Law Commons^™

Three Mistakes About Interpretation, Paul Campos

Michigan Law Review

The single most important word in modem constitutional theory is "interpretation." The single most confusing word in modem constitutional theory is "interpretation." What accounts for this unhappy state of affairs?

I will try to show that Barry Friedman's assertions, as well as others that are but rephrasings of the same basic ideas, are not the common sense truths that so many constitutional theorists assume them to be, but are instead the products of an extraordinarily confused and ultimately incoherent set of assumptions regarding the interpretation of language.

The Constitution, The Legislature, And Unfair Surprise: Toward A Reliance-Based Approach To The Contract Clause, Robert A. Graham

Michigan Law Review

This Note argues that the Court should return to a reliance-based approach to Contract Clause challenges, fashioned loosely along the same lines as the HRID. Although it does not advocate that the Court revivify the rules created by the early decisions, the Note proposes that the Court look to the private parties' expectations and, more specifically, to the reasonableness of those expectations in deciding the clause's applicability to a particular case. Part I provides a brief history of the Contract Clause and its development. This Part follows the clause from the Constitutional Convention through the 1980s to illustrate the Court's …

Article Ii Revisionism, Cass R. Sunstein

Michigan Law Review

One of the most striking developments of the last decade has been the new use of Article II in public law adjudication. Article II is a prominent feature not only of cases involving the creation of federal institutions that are independent of the President, but also of new disputes involving reviewability, scope of review, and standing.

Professor Krent and Mr. Shenkman have performed a valuable service in spelling out the argument that Article II, rather than Article III, justifies constitutional limits on legislative grants of standing. Indeed, on several important matters, we are very much in agreement. In this brief …

Continuing Criminal Enterprise, Conspiracy, And The Multiple Punishment Doctrine, Kenneth G. Schuler

Michigan Law Review

This Note argues that the Multiple Punishment Doctrine prohibits the imposition of concurrent convictions and sentences upon criminal defendants found guilty of engaging in a CCE and conspiring to violate narcotics laws. Part I surveys the values underlying the Multiple Punishment Doctrine and traces the evolution of the Supreme Court's application of the doctrine to modern criminal law. Part II examines the various methods employed by the circuit courts of appeals to deal with simultaneous convictions and sentences for CCE and conspiracy. Part III reviews the test, identified in Part I, that the Supreme Court has implicitly utilized to analyze …

Legitimating Death, Louis D. Bilionis

Michigan Law Review

This article arrives at the surprising conclusion that a meaningful Eighth Amendment death penalty jurisprudence lives on, that it is a quite intelligible jurisprudence, and that it is driven by a coherent methodology with firm roots in the traditions of constitutional adjudication.

To reach that conclusion, it is helpful first to have some sense of what the Supreme Court has been doing in the death penalty area lately. Part I thus presents a topical review of the Court's recent work, identifying the themes that now dominate, pointing out the concerns those themes raise, and asking whether any sense can be …

Of Citizen Suits And Citizen Sunstein, Harold J. Krent, Ethan G. Shenkman

Michigan Law Review

After briefly summarizing Lujan and addressing Sunstein's critique, we explore the concept of accountability underlying the creation of a single executive in Article II. We then apply our theory of the unitary executive to several examples of broad grants of statutory standing, concluding that Congress can confer standing on private citizens only if it specifically articulates and individuates the interests whose violation gives rise to a cognizable case. Although we agree with Sunstein's view that broad grants of statutory standing do not necessarily trench upon constitutional values, we ultimately side with Justice Scalia in concluding that universal citizen standing, as …

Constitutional Judgment, Gene R. Nichol

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Constitutional Interpretation by Philip Bobbitt

The Nonsupreme Court, Kathleen M. Sullivan

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Constitution in Conflict by Robert A. Burt

The Care And Feeding Of The United States Constitution, Abner J. Mikva

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Intelligible Constitution by Joseph Goldstein

Capital Punishment's Future, Welsh S. White

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Capital Punishment in America by Raymond Paternoster

Apple Of Gold: Constitutionalism In Israel And The United States, Cynthia A.M. Stroman

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Apple of Gold: Constitutionalism in Israel and the United States by Gary Jeffrey Jacobsohn

A Question Of Choice, Michele A. Estrin

Michigan Law Review

A Review of A Question of Choice by Sarah Weddington

Interstate Preemption: The Right To Travel, The Right To Life, And The Right To Die, Lea Brilmayer

Michigan Law Review

State laws differ, and they differ on issues of tremendous importance to the ways that we conduct our lives. Abortion and the right to die are two issues on which state law intersects with deeply held moral convictions, and on which state laws vary. With so much hanging in the balance, it is not surprising that those who find themselves outvoted or outmaneuvered in local political processes sometimes seek a legal climate more compatible with their beliefs about human decency and dignity. The right to "vote with one's feet" - to travel or move to another state and trade a …

"But Whoever Treasures Freedom…": The Right To Travel And Extraterritorial Abortions, Seth F. Kreimer

Michigan Law Review

In a prior article, I addressed the problem of extraterritorial abortions under the assumption that the federal constitutional right of reproductive choice would be repudiated by the Supreme Court on Justice Scalia's theory that such rights lack sufficiently deep roots in the history and traditions surrounding the framing of the Constitution and the Fourteenth Amendment. I argued there that a constitutional methodology that relied on traditions and expectations of the Framers would provide a strong basis for concluding that the Constitution imposes severe limits on states' power to project their moralities extraterritorially. If Justice Scalia is serious about a regard …

Conflict Of Constitutions? No Thanks: A Response To Professors Brilmayer And Kreimer, Gerald L. Neuman

Michigan Law Review

This colloquy was organized around the unpleasant hypothesis that the Supreme Court would overrule Roe v. Wade and that Congress would not fill the resulting void with federal legislation. The abortion debate would then move to the states, where local majorities could enact their own resolutions. If the local majorities were large enough, they could even write their local resolutions into their state constitutions. The contrasting state constitutions that could result might then replicate the comparativists' current juxtaposition between the U.S. Constitution and the constitutions of Germany and Ireland. In some states, prohibition of abortion would be constitutionally required, while …

Dialogue And Judicial Review, Barry Friedman

Michigan Law Review

This article argues that most normative legal scholarship regarding the role of judicial review rests upon a descriptively inaccurate foundation. The goal of this article is to redescribe the landscape of American constitutionalism in a manner vastly different than most normative scholarship. At times this article slips across the line into prescription, but by and large the task is descriptive. The idea is to clear the way so that later normative work can proceed against the backdrop of a far more accurate understanding of the system of American constitutionalism.

This article proceeds in three separate parts. Parts I and II …