Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons^™

Anti-Zionism As Racism: Campus Anti-Semitism And The Civil Rights Act Of 1964, Kenneth L. Marcus

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

No abstract provided.

Moving Beyond Strict Scrutiny: The Need For A More Nuanced Standard Of Protection Analysis For K Through 12 Integration Programs, Deborah N. Archer

Articles & Chapters

In Comfort v. Lynn School Committee, the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit evaluated a race-conscious student assignment program using the affirmative action strict scrutiny framework of Grutter v. Bollinger. Comfort is part of a trend of applying strict scrutiny to race-conscious integration programs that has gained new momentum following the decision in Grutter. Invited by the Supreme Court's seemingly unequivocal language in Adarand Constructors v. Pena, that "all racial classifications, imposed by whatever federal, state, or local governmental actor, must be analyzed by a reviewing court under strict scrutiny," federal district and appellate courts confronted with …

Crossing The Color Line: Racial Migration And The One-Drop Rule, 1600-1860, Daniel J. Sharfstein

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Scholars describe the one-drop rule--the idea that any African ancestry makes a person black--as the American regime of race. While accounts of when the rule emerged vary widely, ranging from the 1660s to the 1920s, most legal scholars have assumed that once established, the rule created a bright line that people were bound to follow. This Article reconstructs the one-drop rule's meaning and purpose from 1600 to 1860, setting it within the context of racial migration, the continual process by which people of African descent assimilated into white communities. While ideologies of blood-borne racial difference predate Jamestown, the rhetoric of …

Voter Identification, Spencer Overton

Michigan Law Review

In the wake of closely contested elections, calls for laws that require voters to present photo identification as a condition to cast a ballot have become pervasive. Advocates tend to rely on two rhetorical devices: (1) anecdotes about a couple of elections tainted by voter fraud; and (2) "common sense" arguments that voters should produce photo identification because identification is required to board airplanes, buy alcohol, and engage in other activities. This Article explains the analytical shortcomings of anecdote, analogy, and intuition, and applies a cost-benefit approach generally overlooked in election law scholarship. Rather than rushing to impose a photo-identification …

The Solomon Amendment, Expressive Associations, And Public Employment, Paul Secunda

ExpressO

Rumsfeld v. FAIR apparently concedes that public employers, in the guise of public law school members of the FAIR association, have expressive association rights. This state of affairs could now mean that public employers could gain constitutional rights at the expense of pubic employees. Thus, to the extent that public employers are considered expressive associations, public employees may see their free speech and other constitutional rights diminished (even more so than they recently have been by the Garcetti v. Ceballos decision).

Thankfully, I cannot imagine that the Court, if faced with the question directly, would find that public employers have …

Surfing Past The Pall Of Orthodoxy: Why The First Amendment Virtually Guarantees Online Law School Graduates Will Breach The Aba Accreditation Barrier, Nicholas C. Dranias

ExpressO

The impact of the constitutional dilemma created by the ABA’s aversion to Internet schooling is widespread. Currently, 18 states and 2 U.S. territories restrict bar exam eligibility to graduates of ABA-accredited law schools. Additionally, 29 states and 1 U.S. territory restrict admission to practice on motion to graduates of ABA-accredited law schools.

Although numerous lawsuits have been filed in ultimately failed efforts to strike down bar admission rules that restrict eligibility to graduates of ABA-accredited law schools, none has challenged the ABA-accreditation requirement based on the First Amendment’s prohibition on media discrimination. This Article makes that case.

