Constitutional Law Commons^™

The Rebirth Of Federal Takings Review? The Courts’ “Prudential” Answer To Williamson County’S Flawed State Litigation Ripeness Requirement, J. David Breemer

Touro Law Review

This article reviews recent federal court decisions that have loosened the state litigation ripeness barrier to federal takings review based on its “prudential” character. Part II provides relevant background on Williamson County and the development of the state litigation rule. It explores the logic underlying the rule and the problems it causes in application. Part III reviews the judicial shift away from a jurisdictional understanding of the state litigation rule—under which compliance with the rule is a prerequisite to a court’s power to hear a takings claim—to a prudential view in which application of the state litigation rule lies within …

The Ripeness Game: Why Are We Still Forced To Play?, Michael M. Berger

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Common Law Foundations Of The Takings Clause: The Disconnect Between Public And Private Law, Richard A. Epstein

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

June 18, 2014: The Decline Of Islam, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The Decline of Islam“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Brief For The United States Of America

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reworking The Unworkable: Halliburton Ii And The Court's Reexamination Of Fraud On The Market, Mariana Estévez

Duke Journal of Constitutional Law & Public Policy Sidebar

This commentary previews the upcoming Supreme Court case Erica P. John Fund, Inc. v. Halliburton Co. in which the Court is called upon to reexamine the controversial fraud-on-the-market rule. This rule, a cornerstone of securities litigation for the past two decades, allows the court to presume that securities fraud plaintiffs relied on a misstatement or omission if the security affected is traded on an efficient market. The subject of intense debate for years, this commentary reviews and analyzes precedent and predicts the case's likely outcome--that the Court will not expressly overrule the fraud-on-the-market rule, but will nevertheless modify it to …

Dred Scott: A Nightmare For The Originalists, Sol Wachtler

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

June 13, 2014: The New Spirituality, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The New Spirituality“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Federalism, Diversity, Equality, And Article Iii Judges: Geography, Identity, And Bias, Sharon E. Rush

UF Law Faculty Publications

Each individual has a background, and that background shapes the individual’s views about life, creating an inevitable form of bias referred to as “experiential bias.” Experiential bias is shaped by many identity traits, including, among others, race, sex, sexual orientation, religion and even geography. The geographic identity of state judges and their potential unfair experiential bias is the common justification for federal court diversity jurisdiction. But experiential bias is inescapable, affecting everyone who's ever had an experience, and is generally not unfair, as demonstrated by most studies regarding the "fairness" justification for diversity jurisdiction. More recently, Justice O’Connor connected racial …

Other Civil Rights Decisions In The October 2005 Term: Title Vii, Idea, And Section 1981, Eileen Kaufman

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Other Civil Rights Decisions In The October 2005 Term: Title Vii, Idea, And Section 1981, Leon Friedman

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Criminal Procedure Decisions In The October 2005 Term, Susan N. Herman

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

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

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

First Amendment Decisions In The October 2005 Term, Joel Gora

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Presidential Powers Including Military Tribunals In The October 2005 Term, Erwin Chemerinsky

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

An Overview Of The October 2005 Supreme Court Term, Erwin Chemerinsky

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Preventive Detention In Malaysia: Constitutional And Judicial Obstacles To Reform And Suggestions For The Future, Tyler James B. Jeffery

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Lausti And Salazar: Are Religious Symbols Legitimate In The Public Square?, Katie A. Croghan

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

June 9, 2014: “It Matters What’S True.”, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “ “It matters what’s true.”“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

June 5, 2014: Do You Have To Believe In God To Be Jewish?, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “ Do You Have To Believe in God to Be Jewish?“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Constitutional Limitations On Sovereignty, 2014 Edition, Garrett Power

Book Gallery

This is an “open content” casebook intended for classroom use in courses in Constitutional Law, Land Use Control, and Environmental Law. It consists of 130 odd judicial opinions (most rendered by the U.S. Supreme Court) carefully selected from the two hundred years of American constitutional history which address the clash between public sovereignty and private property. The text considers both the personal right to liberty and the personal right in property.

