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Articles 151 - 180 of 439
Full-Text Articles in Constitutional Law
Coase And The Constitution: A New Approach To Federalism, F.E Guerra-Pujol
Coase And The Constitution: A New Approach To Federalism, F.E Guerra-Pujol
Richmond Journal of Law and the Public Interest
This paper proposes a new approach to the centuries-old question of federalism. In a word, we approach the problem offederalism from a Coasian or property-rights perspective. That is, instead of attempting to draw an arbitrary boundary line between state and federal spheres of power through traditional legal or semantic analysis of the constitution and previous judicial precedents, this paper proposes the creation of alternative 'federalism markets" in which governmental powers and functions would be allocated to Congress, the states, or even private firms through decentralized auction mechanisms and secondary markets. The paper is divided into five parts. Following a brief …
Judicial Gatekeeping And The Seventh Amendment: How Daubert Infringes On The Constitutional Right To A Civil Jury Trial, Brandon L. Boxler
Judicial Gatekeeping And The Seventh Amendment: How Daubert Infringes On The Constitutional Right To A Civil Jury Trial, Brandon L. Boxler
Richmond Journal of Law and the Public Interest
This Article begins by reviewing the history, purpose, and function of the Seventh Amendment within the American constitutional system. It then discusses the Supreme Court's analytical framework for preserving the fundamental features of the right to a civil jury trial while simultaneously permitting rational legal development of the jury system. Next, the Article provides a brief overview of the Court's Daubert jurisprudence, and argues that the creation of judicial gatekeeping has caused an institutional shift of adjudicatory authority away from juries and into the hands of judges in violation of the Seventh Amendment. The Article concludes by suggesting three legal …
Judicial Gatekeeping And The Seventh Amendment: How Daubert Infringes On The Constitutional Right To A Civil Jury Trial, Brandon L. Boxler
Judicial Gatekeeping And The Seventh Amendment: How Daubert Infringes On The Constitutional Right To A Civil Jury Trial, Brandon L. Boxler
Richmond Public Interest Law Review
This Article begins by reviewing the history, purpose, and function of the Seventh Amendment within the American constitutional system. It then discusses the Supreme Court's analytical framework for preserving the fundamental features of the right to a civil jury trial while simultaneously permitting rational legal development of the jury system. Next, the Article provides a brief overview of the Court's Daubert jurisprudence, and argues that the creation of judicial gatekeeping has caused an institutional shift of adjudicatory authority away from juries and into the hands of judges in violation of the Seventh Amendment. The Article concludes by suggesting three legal …
Whiskey, Soldiers, And Voting: Western Virginia Elections In The 1790s, Jud Campbell
Whiskey, Soldiers, And Voting: Western Virginia Elections In The 1790s, Jud Campbell
Law Faculty Publications
Editor's Note: Elections in eighteenth-century Virginia were conducted quite differently than current elections. In this article, the author presents revealing descriptions of early elections in Montgomery County, Virginia immediately following the birth of the United States. The behavior and motivations of the electorate, as well as the candidates, provide interesting insight regarding the social structure o/that era.
Beyond Formalist Sovereignty: Who Can Represent "We The People Of The United States" Today?, David Chang
Beyond Formalist Sovereignty: Who Can Represent "We The People Of The United States" Today?, David Chang
University of Richmond Law Review
No abstract provided.
Failed Constitutional Metaphors: The Wall Of Separation And The Penumbra, Louis J. Sirico Jr.
Failed Constitutional Metaphors: The Wall Of Separation And The Penumbra, Louis J. Sirico Jr.
University of Richmond Law Review
No abstract provided.
