. Chinn, Kris Franklin Jan 1993

The (Queer) Revolution Will Not Be Liberalized, Sarah E. Chinn, Kris Franklin

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.


Watkins V. United States Army And The Employment Rights Of Lesbians And Gay Men, Arthur S. Leonard Jan 1989

Watkins V. United States Army And The Employment Rights Of Lesbians And Gay Men, Arthur S. Leonard

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.