Constitutional Law Commons^™

Looking Backward: Richard Epstein Ponders The “Progressive” Peril, Michael Allan Wolf

UF Law Faculty Publications

In "How Progressives Rewrote the Constitution," Richard Epstein bemoans the growth of a dominant big government. How Progressives should receive a warm reception from the audience, lawyers and laypeople alike, who view the New Deal as a mistake of epic proportions. For the rest of us, significant gaps will still remain between, on the one hand, our understanding of the nation’s past and of the complex nature of constitutional lawmaking and, on the other, Epstein’s version of the nature of twentieth-century reform and Progressive jurisprudence.

Looking Backward: Richard Epstein Ponders The "Progressive" Peril, Michael Allan Wolf

Michigan Law Review

In the 1888 novel Looking Backward, Edward Bellamy dreamed up a twentieth century America that was a socialist utopia, a vision invoked four years later by the conservative Justice David J. Brewer as a warning against government regulation. In How Progressives Rewrote the Constitution, Richard Epstein, looking back at the twentieth century through an interpretive lens much more similar to Brewer's than Bellamy's, sees and bemoans the growth of a dominant big government of which the novelist could only dream. Epstein pulls no punches in his attack on those he deems responsible for the shift in the American …

Black, White, Brown, Green, And Fordice: The Flavor Of Higher Education In Louisiana And Mississippi, Alfreda S. Diamond

ExpressO

"Black, White, Brown, Green, and Fordice: The Flavor of Higher Education in Louisiana and Mississippi" chronicles the higher education desegregation sagas in Louisiana and Mississippi. The Article specifically compares the histories of the higher education desegregation lawsuits in the two states and their subsequent experiences and progress under Settlement Agreements. The statistical populations of many universities in both states are still largely identifiable as “white” or “black,” and so the Article will pose questions not only respecting the implementation of United States v. Fordice in both states, but also respecting the value, desirability, or possibility of the “integrative ideal” converting …

The Inescapable Federalism Of The Ninth Amendment, Kurt T. Lash

ExpressO

For the past several decades, the majority of courts and commentators have viewed the Ninth Amendment as a provision justifying judicial enforcement of unenumerated individual rights against state and federal abridgment. The most influential advocate of this libertarian reading of the Ninth has been Professor Randy Barnett who has argued in a number of articles and books that the Ninth was originally understood as guarding unenumerated natural rights. Recently uncovered historical evidence, however, suggests that those who framed and ratified the Ninth Amendment understood the Clause as a guardian of the retained right to local self-government. Recognizing the challenge this …

A Textual-Historical Theory Of The Ninth Amendment, Kurt T. Lash

ExpressO

Despite the lavish attention paid to the Ninth Amendment as supporting judicial enforcement of unenumerated rights, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the Amendment’s actual text. Doing so reveals a number of interpretive conundrums. For example, although often cited in support of broad readings of the Fourteenth Amendment, the text of the Ninth says nothing about how to interpret enumerated rights such as those contained in the Fourteenth. No matter how narrowly one construes the Fourteenth, the Ninth merely demands that such enumerated rights not be construed to deny or disparage other rights retained by the people. The standard …

Interrogation Of Detainees: Extending A Hand Or A Boot?, Amos N. Guiora

ExpressO

The so called “war on terror” provides the Bush administration with a unique opportunity to both establish clear guidelines for the interrogation of detainees and to make a forceful statement about American values. How the government chooses to act can promote either an ethical commitment to the norms of civil society, or an attitude analogous to Toby Keith’s “American Way,” where Keith sings that “you’ll be sorry that you messed with the USofA, ‘Cuz we’ll put a boot in your ass, It’s the American Way.”

No aspect of the “war on terrorism” more clearly addresses this balance than coercive interrogation. …

The American Tradition Of Racial Profiling, Jean Phan

ExpressO

The enemy has always been easily recognizable in American life: He has been the savage Native American known for scalping people; the black slave bent on ravaging white women; the Asian worker unfairly competing against the white man; the Mexican immigrant who does nothing but leech off the system; the Arab who dreams up terrorist plots, and carries them out. These enemies have always been visible in American society, and yet, they don’t exist in reality. They exist only in the minds of those too afraid to consider that these strange individuals who seem so different, could be just like …

Petitioner's Observations (February 2007) For The Redress Of Violations Of Human Rights Guaranteed By The American Declaration Of The Rights And Duties Of Man, Inter-American Commission On Human Rights, Jeffrey C. Tuomala

Faculty Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.

Jutstice Kennedy And The Environment: Property, States' Rights, And The Search For Nexus, Michael Blumm

ExpressO

Justice Anthony Kennedy, now clearly the pivot of the Roberts Court, is the Court’s crucial voice in environmental and natural resources law cases. Kennedy’s central role was never more evident than in the two most celebrated environmental and natural resources law cases of 2006: Kelo v. New London and Rapanos v. U.S., since he supplied the critical vote in both: upholding local use of the condemnation power for economic development under certain circumstances, and affirming federal regulatory authority over wetlands which have a significant nexus to navigable waters. In each case Kennedy’s sole concurrence was outcome determinative.