On Equality: The Anti-Interference Principle, Donald J. Kochan
On Equality: The Anti-Interference Principle, Donald J. Kochan
University of Richmond Law Review
This essay seeks to summarize the general equality concept and proposes that equality requires that the government engage in anti-interference with individual choices and activities, so long as these things create no negative externalities for others. If we are serious about respecting equality, such interference actions should be avoided. Adopting an "anti-interference principle" is a necessary foundation for achieving the goal of true equality. The primary point is that equality matters. The purpose of this essay is not to survey the vast political, jurisprudential, and academic debate on equality, but instead, to take a broad look at the philosophical concept …
Putting Rationality Back Into The Rational Basis Test: Saving Substantive Due Process And Redeeming The Promise Of The Ninth Amendment, Jeffrey D. Jackson
Putting Rationality Back Into The Rational Basis Test: Saving Substantive Due Process And Redeeming The Promise Of The Ninth Amendment, Jeffrey D. Jackson
University of Richmond Law Review
This article argues for the adoption of a strengthened rational basis test that would allow courts to scrutinize the actual purpose behind legislation and demand that the legislation actually be reasonably related to its valid legislative purpose. Part II looks at the question of why it is desirable to save substantive due process rather than replace it with some other doctrine. Part III examines how substantive due process came to be the dominant form of protection for unenumerated rights, and how it has evolved from its antecedents in English law to the current test. It concludes that substantive due process …
A New Approach To Nineteenth-Century Religious Exemption Cases, Jud Campbell
A New Approach To Nineteenth-Century Religious Exemption Cases, Jud Campbell
Law Faculty Publications
Scholars frequently cite early nineteenth-century cases to ascertain the original meaning of the Free Exercise Clause. Previous studies, however, have ignored crucial trends in those decisions, thus leading to mistaken emphasis on the denial of religious accommodation claims. This Note argues that prevailing theological views, skepticism of courtroom declarations of religious belief, and contemporary notions of judicial deference better explain nineteenth-century cases than does a wholesale rejection of judicially enforceable religious exemptions. This novel approach clarifies previously unexplained tensions in early free exercise opinions. It also suggests that the Supreme Court’s holding in Employment Division v. Smith is inconsistent with …
The Origins Of The Privileges Or Immunities Clause, Part Ii: John Bingham And The Second Draft Of The Fourteenth Amendment, Kurt T. Lash
The Origins Of The Privileges Or Immunities Clause, Part Ii: John Bingham And The Second Draft Of The Fourteenth Amendment, Kurt T. Lash
Law Faculty Publications
Historical accounts of the Privileges or Immunities Clause of Section One of the Fourteenth Amendment generally assume that John Bingham based the text on Article IV of the original Constitution and that Bingham, like other Reconstruction Republicans, viewed Justice Washington’s opinion in Corfield v. Coryell as the definitive interpretation of Article IV. According to this view, Justice Miller in the Slaughterhouse Cases failed to follow both framers’ intent and obvious textual meaning when he sharply distinguished Section One’s privileges or immunities from Article IV’s privileges and immunities.
This article, the second in an extended investigation of the origins of the …
The Anatomy Of A Search: Intrusiveness And The Fourth Amendment, Renée Mcdonald Hutchins
The Anatomy Of A Search: Intrusiveness And The Fourth Amendment, Renée Mcdonald Hutchins
University of Richmond Law Review
In this essay, I contend that when evaluating the constitutionality of enhanced surveillance devices, the existing test for assessing the occurrence of a Fourth Amendment search should be modified. Specifically, I suggest that intrusiveness should be unambiguously adopted by the Court as the benchmark for assessing and defining the existence of a search under the Fourth Amendment. Moreover, intrusiveness should be clearly defined to require an examination of two factors: the functionality of a challenged form of surveillance and the potential for disclosure created by the device.
