Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Constitutional Law Commons™

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Election Law

Institution
Keyword
Publication Year
Publication
Publication Type
File Type

Articles 991 - 1020 of 1332

Full-Text Articles in Constitutional Law

The Intratextual Independent "Legislature" And The Elections Clause, Michael T. Morley Jan 2015

The Intratextual Independent "Legislature" And The Elections Clause, Michael T. Morley

Scholarly Publications

Many states have delegated substantial authority to regulate federal elections to entities other than their institutional legislatures, such as independent redistricting commissions empowered to determine the boundaries of congressional districts. Article I’s Elections Clause and Article II’s Presidential Electors Clause, however, confer authority to regulate federal elections specifically upon State “legislatures,” rather than granting it to States as a whole. An intratextual analysis of the Constitution reveals that the term “legislature” is best understood as referring solely to the entity within each state comprised of representatives that has the general authority to pass laws. Thus, state constitutional provisions or laws …


The Intratextual Independent "Legislature" And The Elections Clause, Michael T. Morley Jan 2015

The Intratextual Independent "Legislature" And The Elections Clause, Michael T. Morley

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Remedial Equilibration And The Right To Vote Under Section 2 Of The Fourteenth Amendment, Michael T. Morley Jan 2015

Remedial Equilibration And The Right To Vote Under Section 2 Of The Fourteenth Amendment, Michael T. Morley

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


The Voting Rights In Winter: The Death Of A Superstatute, Guy-Uriel Charles, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer Jan 2015

The Voting Rights In Winter: The Death Of A Superstatute, Guy-Uriel Charles, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer

Faculty Scholarship

The Voting Rights Act (“VRA”), the most successful civil rights statute in American history, is dying. In the recent Shelby County decision, the U.S. Supreme Court signaled that the anti-discrimination model, long understood as the basis for the VRA as originally enacted, is no longer the best way to understand today’s voting rights questions. As a result, voting rights activists need to face up to the fact that voting rights law and policy are at a critical moment of transition. It is likely the case that the superstatute we once knew as the VRA is no more and is never …


Race, Federalism, And Voting Rights, Guy-Uriel E. Charles, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer Jan 2015

Race, Federalism, And Voting Rights, Guy-Uriel E. Charles, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer

Faculty Scholarship

In Shelby County v. Holder, the Court struck down an important provision of the Voting Rights Act, section 4, on federalism grounds. The Court argued that Congress no longer had the power to enact section 4 because of the “federalism costs” imposed by the Act and because the Act violated "basic principles" of federalism. Unfortunately, the Court failed to articulate the costs to federalism imposed by the Act, much less conduct a cost-benefit analysis in order to determine whether the benefits of the Act outweighed its costs. Moreover, the Court failed to discuss whether the Reconstruction Amendments ought to matter …


Reynolds Reconsidered, Guy-Uriel E. Charles, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer Jan 2015

Reynolds Reconsidered, Guy-Uriel E. Charles, Luis Fuentes-Rohwer

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Enforcing The Fifteenth Amendment, Ellen D. Katz Jan 2015

Enforcing The Fifteenth Amendment, Ellen D. Katz

Book Chapters

This chapter examines efforts to enforce the Fifteenth Amendment in the period from United States v. Reese through Shelby County v. Holder. Reese and Shelby County expose the most rigorous stance the Court has employed to review congressional efforts to enforce the Fifteenth Amendment, while the years in-between show Congress and the Court working more in tandem, at times displaying remarkable indifference to blatant violations of the Fifteenth Amendment, and elsewhere working cooperatively to help vindicate the Amendment’s promise. Defying simple explanation, this vacillation between cooperation and resistance captures the complex and deeply consequential way concerns about federal power, …


A Case For The Electoral College And For Its Faithless Elector, Stephen M. Sheppard Jan 2015

A Case For The Electoral College And For Its Faithless Elector, Stephen M. Sheppard

Faculty Articles

Every four years, the cry goes up to destroy the Electoral College. That cry is especially loud in years when a candidate is elected president who receives a minority of the votes. The election of a "minority president" happened with the election of 2000, but it had happened before. The Electoral College has elected three presidents whom a majority of the voters voted against: Rutherford B. Hayes in 1876, Benjamin Harrison in 1888, and George W. Bush in 2000. (A fourth president was also elected with a minority of the popular vote—John Quincy Adams in 1824—through that election was by …


The Young And The Restless: How The Twenty-Sixth Amendment Could Play A Role In The Current Debate Over Voting Laws, Nancy Turner Jan 2015

The Young And The Restless: How The Twenty-Sixth Amendment Could Play A Role In The Current Debate Over Voting Laws, Nancy Turner