The readings provide an historical context, and an up-to-date focus on many of the constitutional issues facing today’s Supreme Court: imperium versus dominium; the public trust, inverse condemnation, the …

Arriving At Clearly Established: The Taser Problem And Reforming Qualified Immunity Analysis In The Ninth Circuit, Kate Seabright

Washington Law Review

Federal law allows private citizens to bring civil suits against government officials who violate their constitutional rights while acting under the color of state law. The doctrine of qualified immunity shields officials from liability when their conduct does not violate clearly established constitutional rights. When determining whether a right was clearly established at the time of a particular injury, the Ninth Circuit purportedly looks to whatever decisional law is available to inform its analysis. This Comment examines recent Taser-related cases to show that, in practice, courts in the Ninth Circuit actually take two divergent approaches. Some look only to binding, …

Nevada Public Policy And Higher Education: The Roles Of The Legislature And The Board Of Regents Under The Nevada Constitution, Thomas B. Mcaffee, Justin James Mcaffee

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Qualified Immunity For “Private” § 1983 Defendants After Filarsky V. Delia, Andrew W. Weis

Georgia State University Law Review

In 2012, the Supreme Court addressed private party qualified immunity in the case of Filarsky v. Delia. There, the Court found that both the historical and policy bases for immunity under § 1983 supported extending qualified immunity to outside counsel retained by a municipality. The Court noted that full-time government employees can always seek qualified immunity, so not extending it to individuals employed on some other basis would create “significant line-drawing problems . . . [which could] deprive state actors of the ability to ‘reasonably anticipate when their conduct may give rise to liability . . . .’”

This …

The Conversational Consent Search: How “Quick Look” And Other Similar Searches Have Eroded Our Constitutional Rights, Alexander A. Mikhalevsky

Georgia State University Law Review

One area in which law enforcement agencies have stretched constitutional limits concerns the scope of a suspect’s consent to search his or her vehicle. Police forces across the country have tested the limits of consent by asking vague, conversational questions to suspects with the goal of obtaining a suspect’s consent to search, even though that individual may not want to allow the search or may not know that he or she has the right to deny consent.

Conversational phrases like “Can I take a quick look?” or “Can I take a quick look around?” have “emerg[ed] as . . . …

53rd Henry J. Miller Distinguished Lecture Series, The Hon. Justice John Paul Stevens

Georgia State University Law Review

Remarks by the Honorable John Paul Stevens, Retired Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, at the 53rd Henry J. Miller Distinguished Lecture Series.

Polymorphous Public Law Litigation:The Forgotten History Of Nineteenth Century Public Law Litigation, David Sloss

Washington and Lee Law Review

Recent debates about popular constitutionalism and judicial supremacy have focused on the question of who interprets the Constitution. This Article reframes the debate by asking what legal sources courts apply to protect individual rights from government infringement. Throughout the nineteenth century, federal courts applied a mix of international law, statutory, and common law to protect fundamental rights and restrain government action. This Article uncovers the forgotten history of nineteenth century public law litigation. Professors Post and Siegel have advocated “policentric constitutional interpretation,” wherein the Supreme Court shares authority for constitutional interpretation with other actors. By analogy, this Article introduces the …

Arriving At Clearly Established: The Taser Problem And Reforming Qualified Immunity Analysis In The Ninth Circuit, Kate Seabright

Washington Law Review

Federal law allows private citizens to bring civil suits against government officials who violate their constitutional rights while acting under the color of state law. The doctrine of qualified immunity shields officials from liability when their conduct does not violate clearly established constitutional rights. When determining whether a right was clearly established at the time of a particular injury, the Ninth Circuit purportedly looks to whatever decisional law is available to inform its analysis. This Comment examines recent Taser-related cases to show that, in practice, courts in the Ninth Circuit actually take two divergent approaches. Some look only to binding, …

Cambria's Water War: Legal Analysis Of The Building Moratorium And Its Implications For Land Owners, Jayson Parsons

Political Science

With each passing year, Cambria, California's building moratorium becomes increasingly controversial. The moratorium, enacted by the local community services district in 1986 due to a series of water shortages, has resulted in nearly 43% of all property owners under the district's purview to be denied the ability to develop their parcels. This paper seeks to examine the constitutionality of this moratorium using relevant regulatory takings jurisprudence.

Reviewing United States Supreme Court precedent, including Pennsylvania Coal v. Mahon (1922), Penn Central Transport v. New York City (1978), Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council (1992), and Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council …

Changing The Wind: Notes Toward A Demosprudence Of Law And Social Movements, Lani Guinier, Gerald Torres

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This essay was influenced by a class on Law and Social Movements that Professors Guinier and Torres taught at the Yale Law School in 2011. This essay was also informed by numerous conversations with Bruce Ackerman regarding his book that is under review in this Symposium. While we are in fundamental agreement with Professor Ackerman’s project, as well as the claims he makes as to the new constitutional canon, we supplement his analysis with the overlooked impact of the lawmaking potential of social movements. In particular, we focus on those social movements that were critical to the legal changes that …