Law and Gender Commons^™

Reinforcing The Myth Of The Crazed Rapist: A Feminist Critique Of Recent Rape Legislation, Christina E. Wells, Erin Elliott

Faculty Publications

Part I of this article reviews these new legislative provisions, discussing their requirements as well as the general impetus behind their enactment. Part II discusses both the history of rape prosecution and feminist efforts in the 1970s and 1980s to eliminate barriers to successful rape prosecutions. This part also elaborates upon the myth of the crazed rapist and its relationship to feminist reform efforts. Part III explains how the current legislation is rooted in and reinforces that myth by encouraging unsupportable distinctions among rape defendants. Finally, Part IV discusses the feminist response to such laws and argues for a more …

Confronting The Agency In Battered Mothers, Elaine M. Chiu

Faculty Publications

Despite the progress of the last three decades, the American public and even feminists remain caught in a web of ambivalence and contradictory attitudes and beliefs about battered women. Are battered women traumatized victims who suffer at the hands of their individual abusers and from the systemic failures of a male-dominated culture? Are they, therefore, unable to save themselves or their children? In contrast, are these women survivors who manage to protect themselves as best they can under uniquely difficult circumstances? Do they deserve recognition for their efforts, or do battered women somehow contribute to or exacerbate their own abuse …

Holding-Up More Than Half The Sky: Marketization And The Status Of Women In China, Anna M. Han

Faculty Publications

The purpose of this article is to examine generally how Chinese women fared under communism and more specifically, delve into how marketization has adversely impacted the status of women in China. It is this author's contention that despite the overall improvements in the standard of living, Chinese women are increasingly being marginalized economically. The long-term effects of subjugating the advancement of women for the immediate benefits of China's experimentation with a market economy hold vast implications for the future of the country. As China progresses economically, politically and socially, it cannot afford to leave half of its population behind as …

Exploring Feminism Globally To Achieve Global Feminism, Anna M. Han

Faculty Publications

Edited Speech delivered on October 6, 2000 at the University of San Diego Journal of Contemporary Legal Issues Conference on Intersectionality and Critical Race Feminism.

In writing this article, I kept thinking of the various stories that I heard during the workshops in Beijing and again I was struck by the commonality of the underlying issues facing women from around the world. While there may be dramatic political, cultural, linguistic and economic differences, I posit that there were more similarities than there were differences.

Marital Status Discrimination: A Proposal For Title Vii Protection, Nicole Buonocore Porter

Faculty Publications

Marital status is not one of the protected categories of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the federal antidiscrimination statute that governs discrimination in employment. This Article will argue that to avoid the types of inequities caused by marital status discrimination, it is necessary for Title VII to protect employees against marital status discrimination.

The more common claims of marital status discrimination are claims that an employer's no-spouse rule or antinepotism policy violates the state antidiscrimination statute. [These policies have two significant problems.] First of all, many courts fail to look at the widely disparate consequences of …

Statutory Rape Law And Enforcement In The Wake Of Welfare Reform, Rigel C. Oliveri

Faculty Publications

The recent national efforts at reforming the welfare system and new research on the connection between teen pregnancy and statutory rape have led many states to enact stricter laws against statutory rape and to increase the enforcement of existing laws. Punitive statutory rape laws are being viewed more and more as a mechanism for shrinking the welfare rolls by reducing teen pregnancy. Rigel Oliveri documents the resurgence of statutory rape law and enforcement and explores the ramifications it will have on teen parents. In particular, Oliveri approaches the issue from several analytical frameworks, discussing arguments for consent-based standards, the privacy …

Rich Kids, Poor Kids, And The Single-Sex Education Debate, Rosemary C. Salomone

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

Over the past decade, the subject of publicly supported, single-sex education has generated considerable debate in legal and policy circles. Since 1996, much of that debate has centered around the Supreme Court's decision in the Virginia Military Institute case and how that case intersects with Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. In VMI, Justice Ginsburg, speaking for the Court, stated that gender classifications must have "an exceedingly persuasive justification" in order to pass muster under the Fourteenth Amendment equal protection clause. That decision has become a key factor in recent efforts by school districts to establish …

