Law Commons^™

The Statement And Account Clause As A National Security Freedom Of Information Act, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

Saving Disparate Impact, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

No abstract provided.

The Scope Of Regulatory Authority Under The Second Amendment, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

This paper will appear as a chapter in a forthcoming book to be published by the Johns Hopkins University Press that analyzes the efficacy of firearms regulation. In this paper, the authors analyze the emerging jurisprudential framework for assessing the validity of firearms regulation under the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution. This emerging framework, the authors contend, preserves substantial regulatory authority for federal, state, and local governments. The authors then assess the constitutionality of the leading proposals for regulatory reform that have emerged in the wake of the tragic events at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

Saving Disparate Impact, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

More than four decades ago, the Supreme Court concluded that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964’s prohibition on racial discrimination in employment is properly construed to forbid “practices, procedures, or tests neutral on their face, and even neutral in terms of intent,” that nevertheless “operate as ‘built-in headwinds’ for minority groups . . . that are unrelated to testing job capability.” In the Civil Rights Act of 1991, Congress codified liability for cases in which an employer “uses a particular employment practice that causes a disparate impact on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national …

Originalism In Practice, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

Originalism is in ascendance. Both in judicial opinions and in the legal academy, arguments for the interpretation of the Constitution based on its original meaning are increasingly prominent. The scholarly literature to date, however, has focused on theory. Supporters and opponents debate the theoretical merits of originalism, but rarely test their views on the merits of originalism by reference to the realities of constitutional adjudication. In science, a theory gains acceptance if it makes testable predictions that are later borne out. Whatever its theoretical merit, originalism deserves recognition as genuinely distinctive and useful approach to constitutional adjudication only if, in …

Those Who Can't, Teach: What The Legal Career Of John Yoo Tells Us About Who Should Be Teaching Law, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

Perhaps no member of the legal academy in America is more controversial than John Yoo. For his role in producing legal opinions authorizing what is thought by many to be abusive treatment of detainees as part of the Bush Administration’s “Global War on Terror,” some have called for him to be subjected to professional discipline, others have called for his criminal prosecution. This paper raises a different question: whether John Yoo – and his like – ought to be teaching law.

John Yoo provides something of a case study in the problems in legal education today. As a scholar, Professor …

First Amendment Investigations And The Inescapable Pragmatism Of The Common Law Of Free Speech, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

Scholars have struggled to explain our sprawling First Amendment doctrine – once described by Justice Stevens as “an elaborate mosaic of specific judicial decisions, characteristic of the common law process of case-by-case adjudication.” The position that has gained the most traction in recent scholarship has stressed the primacy of governmental motive – this school of thought argues that the degree of scrutiny to be afforded a challenged regulation is based on an assessment of the likelihood that the regulation reflects a governmental motive to burden disfavored speech or speakers.

This article offers a challenge to the purposivist account. It begins, …

Originalism Is Useless, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

Originalism is in ascendance. Both in judicial opinions and in the legal academy, originalist methods of constitutional interpretation are increasingly prominent. This essay nevertheless makes what may seem a claim – originalism is useless. In this, the essay takes a different path the the critics of orignalism have offered to date. Attacks on originalism usually question its normative desirability, but do not doubt that originalism offers a distinct approach to constitutional adjudication as compared to nonoriginalism. The concern here is with the question whether originalism is actually of help in addressing the kind of constitutional questions that come before the …

Originalism Is Useless, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

Originalism is in ascendance. Both in judicial opinions and in the legal academy, originalist methods of constitutional interpretation are increasingly prominent. This essay nevertheless makes what may seem a claim – originalism is useless. In this, the essay takes a different path the the critics of orignalism have offered to date. Attacks on originalism usually question its normative desirability, but do not doubt that originalism offers a distinct approach to constitutional adjudication as compared to nonoriginalism. The concern here is with the question whether originalism is actually of help in addressing the kind of constitutional questions that come before the …

Second Amendment Plumbing After Heller: Of Incorporation, Standards Of Scrutiny, Well-Regulated Militias And Criminal Street Gangs, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

The decision of the United States Supreme Court in District of Columbia v. Heller ended one debate about the Second Amendment while beginning another.