Despite accelerating technological …

Transracial Adoption Of Black Children: An Economic Analysis, Mary Eschelbach Hansen, Daniel Pollack

ExpressO

The anti-discrimination law governing placement of children in foster care and adoption was intended to speed the adoption of Black children who could not be reunited with their families of origin. Only recently have two states been fined for violating this decade-old law. Based on our analysis of administrative data collected by the Children’s Bureau of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, we conclude that more vigorous enforcement of the anti-discrimination law in adoption could result in significant gains to Black children. We find that Black children spend more time as legal orphans than children of other races …

Put That In Your Thurible And Smoke It: Religious Gerrymandering Of Sacramental Intoxication, Mark A. Levine

ExpressO

In February 2006, the Supreme Court ruled on the case Gonzales v. O Centro Beneficente Uniao do Vegetal, granting an injunction permitting the use of ayahuasca, a plant containing the Schedule I substance Dimethyltryptamine, for sacramental intoxication purposes. The unanimous Court justified this injunction by comparing the Uniao do Vegetal's use of the illegal substance with the Native American Church's use of peyote, which contains another Schedule I substance, mescaline. This ruling is incomptabile with lower court rulings rejecting the Ethiopian Zion Coptic Church use of marijuana, consistently stating that the Native American Church has rights beyond those of other …

The "How" Of Enforcing The Fourteenth Amendment: How The Rehnquist Court's Treatment Of Implementation, Not Interpretation, Is The True Post-Boerne Failing, Rebecca L. Goldberg

ExpressO

This article argues that the severe limits the Rehnquist Court imposed on Congress’ power to enforce the Fourteenth Amendment did not stem primarily from the Court’s treatment of Congress’ interpretive powers in City of Boerne v. Flores, as most commentators have assumed, but rather from the Court’s treatment of Congress’ assessments regarding implementation in the cases that followed Boerne (Kimel, Garrett, Hibbs, and Lane). The article provides a new framework for assessing Congress’ power to pass a law under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment – a framework that adheres, in the main, to the Court’s 14§5 doctrine in Boerne …

Reclaiming Mcdonnell Douglas, Martin J. Katz

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

This Article proceeds in three Parts. Part I argues that McDonnell Douglas should never be required (and, in the process, dispels the nearly universally held myth that this framework proves or requires "but for" causation). Part II shows how a nonmandatory McDonnell Douglas would interact with the two alternative frameworks (Price Waterhouse and the 1991 Act), and also shows how a nonmandatory McDonnell Douglas can be implemented under current law. This Part also resolves the three doctrinal debates that currently plague disparate treatment law. Part III refutes most of the normative criticisms that have been leveled at McDonnell Douglas and …

Toward A Limited-Government Theory Of Extraterritorial Detention, Robert Knowles, Marc D. Falkoff

Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Why The Supreme Court Lied About Plessy, David S. Bogen

Faculty Scholarship

This article examines the citation in Plessy of a dozen cases that the Court said held racial segregation statutes in transport to be constitutional. It argues that none of those twelve cases upheld a segregation statute, but were largely decisions upholding decisions by the carrier under the common law. Justice Brown knew that the cases did not uphold segregation statutes, but he went ahead and used them to bury opposition under the weight of precedent. He knew that he was unlikely to be challenged, and he believed that the common law and the Constitution involved the same principles. The conflation …

Tied Up In Knotts? Gps Technology And The Fourth Amendment, Renée Mcdonald Hutchins

Faculty Scholarship

Judicial and scholarly assessment of emerging technology seems poised to drive the Fourth Amendment down one of three paths. The first would simply relegate the amendment to a footnote in history books by limiting its reach to harms that the framers specifically envisioned. A modified version of this first approach would dispense with expansive constitutional notions of privacy and replace them with legislative fixes. A third path offers the amendment continued vitality but requires the U.S. Supreme Court to overhaul its Fourth Amendment analysis. Fortunately, a fourth alternative is available to cabin emerging technologies within the existing doctrinal framework. Analysis …

Queer As Black Folk, Catherine Smith

Scholarly Articles

LGBT discourse that frames homophobia as being the same as racism reinforces homophobia, racism, and sexism. Although sameness arguments may be effective in some instances, such arguments are not the optimal approach to an interracial dialogue on LGBT issues, especially if the participants in the conversation have not had an opportunity to build mutual respect and trust. In order to unify subordinated groups, we must reframe the discussion around superordinate goals.

