Constitutional Law Commons^™

Attachment And Garnishment--Constitutional Law--Due Process Of Law--Garnishment Of Wages Prior To Judgment Is A Denial Of Due Process: The Sniadach Case And Its Implications For Related Areas Of The Law, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

The question of the constitutionality of prejudgment wage garnishment had never before reached the Supreme Court, although in McKay v. Mclnnes, a 1929 memorandum decision, the Court had upheld a statute providing for prejudgment attachment. McKay, which was cited as controlling by the Wisconsin court in its disposition of the constitutional argument in Sniadach, involved an attachment of realty and stock to satisfy a debt. Justice Douglas, writing for the Court in Sniadach, distinguished that case from one involving wage garnishment with the statement that "[a] procedural rule that may satisfy due process for attachments in general ... …

Constitutional Law--The Right To A Jury Trial In Disbarment Proceedings, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

Lawyers in the United States have long been considered officers of the court, subject to examination for good moral character and adequate education in law before admission to the bar. They have also been subject to summary proceedings for disbarment whenever they have deviated from accepted standards of conduct embodied in various codes of professional ethics. Although the specific grounds for disbarment vary from state to state and between federal and state courts, one thing is clear: in the absence of a specific statutory provision there traditionally has been no right to a jury trial in disbarment proceedings. Since the …

Constitutional Reflections On Abortion Reform, Patrick L. Baude

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

United States abortion law is evolving comparably. Even eight years ago, public opinion was deeply divided when a Phoenix housewife sought to avoid giving birth after taking Thalidomide. The Model Penal Code, promulgated that year, authorized abortion in cases of felonious intercourse, to avoid deformity, and to protect the physical or mental health of the mother; these faintly daring innovations are now in danger of being declared unconstitutional because they are too limited. In the last year, three courts have invalidated moderate abortion statutes and the New York legislature has permitted abortion at will in early pregnancy. The purpose of …

Massachusetts In The Federal Courts: The Constitutionality Of The Vietnam War, Anthony A. D'Amato

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

One of the most singular pieces of legislation in American constitutional history passed both houses of the Massachusetts legislature on April 1st, 1970, and was signed into law on the following day by Governor Francis W. Sargent. It provides that, except for an emergency, no inhabitant of Massachusetts inducted into or serving in the armed forces "shall be required to serve" abroad in an armed hostility that has not been declared a war by Congress under Article 1, Section 8, clause 11 of the United States Constitution. The bill further directs the state's attorney general to bring a suit testing …

Constitutional Law--Double Jeopardy--Prosecutions By Both A City And A State For An Identical Offense As A Violation Of The Prohibition Against Double Jeopardy--Waller V. State, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

In Benton v. Maryland, decided in June of this year, the Supreme Court explicitly extended fifth amendment protection against double jeopardy to the states through the fourteenth amendment. Palko was specifically overruled to the extent that it was inconsistent with the Benton decision. Thus, the theories traditionally used to defend prosecutions by both a city and a state for the same offense must be examined to determine whether they are still valid when the fifth amendment's prohibition against double jeopardy is applied to state proceedings. This Recent Development examines the implications of the Benton decision for those theories.

Howard: The Road From Runnymede: Magna Carta And Constitutionalism In America, Leonard W. Levy

Michigan Law Review

A Review o The Road from Runnymede: Magna Carta and Constitutionalism in America by A.E. Dick Howard

Conscription And The Constitution: The Original Understanding, Leon Friedman

Michigan Law Review

The general words of the Constitution-famous phrases such as "due process," "freedom of speech," "interstate commerce," and "raise and support armies"-are not self-evident concepts. As Justice Frankfurter said, "The language of the [Constitution] is to be read not as barren words found in a dictionary but as symbols of historic experience illumined by the presuppositions of those who employed them. Not what words did Madison and Hamilton use, but what was it in their minds which they conveyed?" While the framers obviously could not have foreseen the discovery of electromagnetic radio waves or atomic energy, and had no "intent" concerning …

Sturm & Whitaker: Implementing A New Constitution: The Michigan Experience, Walter D. De Vries

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Implementing a New Constitution: The Michigan Experience by Albert L. Sturm and Margaret Whitaker

Personal Privacy In The Computer Age: The Challenge Of A New Technology In An Information-Oriented Society, Arthur R. Miller

Michigan Law Review

The purpose of this Article is to survey the new technology's implications for personal privacy and to evaluate the contemporary common-law and statutory pattern relating to data-handling. In the course of this examination, it will appraise the existing framework's capacity to deal with the problems created by society's growing awareness of the primordial character of information. The Article is intended to be suggestive; any attempt at definitiveness would be premature. Avowedly, it was written with the bias of one who believes that the new information technology has enormous long-range societal implications and who is concerned about the consequences of the …

Levy: Origins Of The Fifth Amendment, O. John Rogge

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Origins of the Fifth Amendment by Leonard W. Levy

Comment On Powell V. Mccormack, Terrance Sandalow

Articles

The rapid pace of constitutional change during the past decade has blunted our capacity for surprise at Supreme Court decisions. Nevertheless, Powell v. McCormack is a surprising decision. Avoidance of politically explosive controversies was not one of the most notable characteristics of the Warren Court. And yet, it is one thing for the Court to do battle with the Congress in the service of important practical ends or when the necessity of doing so is thrust upon it by the need to discharge its traditional responsibilities. It is quite another to tilt at windmills, especially at a time when the …

