Constitutional Law Commons^™

Race, Dignity, And The Right To Marry, Robin A. Lenhardt

Fordham Law Review

Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges asserts legal marriage’s capacity to afford same-sex couples a measure of “equal dignity” and belonging too long denied. In this Essay, I ask whether there is any reason to believe that marriage could do the same for African Americans. Could broader entrance into marriage, as some conservatives suggest, provide Blacks—gay and straight—a measure of belonging that has been frustratingly elusive, even as the nation prepares to celebrate the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Thirteenth Amendment’s ratification?

Two Excursions Into Current U.S. Supreme Court Opinion-Writing, Paul F. Rothstein

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In the last weeks in June, 2015, as the present term of the U.S. Supreme Court drew to a close, many controversial and important decisions were handed down by the Court. The substance of the decisions has been written about extensively. Two of the decisions in particular, though, caught my eye as a teacher of legal techniques, not for the importance of the subject of the particular decision, but for what they may illustrate in a teachable fashion about at least some opinion writing. The two cases are Ohio v. Clark (June 18, 2015) interpreting the Confrontation Clause of the …

Petition For Writ Of Certiorari, Kosilek V. O'Brien, Jennifer Levi, Joseph L. Sulman, Abigail K. Hemani, Michele E. Connolly, James P. Devendorf, Jamie A. Santos, Christine Dieter

Faculty Scholarship

Jennifer Levi, on behalf of Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders, was one of the Authors of the Petition for Writ of Certiorari, filed in the Supreme Court of the United States on behalf of the Petitioner, Michelle Kosilek, in Kosilek v. O'Brien. Questions presented to the Court by the Petitioner were 1.) whether appellate courts must parse “ques­tions that present elements both factual and legal” into their factual and legal components, so that all factual findings can be reviewed for clear error, or whether, as the First Circuit ruled, they may review such questions as a whole along …

Storming The Castle: Fernandez V. California And The Waning Warrant Requirement, Joshua Bornstein

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review

No abstract provided.

Using The Dna Testing Of Arrestees To Reevaluate Fourth Amendment Doctrine, Steven P. Grossman

All Faculty Scholarship

With the advent of DNA testing, numerous issues have arisen with regard to obtaining and using evidence developed from such testing. As courts have come to regard DNA testing as a reliable method for linking some people to crimes and for exonerating others, these issues are especially significant. The federal government and most states have enacted statutes that permit or direct the testing of those convicted of at least certain crimes. Courts have almost universally approved such testing, rejecting arguments that obtaining and using such evidence violates the Fourth Amendment.

More recently governments have enacted laws permitting or directing the …

Formalism And Distrust: Foreign Affairs Law In The Roberts Court,, Harlan G. Cohen

Scholarly Works

When it comes to foreign relations, the Roberts Court has trust issues. As far as the Court is concerned, everyone — the President, Congress, the lower courts, plaintiffs — has played hard and fast with the rules, taking advantage of the Court’s functionalist approaches to foreign affairs issues. This seems to be the message of the Roberts Court foreign affairs law jurisprudence. The Roberts Court has been active in foreign affairs law, deciding cases on the detention and trial of enemy combatants, foreign sovereign immunity, the domestic effect of treaties, the extraterritorial reach of federal statutes, the preemption of state …

The Problems Inherent In Litigating Employer Free Exercise Rights, Henry L. Chambers Jr.

Law Faculty Publications

This brief Article proceeds in four parts. Part I discusses the Supreme Court's recent cases that address employer free exercise rights. Part II notes problems that accompany providing free exercise rights to employers. Part III explores the expansion of employer prerogative in the context of providing employers additional free exercise rights. Part IV considers problems that arise when employee rights are not deemed central to litigation regarding employer free exercise rights. The Article concludes by proposing a refraining of the free exercise issue that will consider how to account for the interests of the employer, its stakeholders, and its employees …

The Supreme Court's New Approach To Personal Jurisdiction, Bernadette Bollas Genetin

Con Law Center Articles and Publications

The Supreme Court has returned to the issue of whether a “reasonableness” analysis or an “interstate federalism” focus underlies personal jurisdiction doctrine. It has, thus, renewed the debate regarding whether the so-called “forward-looking” or “backward-looking” face of International Shoe should control.

This Article explores two 2014 cases in which the Court took strides toward implementing a liberty interest, or reasonableness, view of personal jurisdiction. In the first case, Daimler AG v. Bauman, the Court introduced a new, narrower approach to general jurisdiction. Under Bauman’s more constrained analysis, general jurisdiction will be available primarily in an individual’s domicile and …

Delegation, Accommodation, And The Permeability Of Constitutional And Ordinary Law, Gillian E. Metzger

Faculty Scholarship

To some, the very idea of the constitutional law of the administrative state is an oxymoron. On this view, core features of the national administrative state — broad delegations and the combination of legislative, executive, and judicial power within administrative agencies, particularly agencies that are headed by unelected executive officials only removable on narrow grounds — are fundamentally at odds with both constitutional separation of powers principles and due process. To others, no such conflict between contemporary administrative governance and the Constitution exists, and assertions of the administrative state’s unconstitutionality rest on basic misunderstandings of what separation of powers and …