Prior to Heller, the principal point on which courts and scholars had joined issue was whether the Second Amendment secures an individual right to bear arms or a right to participate in an organized militia. In Heller, the Court came down on the individual-rights side while resolving little else about the extent to which the Second Amendment will constrain the power to regulate firearms. Among the many questions left for future litigation, the two most important …

The New Originalism Meets The Fourteenth Amendment: Original Public Meaning And The Problem Of Incorporation, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

This paper, prepared for a symposium on the Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment at the University of San Diego's Institute for Constitutional Originalism, examines the historical case for incorporation within the Fourteenth Amendment of the rights in first eight amendments to the Constitution in light of the recent turn in thinking about originalist methods of constitutional interpretation. In recent decades, the historical case for incorporation has made something of a comeback, resting on strong evidence that many of the key framers of the Fourteenth Amendment considered the first eight amendments to be among the privileges and immunities of …

The Emerging First Amendment Law Of Managerial Prerogative, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

In Garcetti v. Ceballos, the Supreme Court, by the narrowest of margins, held that allegations of police perjury made in memoranda to his superiors by Richard Ceballos, a supervisory prosecutor in the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office, were unprotected by the First Amendment because “his expressions were made pursuant to his duties. . . .” The academic reaction to this holding has been harshly negative; scholars argue that the holding will prevent the public from learning of governmental misconduct that is known only to those working within the bowels of the government itself.

This article rejects the scholarly consensus …

Chapman Dialogues: Same Sex Marriage - Response To Professor Eskrdige, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

This essay, a revision of remarks originally delivered as part of the Chapman Dialogues series at Chapman University School of Law, is a response to the remarks of Professor William Eskridge of Yale Law School making the case for the recognition of a constitutional right to same-sex marriage. The essay argues that the judicial establishment of a right in the face of deeply entrenched social norms, prior to the time at which the political groundwork necessary for the enforcement of the right has been laid, risks a powerful and ultimately counterproductive backlash.

Does Due Process Have An Original Meaning? On Originalism, Due Process, Procedural Innovation . . . And Parking Tickets, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

Originalism – the view that constitutional provisions should be interpreted as they were “understood at the time of the law’s enactment” – is the ascendant method of constitutional interpretation. In particular, originalists argue that the Constitution's open-ended provisions should be interpreted in light of their generally understood legal meaning at the time of their framing. An originalist view of due process -- entitling civil and criminal defendants to those procedures considered "due" at the time of framing -- would accordingly condemn any number of innovations in criminal and civil procedures' that alter framing-era procedural rights, such as the novel systems …

Against Orthodoxy: Miranda Is Not Prophylactic And The Constitution Is Not Perfect, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

In the four decades since the decision in Miranda v. Arizona, two point of consensus have emerged about that decision. The first area of agreement is that Miranda’s rationale for requiring its now-famous warnings is wrong, or at least dramatically overstated. In Michigan v. Tucker, the Court first labeled Miranda warnings as “prophylactic standards.” For their part, Miranda’s advocates do not spend much time defending its conception of unwarned custodial interrogation as inherently coercive. The second point of agreement is that Miranda has turned out to be a failure combating the coercive nature of custodial interrogation. Despite Miranda, coerced confessions …

Writing Public Order Laws That Pass Constitutional Muster, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

No abstract provided.

Continuing The March Toward Reasonableness: Last Term's Fourth Amendment Decisions, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

No abstract provided.

The Crime Drop And Racial Profiling: Toward An Empirical Jurisprudence Of Search And Seizure, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

No abstract provided.

Public Order Laws After City Of Chicago V. Morales, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

No abstract provided.

Romer V. Evans As The Transformation Of Local Government Law, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

Colorado's Amendment 2 prohibited the state and local governments in Colorado from enforcing "any statute, regulation, ordinance or policy whereby homosexual, lesbian or bisexual orientation, conduct, practices or relationships shall constitute or otherwise be the basis of or entitle any person or class of persons to have or claim any minority status, quota preferences, protected status or claim of rimi"2 Three Colorado municipalities that had enacted ordinances protecting gays and lesbians, and individuals who had lost the protections offered by those ordinances, brought suit in state court seeking to invalidate the amendment.

Permissible Content Discrimination Under The First Amendment: The Strange Case Of The Public Employee, Lawrence Rosenthal

Lawrence Rosenthal

The speech of public employees poses special problems under the First Amendment. As Justice O'Connor once explained, a rule that forbids employees who deal with the public from being rude to customers should be permissible in the public sector, even though a statute containing the very same prohibition would be considered impermissibly vague when applied to private-sector employees. Recognizing that a special rule for public employees is necessary, the Supreme Court has held that only when public employees speak on a matter of public concern does their speech qualify for constitutional protection, and even then, the employee's interest must be …