Two Understandings Of Supremacy: An Essay, Vincent J. Samar
Two Understandings Of Supremacy: An Essay, Vincent J. Samar
Richmond Journal of Global Law & Business
Does the supremacy provision of Article VI of the U.S. Constitution undermine the legal force of international law in the United States? Recently, there has been some debate on this issue arising out of the claim that if the U.S. Constitution is “the supreme law of the land,” and that only constitutional officers of the United States, in keeping with their responsibilities to uphold the Constitution, can decide what is international law for the U.S. Such debates are not new to the history of the world. For much of world history, national rulers have claimed that their legal authority derives …
The Origin Of Citizen Genet’S Projected Attack On Spanish Louisiana: A Case Study In Girondin Politics, Jud Campbell
The Origin Of Citizen Genet’S Projected Attack On Spanish Louisiana: A Case Study In Girondin Politics, Jud Campbell
Law Faculty Publications
In 1792 the Girondin ministry decided to send Edmond Genet to the United States with plans to recruit western frontiersmen and invade Spanish Louisiana. The episode is well known in American history, but the literature on its French origin is sparse and overemphasizes the contribution of revolutionary leader Jacques- Pierre Brissot. This essay contextualizes the French decision within the debate between Brissot, Minister of Foreign Affairs Pierre Lebrun, and General Charles-François Dumouriez over whether France should send troops against Spanish colonies in South America. The essay argues that Lebrun promoted the western scheme in order to attack Spanish interests without …
Partial Unconstitutionality, Kevin C. Walsh
Partial Unconstitutionality, Kevin C. Walsh
Law Faculty Publications
Courts often hold legislation unconstitutional, but nearly always only part of the statute offends. The problem of partial unconstitutionality is therefore pervasive and persistent. Yet the exclusive doctrinal tool for dealing with this problem--severability doctrine-is deeply flawed. To make matters worse, severability doctrine is purportedly necessary for any workable system of judicial review. The accepted view is that severance saves: A court faced with a partially unconstitutional law must sever and excise the unconstitutional provisions or applications so that the constitutional remainder can be enforced going forward. Absent severance and excision, a law must fall in its entirety. This excision-based …
Our Forgotten Founders: Reconstruction, Public Education, And Constitutional Heroism, Thomas G. Donnelly
Our Forgotten Founders: Reconstruction, Public Education, And Constitutional Heroism, Thomas G. Donnelly
Law Faculty Publications
Works on the Founding generation consistently inhabit national bestseller lists. For instance, David McCullough’s book 1776 placed fifth on Publishers Weekly’s 2005 list, beating out pop culture favorites Blink and Freakonomics. Over the last decade, other similarly successful titles have included His Excellency, Founding Brothers, and John Adams. In fact, McCullough’s hagiographic biography of our nation’s second President was later transformed into an Emmy Award-winning mini-series on HBO—to say nothing of President Obama’s decision to add it to his 2009 summer reading list. In short, Americans revere their eighteenth-century Founders. ...
[Introduction To] The Language Of Law And The Foundations Of American Constitutionalism, Gary L. Mcdowell
[Introduction To] The Language Of Law And The Foundations Of American Constitutionalism, Gary L. Mcdowell
Bookshelf
For much of its history, the interpretation of the United States Constitution presupposed judges seeking the meaning of the text and the original intentions behind that text, a process that was deemed by Chief Justice John Marshall to be “the most sacred rule of interpretation.” Since the end of the nineteenth century, a radically new understanding has developed in which the moral intuition of the judges is allowed to supplant the Constitution’s original meaning as the foundation of interpretation. The Founders’ constitution of fixed and permanent meaning has been replaced by the idea of a “living” or evolving constitution. Gary …
The Origins Of The Privileges Or Immunities Clause, Part I: “Privileges And Immunities” As An Antebellum Term Of Art, Kurt T. Lash
The Origins Of The Privileges Or Immunities Clause, Part I: “Privileges And Immunities” As An Antebellum Term Of Art, Kurt T. Lash
Law Faculty Publications
Historical accounts of the Privileges or Immunities Clause of Section One of the Fourteenth Amendment generally assume that John Bingham based the text on Article IV of the original Constitution and that Bingham, like other Reconstruction Republicans, viewed Justice Washington’s opinion in Corfield v. Coryell as the definitive statement of the meaning of Article IV. According to this view, Justice Miller in the Slaughterhouse Cases failed to follow both framers’ intent and obvious textual meaning when he distinguished Section One’s privileges or immunities from Article IV’s privileges and immunities.