Anticipatory Remedies For Takings, Thomas W. Merrill

Faculty Scholarship

The Supreme Court has rendered two lines of decisions about the remedies available for a violation of the Takings Clause. One line holds that courts have no authority to enter anticipatory decrees in takings cases if the claimant can obtain compensation elsewhere. The other line, which includes three of the Court's most recent takings cases, results in the entry of an anticipatory decree about takings liability. This Essay argues that the second line is the correct one. Courts should be allowed to enter declaratory or other anticipatory judgments about takings liability, as long as they respect the limited nature of …

The Supreme Court And The Transformation Of Juvenile Sentencing, Elizabeth S. Scott, Thomas Grisso, Marsha Levick, Laurence Steinberg

Faculty Scholarship

In the past decade, the Supreme Court has transformed the constitutional landscape of juvenile crime regulation. In three strongly worded opinions, the Court held that imposing harsh criminal sentences on juvenile offenders violates the Eighth Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. In combination, these cases create a special status for juveniles under Eighth Amendment doctrine as a category of offenders whose culpability is mitigated by their youth and immaturity, even for the most serious offenses. The Court also emphasized that juveniles are more likely to reform than adult offenders, and that most should be given a meaningful opportunity to …

Surprise Symphony: The Supreme Court’S Major Criminal Law Rulings Of The 2002 Term, William E. Hellerstein

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

First Amendment Decisions - 2002 Term, Joel Gora

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Supreme Court, Kings County, People V. Nunez, Yale Pollack

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Supreme Court, New York County, People V. Garcia, Yale Pollack

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

2003-2004 Supreme Court Term: Another Losing Season For The First Amendment, Joel M. Gora

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

December 14, 2014: The Tough Guys Who Favor Torture, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The Tough Guys Who Favor Torture“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Look Back At The Rehnquist Era And An Overview Of The 2004 Supreme Court Term, Erwin Chemerinsky

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Supreme Court, Tompkins County, Seymour V. Holcomb, Jessica Goodwin

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Appellate Division, Third Department, People V. Rivette, Michele Kligman

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

District Court, Nassau County, People V. Yaghoubi, David Schoenhaar

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Supreme Court’S Heightened Retaliation Standard In Nassar: A Prudent Limitation Or A Misguided Restriction To Title Vii Claims?, Darren Stakey

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

License To Discriminate: How A Washington Florist Is Making The Case For Applying Intermediary Scrutiny To Sexual Orientation, Kendra Lacour

Seattle University Law Review

Over the past few decades, the debate over sexual orientation has risen to the forefront of civil rights issues. Though the focus has generally been on the right to marriage, peripheral issues associated with the right to marriage—and with sexual orientation generally—have become more common in recent years. As the number of states permitting same-sex marriage—along with states prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation—increases, so too does the conflict between providers of public accommodations and those seeking their services. Never is this situation more problematic than when religious beliefs are cited as the basis for denying services to …

International Norms In Constitutional Law, Michael Wells

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

The Use Of International Sources In Constitutional Opinion, Daniel Bodansky

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

The Exceptional Absence Of Human Rights As A Principle In American Law, Mugambi Jouet

Pace Law Review

Compared to other Western democracies, references to “human rights” are rare in domestic American law. A survey of landmark Supreme Court cases reveals that both conservative and liberal Justices made no mention of “human rights” when addressing fundamental questions: racial segregation, the death penalty, prisoners’ rights, women’s rights, children’s rights, gay rights, and indefinite detention at Guantanamo. This absence illustrates a broader societal trait. In the United States, “human rights” commonly evoke foreign problems like abuses in Third World dictatorships—not domestic problems. By contrast, human rights play a relatively important role as a domestic principle in Europe, Canada, Australia, and …

August 28, 2014: Constitutional Passivity, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

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

The Commerce Power And Congressional Mandates, Dan T. Coenen

Scholarly Works

In National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, a five-Justice majority concluded that the commerce power did not support enactment of the so-called “individual mandate,” which imposes a penalty on many persons who fail to buy health insurance. That ruling is sure to spark challenges to other federal laws on the theory that they likewise mandate individuals or entities to take certain actions. Federal laws founded on the commerce power, for example, require mine operators to provide workers with safety helmets and (at least as a practical matter) require mine workers to wear them. Some analysts will say that laws …

Finding The Lost Involuntary Public Figure, Jeffrey Omar Usman

Utah Law Review

This Article follows Aristotle’s guidance that “[i]f you would understand anything, observe its beginning and its development.” That is precisely how the discussion in this Article begins in Part I, through observation of the beginning and development of the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence on the constitutional limitations imposed upon defamation actions under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Part II of the Article then briefly sets forth the constitutional framework that the Supreme Court imposed in 1974 on defamation actions in Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc. The Article then addresses in Part III how the pressures of the First …

July 4, 2014: Hobby Lobby, Next Stop, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “ Hobby Lobby, Next Stop“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.