American University Law Review

The Twenty-Sixth Amendment is commonly understood as lowering the voting age to eighteen. However, a close look at the Amendment's language and history indicates that the Twenty-Sixth Amendment does more than just grant a right. Properly read, the Twenty-Sixth Amendment acts as an antidiscrimination law similar to the Fourteenth, Fifteenth, and Nineteenth Amendments. Accordingly, the Twenty-Sixth Amendment possesses the power not just to invalidate legislation that explicitly contravenes its purpose, but also to neutralize facially neutral legislation that was enacted with a discriminatory intent. Using Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendment jurisprudence as a guide, this Comment proposes a framework for structuring …


A Quantum Congress, Jorge R. Roig Jan 2015

A Quantum Congress, Jorge R. Roig

Scholarly Works

This article tries to address the problem of a corrupt and broken electoral system that has been captured by special interests through big money spending in political campaigns, while at the same time preserving the spirit of the Free Speech Clause of our Constitution. In doing so, this article first reviews and summarizes the different alternatives proposed as potential fixes for the campaign finance problem. It then explains why none of the proposed alternatives can accomplish the dual goals set out above. Finally, the article briefly sketches a proposal for a fundamental reworking of our representative democracy by substituting legislative …


Toward A Fundamental Right To Evade Law? Protecting The Rule Of Unequal Racial And Economic Power In Shelby County And State Farm, Martha T. Mccluskey Jan 2015

Toward A Fundamental Right To Evade Law? Protecting The Rule Of Unequal Racial And Economic Power In Shelby County And State Farm, Martha T. Mccluskey

Journal Articles

To rationalize its ruling on voting rights, Shelby County, Alabama v. Holder develops a constitutional vision of passivity in the face of institutionalized power to violate the law. This essay compares Shelby County to State Farm Mutual Automobile v. Campbell, a 2003 Supreme Court ruling involving a different subject area, state punitive damage awards. In both, the Court asserts newly articulated judicial power to override other branches, not to protect human rights, but rather to expand institutionalized immunity from those rights. On the surface, the Court’s rejection of state sovereignty in State Farm (protecting multistate corporations from high punitive damages) …


Two-Time Presidents And The Vice-Presidency, Dan T. Coenen Jan 2015

Two-Time Presidents And The Vice-Presidency, Dan T. Coenen

Scholarly Works

Does the Constitution limit the ability of a twice-before-elected President to serve as Vice-President? This question, as it turns out, presents an intricate constitutional puzzle, the solution of which requires working through four separate sub-inquiries: Is a two-term President totally ineligible for the Vice-Presidency? Is such a person barred from election to the Vice-Presidency even if that person remains appointable to that office? Is a twice-before-elected President, even if properly placed in the Vice-Presidency, incapable of succeeding from that office to the Presidency? And even if such a succession can occur, must the resulting term of service as President expire …


Unmistakably Clear: Human Rights, The Right To Representation, And Remedial Voting Rights Of People Of Color, Matthew H. Charity Jan 2015

Unmistakably Clear: Human Rights, The Right To Representation, And Remedial Voting Rights Of People Of Color, Matthew H. Charity

Faculty Scholarship

The Author critiques the Supreme Court’s analysis in its Shelby County v. Holder decision, which found the preclearance requirement of the Voting Rights Act unconstitutional by applying a disparate treatment analysis to how States were treated under the Act. Such a reading of the Act makes a number of tacit and explicit assumptions with regard to the choice by the Federal Government and by the States of whose rights governmental actors must protect. The Court reached its conclusion by decontextualizing the Civil Rights movement and the Voting Rights Act from decolonization and post-World War II expressions of human rights, a …


The Meme Of Voter Fraud, Atiba R. Ellis Oct 2014

The Meme Of Voter Fraud, Atiba R. Ellis

Catholic University Law Review

The meme of voter fraud is the idea that unworthy voters are attacking the electoral system by voting fraudulently through impersonation or other bad acts. Although scholars of election law aptly demonstrate that the meme is a myth, the meme nonetheless endures as a rationale for the continued passage of heightened voter regulations like voter identification laws. Scholarship critiquing the voter fraud meme relies on partisanship as the prime explanation for voter fraud arguments. This explanation is incomplete in light of the fact that proponents of the myth continue to believe it on an ideological level even when the lack …


Financing Elections And "Appearance Of Corruption": Citizen Attitudes And Behavior In 2012, Molly J. Walker Wilson Oct 2014

Financing Elections And "Appearance Of Corruption": Citizen Attitudes And Behavior In 2012, Molly J. Walker Wilson

Catholic University Law Review

As political spending reaches new highs in the 2012 election cycle, and as the controversy surrounding wealthy donors and interest groups grows, polls demonstrate a surge of cynicism among Americans who profess a belief that the American political system is corrupt. The Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United made possible the most recent expansion of political spending. In this case, the question was whether allowing corporations and unions to spend unlimited amounts of money on political advertising would result in corruption or the appearance of corruption. The majority on the Court determined that it would not. Many observers have …


Unstable Footing: Shelby County’S Misapplication Of The Equal Footing Doctrine, Austin Graham Oct 2014

Unstable Footing: Shelby County’S Misapplication Of The Equal Footing Doctrine, Austin Graham

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

No abstract provided.