Constitutional Law--Police Power--Michigan Statute Requiring Motorcyclists To Wear Protective Helmets Held Unconstitutional, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

The effects of the helmet decisions on the law in general may be substantial. On the one hand, if a helmet statute is held constitutional, inroads could be made upon personal liberty; the legislature might rely on similar strained and unproved relationships to the general welfare in order to justify regulations impinging upon other areas of individual conduct. On the other hand, to hold such a statute unconstitutional may require the judiciary to interfere unreasonably with the legislature's conception of public welfare. In light of these considerations, courts dealing with challenges to such regulations in the future should pay closer …

Dietze: America's Political Dilemma, Paul G. Kauper

Michigan Law Review

A Review of America's Political Dilemma by Gottfried Dietze

The Constitution, Congress, And Presidential Elections, Albert J. Rosenthal

Michigan Law Review

It has been recommended by a prestigious commission of the American Bar Association and endorsed by the ABA's House of Delegates. The Bar Association of the City of New York, which had previously recommended a different proposed amendment, has now shifted its support to direct popular vote, as has Senator Birch Bayh, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Constitutional Amendments of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. A Gallup poll indicates that 66 per cent of the nation supports this amendment, with only 19 per cent opposed.

It must be remembered, however, that a decision to amend the Constitution is, as …

Constitutional Law--Executive Agreements--International Law--Executive Authority Concerning The Future Political Status Of The Trust Territory Of The Pacific Islands, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

It is fair to conclude that the President, even in the absence of express congressional authorization, has constitutional authority indeed, a constitutional duty-to carry out those obligations assumed under the Micronesian trusteeship agreement. Execution of this agreement lies within the scope of the authority given the President by the faithful execution clause and by his independent constitutional powers in the area of foreign policy. Thus, it is next necessary to determine the scope of the president's authority under the trusteeship agreement.

The Supreme Court And The People, Everett Mckinley Dirksen

Michigan Law Review

There is only one circumstance, as I read the Constitution, which authorizes the federal government to intrude or interfere with the governmental structure of a state. That would occur under the provisions of section 4 of article IV, which, in pertinent part, state: "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican form of Government .... " This was the question, if indeed there was a federal question, to be determined in the earlier Baker v. Carr and the reapportionment cases. To rely on the fourteenth amendment for authority to establish by judicial decree a new …

Proposed Legislation To Implement The Convention Method Of Amending The Constitution, Sam J. Ervin Jr.

Michigan Law Review

Article V of the Constitution of the United States provides that constitutional amendments may be proposed in either of two ways--by two-thirds of both houses of the Congress or by a convention called by the Congress in response to the applications of two-thirds of the state legislatures. Although the framers of the Constitution evidently contemplated that the two methods of initiating amendments would operate as parallel procedures, neither superior to the other, this has not been the case historically. Each of the twenty-five constitutional amendments ratified to date was proposed by the Congress under the first alternative. As a result, …

The Alternative Amendment Process: Some Observations, Paul G. Kauper

Michigan Law Review

The alternative method of formal amendment of the Constitution raises unresolved questions of interpretation. As a contribution to the formulation of procedures for the implementation of this method Senator Ervin has introduced a bill dealing with the matter in considerable detail. In dealing with the subject I propose to discuss not only the convention procedure provided in article V, and in this connection point up some considerations respecting Senator Ervin's bill, but also some basic questions relating to the formal amendment process and the role assumed by the Supreme Court in the process of constitutional change.

Article V: The Comatose Article Of Our Living Constitution?, Robert G. Dixon Jr.

Michigan Law Review

Capacity for steady--even startling-development and relative incapacity for formal change, are twin features of American constitutionalism often noticed but seldom analyzed conjointly. Even the most stalwart supporters of the status quo do not want an unamendable Constitution, but disagreement as to how change should be effected, and the scope of it, runs deep. Indeed, this is the central problem of Marbury v. Madison. That case was the effective innovator of judicial review, our "real" system for developmental constitutionalism. Interestingly, it also was one of the quite rare instances when a seemingly simple constitutional text was at issue (scope of Supreme …

The Dirksen Amendment And The Article V Convention Process, Arthur Earl Bonfield

Michigan Law Review

This article will concentrate on the legal issues facing Congress in the current effort to call a constitutional convention. Because all of the previous amendments to the Constitution were proposed to the states by a two-thirds vote of both Houses of Congress, the issues raised in the present situation have never been resolved. The appropriate course of action for the national legislature is especially in doubt. An attempt will therefore be made here to focus on proper decision-making by Congress in resolving these constitutional issues. The role of the judiciary will be considered only incidentally, since, as will be seen, …

Disadvantages Of A Federal Constitutional Convention, Ralph M. Carson

Michigan Law Review

Article V says that on application of two-thirds of the states Congress "shall" call the convention for proposing amendments. The imperative color of this word cannot be disregarded. It leaves no discretion in Congress as to the convening of an article V assembly, although it may be consistent with some control by Congress over the modalities. A deliberate refusal on the part of Congress to call a convention, once the requisite number of state applications were in hand, may be expected, by enlarged analogy to what has been done in the recent civil rights cases and what is being proposed …