Justice Kennedy has …

Marbury In Mexico: Judicial Review’S Precocious Southern Migration, M C. Mirow

Faculty Publications

In attempting to construct United States-style judicial review for the Mexican Supreme Court in the 1880s, Ignacio Vallarta, president of the court, read Marbury in a way that preceded this use of the case in the United States. Using this surprising fact as a central example, this article makes several important contributions to the field of comparative constitutional law. The work demonstrates that through constitutional migration, novel readings of constitutional sources can arise in foreign fora. In an era when the United States Supreme Court may be accused of parochialism in its constitutional analysis, the article addresses the current controversy …

Labor Regulation, Union Avoidance And Organized Labor Relations Strategies On Tribal Lands: New Indian Gaming Strategies In The Wake Of San Manuel Band Of Indians V. National Labor Relations Board, 40 J. Marshall L. Rev. 1259 (2007), D. Michael Mcbride Iii, H. Leonard Court

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

John Locke And The Meaning Of The Takings Clause, Jeffrey M. Gaba

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

ohn Locke, political philosopher and all around polymath, stands as a central figure in the development of Western conceptions of property rights and democratic institutions. If not the sole voice that is echoed in the American revolution and the Constitutional Convention, he clearly influenced the founders, particularly James Madison, and he thus represents an intellectual force that is a legitimate part of the current debate over the relationship between government power and individual property rights.

The purpose of this article is to provide both a detailed analysis of Locke to aid the Takings debate and a particular reading of the …

No Right To Respect: Dred Scott And The Southern Honor Culture, 42 New Eng. L. Rev. 79 (2007), Cecil J. Hunt Ii

UIC Law Open Access Faculty Scholarship

This Article reflects on the infamous decision in Dred Scott v. Sanford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 (1857), in which the Supreme Court of the United States upheld the constitutionality of slavery. This Article considers this infamous case and the distance the nation has come since it was decided as well as its continuing legacy on the contemporary American struggle for racial equality. In Dred Scott the Court held that slavery was constitutional because it was consistent with the intent of the Framers and because black people were "a subordinate and inferior class of beings who... whether emancipated or not.., …

Truth, Deterrence, And The Impeachment Exception , James L. Kainen

Faculty Scholarship

James v. Illinois permits illegally-obtained evidence to impeach defendants, but not defense witnesses. Thus far, all courts have construed James to allow impeachment of defendants' hearsay declarations. This article argues against allowing illegally-obtained evidence to impeach defendants' hearsay declarations because doing so unduly diminishes the exclusionary rule's deterrent effect. The distinction between impeaching defendants and defense witnesses disappears when courts allow prosecutors to impeach defendants' hearsay declarations. Because defense witnesses report exculpatory conduct of a defendant who always has a substantial interest in disguising his criminality, their testimony routinely incorporates defendant hearsay. Defense witness testimony thus routinely paves the way …

Originalism And The Natural Born Citizen Clause, Lawrence B. Solum

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The enigmatic phrase "natural born citizen" poses a series of problems for contemporary originalism. New originalists, like Justice Scalia, focus on the public meaning of the constitutional text, but the notion of a "natural born citizen" was likely a term of art, derived from the idea of a "natural born subject" in English law--a category that most likely did not extend to persons, like John McCain, who were born outside sovereign territory. But the constitution speaks of "citizens" and not "subjects," introducing uncertainties and ambiguities that might (or might not) make McCain eligible for the presidency.

What was the original …

The Progressive Political Power Of Balkin's "Original Meaning", Dawn E. Johnsen

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

The (Futile) Search For A Common Law Right Of Confrontation: Beyond Brasier's Irrelevance To (Perhaps) Relevant American Cases, Randolph N. Jonakait

Articles & Chapters

After Crawford v. Washington asserted that the Confrontation Clause constitutionalized the common law right of confrontation, cases have been suggested that illustrate that right. This short essay considers whether the 1779 English case Rex v. Brasier is such a decision, as some contend. The essay concludes that Brasier says nothing about the right of confrontation and points to a comparable framing-era, American case that indicates that general rules about hearsay and confrontation were not at issue. The essay maintains that if the historical understandings of the right of confrontation and hearsay are to control the Confrontation Clause, then framing-era, American …

The Incompatibility Principle, Harold H. Bruff

Publications

No abstract provided.

An External Perspective On The Nature Of Noneconomic Compensatory Damages And Their Regulation, Ronald J. Allen, Alexia Brunet, Susan Spies Roth

Publications

No abstract provided.

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

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

On The Fortieth Anniversary Of The Miranda Case: Why We Needed It, How We Got It--And What Happened To It, Yale Kamisar

Articles

Last year (the year I gave the talk on which this article is based) marked the fortieth anniversary of Miranda v. Arizona,' one of the most praised, most maligned-and probably one of the most misunderstood-Supreme Court cases in American history. It is difficult, if not impossible, to evaluate Miranda without looking back at the test for the admissibility of confessions that preceded it.