At the societal level, advocates must come to see that we-LGBT people, black people, and those of us who live at the intersections thereof-do not have to be the …

Thompson V. Hud: Groundbreaking Housing Desegregation Litigation, And The Significant Task Ahead Of Achieving An Effective Desegregation Remedy Without Engendering New Social Harms, Gina Kline

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

The Chilling Effect Of Government Surveillance Programs On The Use Of The Internet By Muslim-Americans, Dawinder S. Sidhu

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

Title Vi And The Warren County Protests, Bradford Mank

Faculty Articles and Other Publications

One part of the 1982 civil rights struggle against building a Polychlorinated Biphenyls ("PCB") landfill in Warren County, North Carolina, was a suit by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ("NAACP") under Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Although the suit was unsuccessful, the Warren County protests led to a 1983 General Accounting Office study and a 1987 United Church of Christ's Commission on Racial Justice (CRJ) study, both of which found that hazardous waste facilities were more likely to be located in minority communities. The Warren County protests and the two studies helped build …

Torch (January 2007), Amy Homans, Civil Rights Team Project

Torch: The Civil Rights Team Project Newsletter

No abstract provided.

The Foundations Of Section 1983 Jurisprudence: A Look From The Concept Of Law, Timothy I. Oppelt

Florida A & M University Law Review

This article uses the theories of H.L.A. Hart to provide an interpretive framework for a vital civil rights statute, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983. Any interpretation of Sec. 1983 requires some sense of the fundamental nature of law and the ability to identify legal rules. Specifically, this article examines the "under color of" language of Sec. 1983 and the statute's application to municipalities. It is possible that these areas remain partially in flux or undeveloped because the Court lacks an interpretation of the statute that accounts for how rules can confer power, create artificial persons, delegate the ability to act with …

Sex-Separation In Public Restrooms: Law, Architecture, And Gender, Terry S. Kogan

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

This Article challenges the common assumption that legally mandated sex-separation of public restrooms is a benign recognition of natural anatomical differences between men and women. Relying on legal history, gender history, and architectural theory, my central thesis is that, contrary to common intuitions, there was nothing benign or gender neutral about the social and historical origins of the first laws adopted at the end of the nineteenth century that mandated such separation.

Defining Our Freedom, Minnesota State University, Mankato

Civil Rights

Bibliography and photographs of a display of government documents from Minnesota State University, Mankato.

No Intent, No Foul? Unconscious Bias In Employment Decisions, Martin J. Katz

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Many commentators have criticized current anti-discrimination law on the grounds that it does not adequately prohibit unconscious bias in employment decisions. That claim is wrong: Unconscious bias is fully actionable, and it can generally be proved by knowledgeable employment lawyers. The idea behind unconscious bias is that well-meaning employers and supervisors, who would likely consider themselves supporters or even champions of equality, might subconsciously harbor attitudes that result in negative employment decisions for women and minorities.

Racial Disparities In U.S. Public Education And International Human Rights Standards: Holding The U.S. Accountable To Cerd, Amelia Parker

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Protection Of Religious Minorities In Europe: The Council Of Europe's Successes And Failures., Lauren C. Baillie

American University International Law Review

No abstract provided.

Panelist Biographies, Introduction By Dana Gold, Editor's Note, Dana L. Gold

Seattle University Law Review

This conference brought together nationally recognized scholars, attorneys, policymakers and activists from across the country who represent a depth of knowledge and range of viewpoints necessary to explore the intersection of corporate and First Amendment law. This discussion was sometimes heated, frequently politically surprising, and always robust. In this symposium issue, the Seattle University Law Review has captured the presentations and exchanges at this unique, multidisciplinary conference.

Special Purpose Credit Programs: A Well-Intentioned Idea Gone Bad, Luke Reynolds

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Legislative Updates, Dan Raposa

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

The Irrationality Of A Rational Basis: Denying Benefits To The Children Of Same-Sex Couples , Sam Castic

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Pencil Me In: The Use Of Title Ix And S.1983 To Obtain Equal Treatment In High School Athletics Scheduling , Leigh E. Ferrin

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Equal Marriage Rights For Transgendered Individuals , Parker Thoeni

The Modern American

No abstract provided.