Law Commons^™

Delimiting The Culture Defense, James M. Donovan, John Stuart Garth

James M. Donovan

This essay builds upon the arguments of Alison Dundes Renteln in her influential book, THE CULTURAL DEFENSE 2004), in which she argues persuasively for a uniformly recognized culture defense in certain litigations. Critiquing some of her details, we recast her three-prong culture defense test to more effectively balance the competing interests of minority culture members to have their ways of life taken seriously by the courts, and of members of the dominant tradition who wish to preserve the rule of law with its necessary perception as treating all parties equally. The offered formulation now includes the following five elements:

1. …

"Anticipatory Self-Defense" And Other Stories, Jeanne M. Woods, James M. Donovan

James M. Donovan

We argue that the specious justification for the invasion of Iraq -- a war based on a pretext of anticipatory self-defense -- necessarily exacerbates the inherent tendency of war to dehumanize and humiliate the enemy. This tendency is particularly evident in the variant of anticipatory self-defense that we have denominated as "capacity preemption," a type of claim that by definition depends upon characterizations of the opponent as utterly inhuman.

The Bush Doctrine tells a timeless story of self-defense. This story is shaped by an identifiable and predictable narrative structure, one that is able to transform the morally outrageous -- an …

Civilian Immunity And The Rebuttable Presumption Of Innocence, James M. Donovan

James M. Donovan

"Terrorist" is a word that at once vilifies and justifies, serving the same function in today's politics and popular imagination as was served by the term "Nazi" a half century ago, or "communist" thereafter, or "witch" in our colonial days, in that it is "always, or even necessarily, wrong." Few appellations today are as effective to ostracize a person, movement, or organization from civilized company, and an astonishing array of actions and reactions can be fully warranted when having as their intent a response to the mere threat -- much less an actual act -- of terrorism.

This Essay does …

Rock-Salting The Slippery Slope: Why Same-Sex Marriage Is Not A Commitment To Polygamous Marriage, James M. Donovan

James M. Donovan

E.J. Graff has documented how any change in the marriage rules inevitably leads to predications of apocalyptic cries warning of "death of marriage and civilization itself." The conservative fit over the possibility of the social acceptance of same-sex marriage therefore has an ancient if repetitive script. Still, the "threat" of same-sex marriage poses for conservatives at least one atypical wrinkle. Unlike discussions of equal or even greater rancor, that raging over same-sex marriage forces its opponents to treat with special delicacy. In the case of abortion, opponents are able to argue in absolute terms: abortion is wrong, period, even if …

Doma: An Unconstitutional Establishment Of Fundamentalist Christianity, James M. Donovan

James M. Donovan

This Article scrutinizes the constitutionality of the intent of the Defense of Marriage Act [DOMA]. According to the text of the Act, DOMA's purposes are "to define and protect the institution of marriage," where marriage is defined to exclude same-sex partners. To be constitutionally valid under the Establishment Clause, this notion that heterosexual marriage requires "protection" from gay and lesbian persons must spring from a secular and not religious source. This Article posits that DOMA has crossed this forbidden line between the secular and the religious. DOMA, motivated and supported by fundamentalist Christian ideology, and lacking any genuine secular goals …