Exercising The Right To Public Accommodations: The Debate Over Single-Sex Health Clubs, Miriam A. Cherry

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

Recently, the debate over single-sex health clubs gained national attention when a patent attorney, James Foster, sued for admission to Healthworks, a Massachusetts all-women's health club. One day in 1996, Foster entered the club, which was located close to his Boston condominium, and asked for a tour and an application for membership. The club employees, however, refused him a tour, informing him that Healthworks did not admit men. Shortly thereafter, Foster filed a discrimination claim with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination contending that Healthworks had violated the Massachusetts public accommodations statute. He won at the administrative hearing, and Healthworks …

"Trapped" In Sing Sing: Transgendered Prisoners Caught In The Gender Binarism, Darren Rosenblum

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

A transgendered woman, who has undergone extensive hormonal therapy and cosmetic surgery, is convicted and imprisoned. Because she still has a penis, albeit a nonfunctioning one, prison officials categorize her as a male, and place her in a men's prison. "You were born a boy, and you're going to stay a boy," the prison doctor says, rejecting continuation of her long-term estrogen treatment. Her body begins to regain the masculinity she had largely escaped. Bruised by the changes, her body no longer feels like her own, but one imposed on her by the criminal justice system. Her femininity stands …

Shaping Regional Economies To Sustain Quality Work: The Cooperative Health Care Network, Peter R. Pitegoff

Faculty Publications

This chapter chronicles a creative response to social retrenchment, a saga of strategic deployment of accessible resources and a reshaping of regional economic forces for the benefit of targeted labor markets. While charting its own course, CHCB is part of a mutually supportive network of health care employers and trainers, including successful home care companies in Philadelphia and the South Bronx. Together, these three corporations form the core of the Cooperative Health Care Network and employ over 500 home health aides. About 80 percent of the employees were formerly dependent on public assistance. The network [network] experience and their applicability …

Adoption Of Children In Missouri, Mary M. Beck

Faculty Publications

The purpose of this Article is to investigate the effect of Missouri law on adoption and to determine whether its provisions adequately protect the parties to adoption and whether its degree of clarity properly forestalls litigation.

Hypocrites And Barking Harlots: The Clinton-Lewinsky Affair And The Attack On Women, Christina E. Wells

Faculty Publications

This essay defends against the wholesale castigation of women who support the President. It reveals that such criticism is wrong and unfair. Specifically, it demonstrates that the critics have unreasonably characterized women's responses to Clinton as hypocritical or extremely naive, rather than as examples of astute political decision-making. The essay further exposes the sexism underlying the critics' arguments, revealing that stereotypes regarding (1) women's role as the keeper of morals and (2) women as non-political or non-rational beings are at the heart of much of the criticism. By reinforcing these stereotypes, the critics pose a greater danger to women than …

Crossing The Line: The Political And Moral Battle Over Late-Term Abortion, Rigel C. Oliveri

Faculty Publications

This paper focuses on the political and moral debate surrounding two pieces of federal legislation which sought to criminalize a particular late term abortion technique scientifically known as "intact dilation and extraction," and popularly known as "partial birth abortion." The Congressional "Partial Birth Abortion" Bans of 1996 and 1997 inflamed the already emotionally charged contest over abortion rights. The intense lobbying and advocacy efforts put pro-choice activists in the uncomfortable position of having to defend one of the most extreme positions on the abortion-rights spectrum. The advocacy was further complicated by the fact that very few women obtain late term …

Not-So-Arbitrary Arbitration: Using Title Vii Disparate Impact Analysis To Invalidate Employment Contracts That Discriminate, Miriam A. Cherry