A close analysis of antebellum law, however, suggests that Justice Miller’s …
Lessons Learned From The Evolution Of Evolving Standards, Corinna Barrett Lain
Lessons Learned From The Evolution Of Evolving Standards, Corinna Barrett Lain
Law Faculty Publications
In the discussion that follows, I explore the evolution of the "evolving standards" doctrine to make a point about its legitimacy and Supreme Court decisionmaking under the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause more generally. In Part I, I trace the origins of the doctrine to its present state. In Part II, I turn to lessons learned from the evolution of "evolving standards," questioning the textual defense of the doctrine and the constraining power of law itself. I conclude that while the "evolving standards" doctrine is problematic, it is not the crux of the problem. Supreme Court decisionmaking in the death …
Resurrecting The Promise Of Brown: Understanding And Remedying How The Supreme Court Reconstitutionalized Segregated Schools, Kimberly J. Robinson
Resurrecting The Promise Of Brown: Understanding And Remedying How The Supreme Court Reconstitutionalized Segregated Schools, Kimberly J. Robinson
Law Faculty Publications
The Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education held that separate educational facilities were "inherently unequal." After tolerating substantial delay and evasion of the requirements of Brown, the Court eventually required school districts to dismantle the dual systems by eliminating all traces of separate schools and creating integrated schools. In contrast to numerous scholars that have contended that many of the Court's later school desegregation decisions withdrew from or grew weary of school desegregation, this Article argues that the effect of many of the Court's leading school desegregation decisions was to reconstitutionalize segregated schools. Furthermore, the Court's …
A Popular Approach To Popular Constitutionalism: The First Amendment, Civic Education, And Constitutional Change, Thomas G. Donnelly
A Popular Approach To Popular Constitutionalism: The First Amendment, Civic Education, And Constitutional Change, Thomas G. Donnelly
Law Faculty Publications
Popular constitutionalists fear that our constitutional culture is becoming less popular. At the same time, these scholars often ignore key popular sources of constitutional meaning. Their accounts focus, instead, on the elite conflicts that give rise to constitutional change, particularly the ongoing debates between elected officials, movement leaders, and the Supreme Court. Although these studies are essential to understanding the pathways for promoting non-Article V constitutional change, they are "popular" only in the sense that they focus on non-judicial actors and politically salient controversies. The constitutional life of the average citizen is generally ignored. If legal scholars are serious about …
Run For The Border: Laptop Searches And The Fourth Amendment, Nathan Alexander Sales
Run For The Border: Laptop Searches And The Fourth Amendment, Nathan Alexander Sales
University of Richmond Law Review
No abstract provided.
Our Founding Feelings: Emotion, Commitment, And Imagination In Constitutional Culture, Doni Gewirtzman
Our Founding Feelings: Emotion, Commitment, And Imagination In Constitutional Culture, Doni Gewirtzman
University of Richmond Law Review
No abstract provided.
Constitutional Enforcement By Proxy, John F. Preis
Constitutional Enforcement By Proxy, John F. Preis
Law Faculty Publications
Americans love their Constitution. But love, as we all know, is blind. This may explain why we often look to constitutional law to vindicate our civil rights while ignoring the potential of sub-constitutional law. Federal courts have not ignored this possibility, however, and have increasingly forced civil rights plaintiffs to seek relief using sub-constitutional law where it is available. A victim of discrimination, for example, might be denied the chance to invoke the Equal Protection Clause and told instead to rely on a federal antidiscrimination statute. In this and other cases, courts seem to believe that constitutional rights can be …
Originalism As Jujitsu, Kurt T. Lash
Originalism As Jujitsu, Kurt T. Lash
Law Faculty Publications
The Ninth Amendment presents an irresistible mystery. It speaks of "other rights" retained by the people and it prohibits interpretations which "deny or disparage" those rights. The Amendment, however, tells us nothing about what these rights are or how they can be enforced. On the one hand, this makes the Ninth rather difficult to apply. On the other hand, the lack of definitional clarity also makes the Ninth Amendment something of a desideratum for those seeking expanded judicial protection of previously unrecognized individual rights. Accordingly, the Ninth Amendment has been cited in support of everything from Dial-a-Porn to freedom from …
Frames Of Reference And The "Turn To Remedy" In Facial Challenge Doctrine, Kevin C. Walsh