The Honduran Constitution Is Not A Suicide Pact: The Legality Of Honduran President Manuel Zelaya's Removal, Frank M. Walsh Sep 2014

The Honduran Constitution Is Not A Suicide Pact: The Legality Of Honduran President Manuel Zelaya's Removal, Frank M. Walsh

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.


Campaign Finance And Political Gerrymandering Decisions In The October 2005 Term, Burt Neuborne Jun 2014

Campaign Finance And Political Gerrymandering Decisions In The October 2005 Term, Burt Neuborne

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.


The Transformative Twelfth Amendment, Joshua D. Hawley Apr 2014

The Transformative Twelfth Amendment, Joshua D. Hawley

Faculty Publications

This paper argues that the Twelfth Amendment represents far more than a mechanical adjustment of the electoral college. Rather, it is the constitutional text that gives us the political presidency that we know today. The Twelfth Amendment worked a major structural change in the relationship between the legislative and executive branches and for that reason bears directly on the debate over the unitary executive and the meaning of “executive power.” Specifically, presidential removal power is best justified not by the original Article II, but by the constitutional structure the Twelfth Amendment created. And the scope and definition of executive power …


A Tale Of Two Minority Groups: Can Two Different Minority Groups Bring A Coalition Suit Under Section 2 Of The Voting Rights Act Of 1965, Sara Michaloski Apr 2014

A Tale Of Two Minority Groups: Can Two Different Minority Groups Bring A Coalition Suit Under Section 2 Of The Voting Rights Act Of 1965, Sara Michaloski

Catholic University Law Review

No abstract provided.


Evaluating Candidacy Restrictions: The Implications Of New York's Modified Approach, Brian Hodgkinson Mar 2014

Evaluating Candidacy Restrictions: The Implications Of New York's Modified Approach, Brian Hodgkinson

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.


Party-Based Corruption And Mccutcheon V. Fec, Michael S. Kang Mar 2014

Party-Based Corruption And Mccutcheon V. Fec, Michael S. Kang

NULR Online

No abstract provided.


The Recent History Of Gerrymandering In Florida: Revitalizing Davis V. Bandemer And Florida’S Constitutional Requirements On Redistricting, Devon Ombres Mar 2014

The Recent History Of Gerrymandering In Florida: Revitalizing Davis V. Bandemer And Florida’S Constitutional Requirements On Redistricting, Devon Ombres

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

No abstract provided.


Shelby And The Sisyphean Struggle For Black Enfranchisement, Rick Valelly Feb 2014

Shelby And The Sisyphean Struggle For Black Enfranchisement, Rick Valelly

Schmooze 'tickets'

No abstract provided.


Super Pac Contributions, Corruption, And The Proxy War Over Coordination, Richard L. Hasen Feb 2014

Super Pac Contributions, Corruption, And The Proxy War Over Coordination, Richard L. Hasen

Schmooze 'tickets'

No abstract provided.


To End Government Shutdowns, End Partisan Gerrymandering, Sanford Levinson Feb 2014

To End Government Shutdowns, End Partisan Gerrymandering, Sanford Levinson

Schmooze 'tickets'

No abstract provided.


Race Or Party?: How Courts Should Think About Republican Efforts To Make It Harder To Vote In North Carolina And Elsewhere, Richard L. Hasen Feb 2014

Race Or Party?: How Courts Should Think About Republican Efforts To Make It Harder To Vote In North Carolina And Elsewhere, Richard L. Hasen

Schmooze 'tickets'

No abstract provided.


Hungary: An Election In Question, Kim Lane Scheppele Feb 2014

Hungary: An Election In Question, Kim Lane Scheppele

Schmooze 'tickets'

No abstract provided.


The Last Stand: Restricting Voting Rights & Sustaining White Power In Modern America, Desmond S. King, Rogers M. Smith Feb 2014

The Last Stand: Restricting Voting Rights & Sustaining White Power In Modern America, Desmond S. King, Rogers M. Smith

Schmooze 'tickets'

No abstract provided.


What Became Of Fundamental Rights?: Of Voter Ids And Voting Rights, Carol Nackenoff Feb 2014

What Became Of Fundamental Rights?: Of Voter Ids And Voting Rights, Carol Nackenoff

Schmooze 'tickets'

No abstract provided.