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

On May 20, 1996, three women filed a sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuit against the Wall Street investment firm Smith Barney. Later joined by twenty additional women, the plaintiffs alleged that Smith Barney failed to hire and promote women, created a hostile work environment, and discriminated on the basis of pregnancy and marital status. The lawsuit quickly gained widespread publicity, most notably for its accusation that the former manager of the Garden City, New York, branch had established a fraternity-like "boom-boom room" in the office basement where female employees were either excluded or harassed if allowed to enter. On …

Re-Defining Reproductive Freedom, Timothy Zick

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Child Care Policy And The Welfare Reform Act, Peter R. Pitegoff

Faculty Publications

This article sketches the 1996 Welfare Reform Act's major changes with particular attention to federally subsidized child care for low-income families.

Private Commissions, Assisted Reproduction, And Lawyering, Larry I. Palmer

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Immigration - Refugee Act Of 1980 - Resistance To Female Circumcision As Grounds For Political Asylum In The United States, Linda A. Malone

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Beyond Bosnia And In Re Kasinga: A Feminist Perspective On Recent Developments In Protecting Women From Sexual Violence, Linda A. Malone

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The First Stone In Retrospect: An Outsider's Observations On The Book And Its Critics, Susan Grover

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Ties That Bind: An Interdisciplinary Analysis Of Gender, Ethnicity, And The Practice Of Law, Rosemary C. Salomone

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

Over the past decade, fueled in part by Carol Gilligan's controversial book, In a Different Voice, both feminists and scholars of color have critically examined the law from the "outsiders'" perspective. Stretching methodological bounds, this interrelated body of scholarship has utilized narrative form to question the gender and racial implications of social practices and legal rules and to demonstrate the useful purpose that stories serve as a means of including marginalized groups in law's evolution and reform. Women scholars of color have carved out a particular role in this debate, criticizing feminism's categorical conceptualization of "woman." They have advanced …

The Radical Feminist Defense Of Individualism, Cynthia V. Ward

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Countermajoritarian Paradox, Neal Devins

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Who Are The Parents Biotechnological Children?, Larry I. Palmer

Faculty Publications

We do not underestimate the difficulties of legislating on this subject. In addition to the inevitable confrontation with the ethical and moral issues involved, there is the question of the wisdom and effectiveness of regulating a matter so private, yet of such public interest. Legislative consideration of surrogacy may also provide the opportunity to begin to focus on the overall implications of the new reproductive biotechnology- in vitro fertilization, preservation of sperms and eggs, embryo implantation and the like. The problem is how to enjoy the benefits of the technology-especially for infertile couples-while minimizing the risk of abuse. The problem …

Ain't?, Susan Grover

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Queer Intersectionality And The Failure Of Recent Lesbian And Gay "Victories", Darren Rosenblum

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

Amidst the juridical heterosexism of our legal system, the few successful lesbian and gay cases stand out as brilliant, hopeful harbingers of the future. With good cause, lesbian and gay people have hailed state cases that indicate Bowers v. Hardwick has not contaminated all American courts. Although termed "victories" for the lesbian and gay community, several recent New York cases exclude many queer legal needs. Four cases, Braschi v. Stahl Assoc., In the Matter of the Adoption of Evan, M.A.B. v. R.B. and Thomas S. v. Robin Y., embody the law's progress on lesbian and gay issues. This essay …

The Legal Significance Of Gestation, Larry I. Palmer

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Zoe Baird, Betrayal And Fragmentation, Susan Grover

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Employer's Fetal Injury Quandary After Johnson Controls, Susan Grover

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Child Care Enterprise, Community Development, And Work, Peter R. Pitegoff

Faculty Publications

Child care enterprise can be a vehicle for community-based economic development. Beyond the critical goal of child care service, day care as an enterprise can help build capacity for job creation and entrepreneurship in the inner city and in disadvantaged communities. Stable child care institutions with quality jobs can sound a counterpoint to the feminization of poverty. The demand for child care services is substantial and growing. In single parent families and in households with two working parents, day care is essential to enable parents to work or go to school. Further, high quality early childhood programs can have a …