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Full-Text Articles in Law

The Whim Of Twelve Is Cloaked In Racial Prejudice: Why Inherent Racial Discrimination In The Capital Punishment System Requires That Maryland's Legislature Enact A Fairness In Death Sentencing Act, Matthew E. Feinberg Jan 2008

The Whim Of Twelve Is Cloaked In Racial Prejudice: Why Inherent Racial Discrimination In The Capital Punishment System Requires That Maryland's Legislature Enact A Fairness In Death Sentencing Act, Matthew E. Feinberg

Matthew E Feinberg

At sentencing in a capital case, “[p]eople live or die, dependent on the whim of one man or of [twelve,]” and “where responsibility is divided by twelve, it is easy to say: ‘Away with him.’" Although judges, practitioners, and academics hope for a fair and reliable penalty, since the 1970s, the prospect of racial discrimination in capital punishment has had a very real impact on the criminal justice system. Throughout the country, Caucasian and African American criminals are being treated differently in death sentencing simply because of the color of their skin. “[I]n the face of science, in the face …


From Proposition 209 To Proposal 2: Examining The Effects Of Anti-Affirmative Action Voter Initiatives, Michigan Journal Of Race & Law Jan 2008

From Proposition 209 To Proposal 2: Examining The Effects Of Anti-Affirmative Action Voter Initiatives, Michigan Journal Of Race & Law

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

Transcript of the symposium held at the University of Michigan Law School on Saturday, February 9, 2008 in Hutchins Hall Room 100


The Sit-Ins And The Failed State Action Revolution, Christopher W. Schmidt Jan 2008

The Sit-Ins And The Failed State Action Revolution, Christopher W. Schmidt

Studio for Law and Culture

This article revises the traditional account of why the Supreme Court, when faced in the early 1960s with a series of cases arising out of the lunch counter sit-in movement, refused to hold racial discrimination in public accommodations unconstitutional. These cases are the great aberration of the Warren Court. At a time when the justices confidently reworked one constitutional doctrine after another, often in response to the moral challenges of the civil rights movement and often in the face of considerable public resistance, they broke pattern in the sit-in cases. And they did so despite a transformation in popular opinion …


Blood Quantum And Equal Protection, Rose Cuison Villazor Jan 2008

Blood Quantum And Equal Protection, Rose Cuison Villazor

Studio for Law and Culture

Modern equal protection doctrine treats laws that make distinctions on the basis of indigeneity defined on blood quantum terms along a racial/political paradigm. This dichotomy may be traced to Morton v. Mancari and more recently to Rice v. Cayetano. In Mancari, the Supreme Court held that laws that privilege members of Native American tribes do not constitute racial discrimination because the preferences have a political purpose – to further the right to self-government of tribes. Rice v. Cayetano crystallized the juxtaposition of the racial from the political nature of indigeneity by invalidating a law that privileged Native Hawaiians. That …


White Cartels, The Civil Rights Act Of 1866, And The History Of Jones V. Alfred H. Mayer Co., Darrell A. H. Miller Jan 2008

White Cartels, The Civil Rights Act Of 1866, And The History Of Jones V. Alfred H. Mayer Co., Darrell A. H. Miller

Fordham Law Review

In 2008, Jones v. Alfred H. Mayer Co. turned forty. In Jones, the U.S. Supreme Court held for the first time that Congress can use its enforcement power under the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery, to prohibit private racial discrimination in the sale of property. Jones temporarily awoke the Thirteenth Amendment and its enforcement legislation—the Civil Rights Act of 1866—from a century-long slumber. Moreover, it recognized an economic reality: racial discrimination by private actors can be as debilitating as racial discrimination by public actors. In doing so, Jones veered away from three decades of civil rights doctrine—a doctrine that had …


Parents Involved And The Meaning Of Brown: An Old Debate Renewed, Jonathon L. Entin Jan 2008

Parents Involved And The Meaning Of Brown: An Old Debate Renewed, Jonathon L. Entin

Seattle University Law Review

This Article examines some of the jurisprudential roots of the racial discrimination debate, tracing the issue back to Brown and its immediate aftermath but finding the seeds of the disagreement in the ambiguities of the first Justice Harlan's celebrated dissenting opinion in Plessy v. Ferguson. The tensions between the two approaches did not matter in Plessy because segregation was impermissible under either theory, but the two approaches pointed in opposite directions in Parents Involved. Part II offers an overview of the Seattle and Louisville policies that were struck down in Parents Involved. Part III examines the various …


The Meaning Of Race In The Dna Era: Science, History And The Law, Christian Sundquist Jan 2008

The Meaning Of Race In The Dna Era: Science, History And The Law, Christian Sundquist

Articles

The meaning of “race” has changed dramatically over time. Early theories of race assigned social, intellectual, moral and physical values to perceived physical differences among groups of people. The perception that race should be defined in terms of genetic and biologic difference fueled the “race science” of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth centuries, during which time geneticists, physiognomists, eugenicists, anthropologists and others purported to find scientific justification for denying equal treatment to non-white persons. Nazi Germany applied these understandings of race in a manner which shocked the world, and following World War II the concept of race increasingly came to be …


The Current State Of Residential Segregation And Housing Discrimination: The United States' Obligations Under The International Convention On The Elimination Of All Forms Of Racial Discrimination, Michael B. De Leeuw, Megan K. Whyte, Dale Ho, Catherine Meza, Alexis Karteron Jan 2008

The Current State Of Residential Segregation And Housing Discrimination: The United States' Obligations Under The International Convention On The Elimination Of All Forms Of Racial Discrimination, Michael B. De Leeuw, Megan K. Whyte, Dale Ho, Catherine Meza, Alexis Karteron

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

The United States government accepted a number of obligations related to housing when it ratified the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination ("CERD"). For example, the United States government must ensure that all people enjoy the rights to housing and to own property, without distinction as to race; cease discriminatory actions, including those that are discriminatory in effect regardless of intent; and take affirmative steps to remedy past discrimination and eradicate segregation. This Article discusses the United States government's compliance with those obligations, as well as the importance of meaningful compliance in maintaining the United …


Reconstituting Japanese Law: International Norms And Domestic Litigation, Timothy Webster Jan 2008

Reconstituting Japanese Law: International Norms And Domestic Litigation, Timothy Webster

Faculty Publications

This paper examines a number of lawsuits challenging racial discrimination in Japan’s private sector. Since Japan does not have a law banning private acts of racial discrimination, victims of racial discrimination invoke international human rights law to buttress their claims for compensation. I argue that Japanese judges are, by and large, receptive to these international law claims, but that the system for adjudicating racial discrimination disputes is inadequate. Specifically, a law that bans private acts of racial discrimination would put Japan in line with recently emergent global norms of equality.


Social Science And The Evolving Standards Of Death Penalty Law, Samuel R. Gross, Phoebe C. Ellsworth Jan 2008

Social Science And The Evolving Standards Of Death Penalty Law, Samuel R. Gross, Phoebe C. Ellsworth

Book Chapters

Unlike many of the topics covered in this book, death penalty litigation involves a wide variety of empirical issues. The Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution provides that "Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishment inflicted." But what is a "cruel and unusual punishment?" It could be a punishment that is morally unacceptable to the American people, like cutting off noses or hands. Following the other clauses of the amendment, it could be a punishment that is excessive, in that a lesser penalty would achieve the same ends. For example, if a …