Law Commons^™

The Pathological Politics Of Criminal Law, William J. Stuntz

Michigan Law Review

Substantive criminal law defines the conduct that the state punishes. Or does it? If the answer is yes, it should be possible, by reading criminal codes (perhaps with a few case annotations thrown in), to tell what conduct will land you in prison. Most discussions of criminal law, whether in law reviews, law school classrooms, or the popular press, proceed on the premise that the answer is yes. Law reform movements regularly seek to broaden or narrow the scope of some set of criminal liability rules, always on the assumption that by doing so they will broaden or narrow the …

Are Shaming Punishments Beautifully Retributive? Retributivism And The Implications For The Alternative Sanctions Debate, Dan Markel

Vanderbilt Law Review

In the last few years, scholars and policymakers in the area of criminal justice have focused an increasing amount of attention on two topics. The first is the retributivist theory of punishment ("retributivism");' the second is the development of alternative sanctions to the orthodoxy of incarcerating criminals in publicly managed prisons. This Article is about what connections may properly be drawn between what justifies punishment and how we actually go about punishing offenders.

A preliminary word on retributivism may be helpful. Retributivism is a theory about retribution, and retribution's features, or its definition, may be understood in either a weak …

Sanctioning Government: Explaining America's Severity Revolution, Jonathan Simon

University of Miami Law Review

No abstract provided.

Torture Of Terrorists In Israel: The United Nations And The Supreme Court Of Israel Pave The Way For Human Rights To Trump Communitarianism, Jason S. Greenberg

ILSA Journal of International & Comparative Law

The General Security Service of Israel, also known as the Shin Bet, investigates individuals suspected of being involved with crimes against Israel's security.

Rape, Murder, And Formalism: What Happens If We Define Mistake Of Law?, Gerald F. Leonard

Faculty Scholarship

The criminal law maxim "ignorance of the law is no excuse" represents a broad doctrine of strict liability in an area of law that usually insists on a culpable state of mind as a prerequisite for liability. For that reason, many scholars have attacked the harsh mistake-of-law rules as incompatible with basic principles of culpability. Other scholars have come to the defense of the maxim, and courts have adhered to it quite strongly even as the list of exceptions to the maxim has slowly grown. Oddly enough, however, this debate has proceeded without a definition of mistake of law. Distinguishing …