Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons^™

Change In Racial And Ethnic Classifications Is Here: Proposal To Address Race And Ethnic Ancestry Of Blacks For Affirmative Action Admissions Purposes, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

African American Disproportionality In School Discipline: The Divide Between Best Evidence And Legal Remedy, Kevin D. Brown, Russell J. Skiba, Suzanne E. Eckes

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

A Disability By Any Other Name Is Still A Disability: Log Cabin, The Disability Spectrum, And The Ada (Aa), Gabrielle L. Goodwin

Articles by Maurer Faculty

In EEOC v. Lee's Log Cabin, the Seventh Circuit followed the Supreme Court precedent of the last decade that has increasingly narrowed the determination of what constitutes a disabled individual under the Americans with Disabilities Act. In 2008, Congress passed the ADA Amendments Act in an attempt to restore the ADA to its original purpose and the original vision of the ADA's drafters and supporters. Whether these amendments will produce dramatic changes in the way the administrative agencies and courts apply the ADA remains to be seen. Nonetheless, the only way the ADA or its amendments will successfully protect against …

The Hangman's Noose And The Lynch Mob: Hate Speech And The Jena Six, Jeannine Bell

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Taking the hangman's noose hanging in Jena, Louisiana in 2006 as a starting point, this Article begins by placing the hanging of a noose in historical context. The Article then proceeds to explore contemporary manifestations of noose hanging in the workplace, in schools and other settings. The Article examines noose hangings that occurred around the country since the display in Jena to explore the social meaning of a noose. Also examined are media constructions of noose hanging and the perception that some Blacks targeted by noose hanging have had of these incidents. The article concludes with a victim based reasonable …

Kosovo: The Day After, Timothy William Waters

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The Fair Housing Act And Extralegal Terror, Jeannine Bell

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Article examines the implications the Fair Housing Act (FHA) has on anti-integrationist racial violence faced by racial and ethnic minority's integrating white neighborhoods. The first part of the article describes anti-integrationist violence as it occurs in two separate but distinct time periods the first occurring, before the passage of the FHA. The second time period that article addresses is the post-1968 era until the present day. In discussing the period since the passage of the Act, the article describes several important mechanisms in how the FHA functions as a remedy for extralegal violence. The Article concludes with a call …

Reflections On Justice Kennedy's Opinion In Parents Involved: Why Fifty Years Of Experience Shows Kennedy Is Right, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Lessons Learned From Comparing The Application Of Constitutional Law And Anti-Discrimination Law To African Americans In The U.S. And Dalits In India In The Context Of Higher Education, Kevin D. Brown, Vinay Sitapati

Articles by Maurer Faculty

In this Article the authors will compare the development of constitutional law and federal anti-discrimination law in the context of higher education of African-Americans in the U.S. and Dalits in India. Both groups suffer from oppression and discrimination based upon a hereditary trait and related to their integration into mainstream society; neither group is completely isolated from the majority population responsible for the discrimination; and African-Americans and Dalits approximate similar percentages of their country's population. Based upon the 2000 census, African-Americans constitute 12.7% of the American populations, and, according to the 1991 Census Report of India, Dalits make up 16.5% …

The Blessing Of Departure: Acceptable And Unacceptable State Support For Demographic Transformation: The Lieberman Plan To Exchange Populated Territories In Cisjordan, Timothy W. Waters

Articles by Maurer Faculty

What limits ought there be on a state's ability to create a homogeneous society, to increase or perpetuate non-diversity, or to create hierarchies within existing diversity? This paper examines those questions with reference to the Lieberman Plan - which proposes to transfer populated territories from Israel to the Palestine in exchange for Jewish settlements on the West Bank - as an abstract exercise in demographic transformation by the state.

First the article considers if the Lieberman plan would "work": Would it create the alterations it proposes, and would those changes achieve a stable, peaceful, even just settlement? It finds that …

Demise Of The Talented Tenth: Affirmative Action And The Increasing Underrepresentation Of Ascendant Blacks At Selective Educational Institutions, Kevin D. Brown, Jeannine Bell

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Over the past 30 years America has experienced both a substantial increase in the percentage of blacks multiracial blacks and an unprecedented influx of voluntary immigration of blacks primarily from Africa and the Caribbean. The percentage of foreign-born black immigrants reached 8% of the black population in 2005, and no doubt is higher today. There is evidence that suggests not only that multiracial blacks and foreign-born black immigrants and their sons and daughters constitute a disproportionate percentage of black students in selective higher education programs, but their percentages are larger than most people realize. This article addresses the resulting change …

Symposium: Race Across Boundaries: Introduction, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Bringing Democracy To Puerto Rico: A Rejoinder, Luis E. Fuentes-Rohwer

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

A Different Departure: A Reply To Shany's "Redrawing Maps, Manipulating Demographics: On Exchange Of Populated Territories And Self-Determination", Timothy W. Waters

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Anyone reading Yuval Shany's response to my article, "The Blessing of Departure -- Exchange of Populated Territories: The Lieberman Plan as an Abstract Exercise in Demographic Transformation," would hardly characterize it as "agreement." In part this is because Shany builds his case by assuming I am saying something about self-determination that misses -- at least misplaces -- my real point. This is unfortunate, both as it masks the fact that Shany and I actually agree transfers can be legal, and it distracts attention from the points of real, substantive disagreement. The misreading is not an accident, rather the product of …