Frames Of Reference And The "Turn To Remedy" In Facial Challenge Doctrine, Kevin C. Walsh
Law Faculty Publications
This Symposium on Facial Challenges in the Roberts Court provides an opportunity to chart a path toward greater doctrinal coherence in light of the Court's most recent uses of the distinction between facial and as-applied challenges. In his contribution to this Symposium, David Faigman makes two claims that I address in this response. The first of Professor Faigman's claims is descriptive: "the debate over facial versus as-applied challenges is merely a subcategory of the pervasive issue concerning defining the proper frame of reference for empirical questions arising under the Constitution.'"' As Professor Faigman uses the term, a "frame of reference" …
Leaving The Chisholm Trail: The Eleventh Amendment And The Background Principle Of Strict Construction, Kurt T. Lash
Leaving The Chisholm Trail: The Eleventh Amendment And The Background Principle Of Strict Construction, Kurt T. Lash
Law Faculty Publications
Most scholars and courts assume that the Eleventh Amendment emerged from a sudden 'shocked' public reaction to the Supreme Court's decision in Chisholm v. Georgia. The Supreme Court's decision in Hans v. Louisiana has been subject to particular criticism for extending the doctrine of sovereign immunity beyondthe text of the amendment and the particular subject matter before the Court in Chisholm. This article contends that the modern emphasis on Chisholm v. Georgia as the generative source of the Eleventh Amendment is historically incorrect. Public debate regarding the key issues behind the Eleventh Amendment had been underway long before the Court …
Beyond Incorporation, Kurt T. Lash
Beyond Incorporation, Kurt T. Lash
Law Faculty Publications
Incorporation as a theory of constitutional interpretation is dying. Incorporationist scholars are killing it. In this paper, I argue that they are right to do so, whether they mean to or not. The current incorporation debate bears so little resemblance to the theory of incorporation as it originally emerged at the time of the New Deal that I argue it is time to abandon the metaphor of incorporation altogether and admit that what we are after has nothing to do with incorporated texts from 1787. Our search is for the public understanding of texts added to the Constitution in 1868. …
Popular Constitutionalism, Civic Education, And The Stories We Tell Our Children, Thomas G. Donnelly
Popular Constitutionalism, Civic Education, And The Stories We Tell Our Children, Thomas G. Donnelly
Law Faculty Publications
This Note analyzes a set of constitutional stories that has not been the subject of focused study—the constitutional stories we tell our schoolchildren in our most widely used high school textbooks. These stories help reinforce a constitutional culture that is largely deferential to the Supreme Court, limiting references to popular resistance to the Court and often linking such popular resistance to the actions of self-interested politicians, at best, and historical villains, at worst. Our textbooks are especially critical of blunt institutional checks on the Court (like judicial impeachment and “court-packing”), but are sometimes receptive to subtler, longer-term checks (like social …
The Unexceptionalism Of Evolving Standards, Corinna Barrett Lain
The Unexceptionalism Of Evolving Standards, Corinna Barrett Lain
Law Faculty Publications
Conventional wisdom is that outside the Eighth Amendment, the Supreme Court does not engage in the sort of explicitly majoritarian state nose-counting for which the "evolving standards of decency" doctrine is famous. Yet this impression is simply inaccurate. Across a stunning variety of civil liberties contexts, the Court routinely-and explicitly--determines constitutional protection based on whether a majority of states agree with it. This Article examines the Supreme Court's reliance on the majority position of the states to identify and apply constitutional norms, and then turns to the qualifications, explanations, and implications of state polling as a larger doctrinal phenomenon. While …
Biblical Interpretation, Constitutional Interpretation And Ignoring Text, Henry L. Chambers, Jr.
Biblical Interpretation, Constitutional Interpretation And Ignoring Text, Henry L. Chambers, Jr.
Law Faculty Publications
Much is made of how to interpret the Constitution. The Constitution is foundational and its law is the highest law in the land. Consequently, interpreting the Constitution correctly is important, not only so that the Constitution's words are honored but so that its ideals are honored. Similar desires accompany the interpretation of other important documents. Indeed, how a sacred text like the Bible is or can be interpreted may shed light upon how the Constitution could be or should be interpreted. This brief Essay considers how a particular vision of Christian biblical interpretation can inform constitutional interpretation. This Essay does …