The Constitution's Political Deficit, Robin West

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Professor Levinson has wisely called for an extended conversation regarding the possibility and desirability of a new Constitutional Convention, which might be called so as to correct some of the more glaring failings of our current governing document. Chief among those, in his view, are a handful of doctrines that belie our commitment to democratic self-government, such as the two-senators-per-state makeup of the United States Senate and the Electoral College. Perhaps these provisions once had some rhyme or reason to them, but, as Levinson suggests, it is not at all clear that they do now. They assure that our legislative …

Towards A Common Law Originalism, Bernadette Meyler

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Originalists' emphasis upon William Blackstone's "Commentaries on the Laws of England" tends to suggest that the common law of the Founding era consisted in a set of determinate rules that can be mined for the purposes of constitutional interpretation. This Article argues instead that disparate strands of the common law, some emanating from the colonies and others from England, some more archaic and others more innovative, co-existed at the time of the Founding. Furthermore, jurists and politicians of the Founding generation were not unaware that the common law constituted a disunified field; indeed, the jurisprudence of the common law suggested …

The Founders And Slavery, Arthur R. Landever

Law Faculty Presentations and Testimony

The point of my talk is that our founders, who our tradition praises profusely of course, as men on Mount Olympus, had moral blinders on. I'm going to talk about key founders. Then I'm going to talk about the key English case, decided in 1772, Somerset v. Stuart. Then I'm going to talk about the Compromises of the 1770s and 1780s. Then I'm going to talk about what we can and can't learn from history. Then I'm going to consider what our generation is doing in the 21st century, considering what might shock our own descendants, two hundred years from …

Original Intent In The First Congress, Louis J. Sirico Jr.

Working Paper Series

Most of the literature on this country’s Founding Era concludes that at least in the very early years, the Founders did not look to original intent to construe the Constitution. However, this study looks not at what the Founders said they believed, but how they acted. In the First Federal Congress, the members did use arguments based on original intent. This study identifies their originalist arguments and categorizes them into five rhetorical categories. It concludes that these arguments did not dominate the debates, but were one type of argument among many.

The Rhetoric For Ratification: The Argument Of "The Federalist" And Its Impact On Constitutional Interpretation, Dan T. Coenen

Scholarly Works

Courts, lawyers, and scholars have long assumed that The Federalist Papers supply important information for use in constitutional argument and interpretation. In recent years, commentators have questioned this view. Their skepticism grows out of two major concerns. First, Justice Scalia's challenge to the use of legislative history in the statutory context casts a cloud over judicial use of background texts such as The Federalist in seeking the meaning of the Constitution. Second, even if courts may rely on some background materials in interpreting the Constitution, there is reason to conclude that The Federalist does not qualify as the sort of …

A Complete Property Right Amendment, John H. Ryskamp

ExpressO

The trend of the eminent domain reform and "Kelo plus" initiatives is toward a comprehensive Constitutional property right incorporating the elements of level of review, nature of government action, and extent of compensation. This article contains a draft amendment which reflects these concerns.

St. George Tucker’S Second Amendment: Deconstructing ‘The True Palladium Of Liberty’, Stephen P. Halbrook

ExpressO

St. George Tucker, known as “America’s Blackstone” and author of the first commentary on the Constitution in 1803, described the Second Amendment right of the people to keep and bear arms as “the true palladium of liberty.” In a recent symposium at the William and Mary College of Law, Prof. Saul Cornell presented Tucker as an adherent of the view that the Amendment guarantees a collective or civic right to bear arms in the militia, not an individual right to have arms for self defense or as a dissuasion to tyranny. In response, my article scrutinizes Tucker’s work in detail …

Uncivil Religion: "Judeo-Christianity" And The Ten Commandments, Frederick Mark Gedicks, Roger Hendrix

ExpressO

In the recent Decalogue Cases, Justice Scalia argued that when it comes to “public acknowledgment of religious belief, it is entirely clear from our Nation's historical practices that the Establishment Clause permits th[e] disregard of polytheists and believers in unconcerned deities, just as it permits the disregard of devout atheists.” Justice Scalia's argument represents the latest attempt to insulate American civil religion from Establishment Clause attack. A “civil religion” is a set of nondenominational values, symbols, rituals, and assumptions which create both reverence of national history and formation of a communal national bond. The most recent incarnation of American civil …

Function Over Form: Reviving The Criminal Jury's Historical Role As A Sentencing Body, Chris Kemmitt

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article argues that the Supreme Court, as evinced by its recent spate of criminal jury decisions, has abandoned the criminal jury known to the Founders and, in so doing, has severely eroded the protections intended to inhere in the Sixth Amendment jury trial right. It then proposes one potential solution to this problem.

According to the Supreme Court, this recent line of cases has been motivated by the need to preserve the "ancient guarantee" articulated in the Sixth Amendment under a new set of legal circumstances. Unfortunately, the Court misinterprets the ancient guarantee that it is ostensibly attempting to …