Government Data Mining: The Need For A Legal Framework, Fred H. Cate

Articles by Maurer Faculty

The article examines the government's growing appetite for collecting personal data. Often justified on the basis of protecting national security, government data mining programs sweep up data collected through hundreds of regulatory and administrative programs, and combine them with huge datasets obtained from industry. The result is an aggregation of personal data - the "digital footprints" of individual lives - never before seen. These data warehouses are then used to determine who can work and participate in Social Security programs, who can board airplanes and enter government buildings, and who is likely to pose a threat in the future, even …

Exposing Sex Stereotypes In Recent Same-Sex Marriage Jurisprudence, Deborah A. Widiss, Elizabeth Rosenblatt, Douglas Nejaime

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This article examines sex discrimination arguments in recent same-sex marriage cases. Since 1993, when the Hawaii Supreme Court held in Baehr v. Lewin that denying same-sex couples the right to marry could state a claim of sex discrimination, every state high court to consider the issue has rejected the claim. But many recent decisions have in fact relied upon sex-based stereotypes to justify marriage restrictions. These include claims that men and women, simply by virtue of their gender, provide distinct role models for children; that men and women play "opposite" or "complementary" roles within marriage; and that marriage is essential …

Review: Robert L. Carter, A Matter Of Law: A Memoir Of Struggle In The Cause Of Equal Rights, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Hate Thy Neighbor, Jeannine Bell

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Article addresses one of the consequences of racial segregation in housing - violence and intimidation directed at minorities who are integrating white neighborhoods. In describing the history and dynamics of this type of anti-integrationist crime, the Article seeks to offer an introduction to the setting of hate crimes in a neighborhood context. The Article provides a critical bridge between hate crime law and housing law, exploring the substantial difficulties when each of these legal remedies is used to combat this type of violence. The Article concludes by offering a series of solutions uniquely crafted to combat the problem of …

Using Federal And State Laws To Promote Secure Housing For Survivors Of Domestic Violence, Deborah A. Widiss, Emily J. Martin

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The Politics Of Preclearance, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer, Guy-Uriel E. Charles

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Essay examines recent charges of political motivation against the Department of Justice and its enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. These accusations appear well-deserved, on the strength of the Department’s recent handling of the Texas redistricting submission and Georgia’s voting identification requirement. This Essay reaches two conclusions. First, it is clear that Congress wished to secure its understanding of the Act into the future through its preclearances requirement. Many critics of the voting rights bill worried about the degree of discretion that the legislation accorded the Attorney General. Supporters worried as well, for this degree of discretion might lead …

Preclearance, Discrimination, And The Department Of Justice: The Case Of South Carolina, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer, Guy-Uriel E. Charles

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Revisiting "The Need For Negro Lawyers": Are Today's Black Corporate Lawyers Houstonian Social Engineers?, H. Timothy Lovelace Jr.

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The Supreme Court's Role In The Growing School Choice Movement, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

The expansion of school choice in elementary and secondary education, particularly in urban areas, is one of largest current educational reform movements sweeping the nation. This is true despite the fact that it is still too early for a consensus to develop about the educational benefits of increased choice. 1 Society always precedes schooling. Thus, major educational reforms pass in and out of favor depending on social conditions and how prevailing patterns of understanding interpret those conditions.2 Among the most significant social developments influencing educational reforms are legal decisions. Since the Supreme Court is the final authority on constitutional law, …

Domesticating The Gerrymander: An Essay On Standards, Fair Representation, And The Necessary Question Of Judicial Will, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer

Articles by Maurer Faculty

The U.S. Supreme Court has moved beyond its cautious intervention in Baker v. Carr and now firmly controls the law of democracy. Yet political gerrymandering questions so understood have traditionally proven difficult for the Court to examine properly. The recent Vieth v. Jubelirer is but a further example of this phenomenon. This Essay situates Vieth within the reapportionment revolution and ultimately concludes that the central question in gerrymandering cases is the question of judicial will and whether the Court will choose to exercise its power. This Essay closes with a cautionary note: in light of the Court's general performance in …

O Say, Can You See: Free Expression By The Light Of Fiery Crosses, Jeannine Bell

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Article presents a comprehensive, context-based theory which both places cross burning in its proper doctrinal framework and recognizes the history of cross burning as one of Ku Klux Klan-inspired terrorism directed at African Americans. The author prefaces critical commentary on the Supreme Court's decision in Virginia v. Black with analysis of the full landscape of cross burning cases including another issue to which others have paid little attention - the ways in which state courts have negotiated First Amendment challenges to cross burning statutes. Thoroughly examining cross burning from each of these perspectives, the Article argues that cross burning …

The Road Not Taken In Brown: Recognizing The Dual Harm Of Segregation, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The Racial Gap In Ability: From The Fifteenth Century To Grutter And Gratz, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Justice O'Connor’s opinion for the United States Supreme Court in Grutter v. Bollinger upheld the University of Michigan Law School’s affirmative action plan. Beneficiaries of affirmative action clearly meet the necessary qualifications for admissions to selective colleges, universities, and graduate programs. But, the justifications for affirmative action articulated by Justice O'Connor implicitly recognized that underrepresented minorities with a history of discrimination are not as academically qualified as their non-Hispanic white (and Asian counterparts). Their inclusion in affirmative action plans is based on the belief that they provide enough educational and non-educational benefits to offset their academic shortcomings.

There are measurable …

The Hypothetical Opinion In Grutter V. Bollinger From The Perspective Of The Road Not Taken In Brown V. Board Of Education, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

After Grutter V. Bollinger-- Revisiting The Desegregation Era From The Perspective Of The Post-Desegregation Era, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Brown V. Board Of Education: Reexamination Of The Desegregation Of Public Education From The Perspective Of The Post-Desegregation Era, Kevin D. Brown

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Mobilizing Immigrants, Jayanth K. Krishnan

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.