Law and Race Commons^™

Religiosity In Constitutions And The Status Of Minority Rights, Brandy G. Robinson

Cultural Encounters, Conflicts, and Resolutions

Minority rights and religion have never been topics that are simultaneously considered. However, arguably, the two have relevance, especially when combined with the topic and theory of constitutionalism. Historically and traditionally, minorities have been granted certain rights and have been denied certain rights under various constitutions. These grants and denials relate to cultural differences and values, arguably relating to a culture’s understanding and interpretation of religion.

This article explores the relationship and status of minority rights as it relates to religiosity and constitutionalism. Essentially, there is a correlation between these topics and research shows where certain nations have used religion …

Newsroom: Horwitz On The Role Of Grand Juries, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

The Highly Political Supreme Court, Riley Lane Munks

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

This paper investigates whether Republicans or Democrats support a strong Supreme Court and why. Furthermore, by analyzing data from the 2012 American National Election Survey, I will study support of the court based on gender, age, and race. Since the early 1980’s the court has taken a strong conservative direction, to the dismay of many liberals. Republicans feel comfortable sending a congressional dispute to the courts while Democrats may feel disenfranchised with the judicial process. I also believe that younger people believe the court is an outdated method of making laws and interpreting the constitution. Originally the Supreme Court was …

Privacy Doesn't Exist In A Vacuum, Dawinder S. Sidhu

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Windsor, Surrogacy, And Race, Khiara M. Bridges

Washington Law Review

Scholars and activists interested in racial justice have long been opposed to surrogacy arrangements, wherein a couple commissions a woman to become pregnant, give birth to a baby, and surrender the baby to the couple to raise as its own. Their fear has been that surrogacy arrangements will magnify racial inequalities inasmuch as wealthy white people will look to poor women of color to carry and give birth to the white babies that the couples covet. However, perhaps critical thinkers about race should reconsider their contempt for surrogacy following the Supreme Court’s recent decision in United States v. Windsor. …

Racial Impact Statements: Considering The Consequences Of Racial Disproportionalities In The Criminal Justice System, Jessica Erickson

Washington Law Review

The American criminal justice system is currently suffering from a dramatic increase in mass incarceration and staggering rates of racial disproportionalities and disparities. Many facially neutral laws, policies, and practices within the criminal justice system have disproportionate impacts on minorities. Racial impact statements provide one potential method of addressing such disproportionalities. These proactive tools measure the projected impacts that new criminal justice laws and policies may have upon minorities, and provide this information to legislators before they decide whether to enact the law. Four states currently conduct racial impact statements, and other states are considering adopting their own versions. The …

Racial Disparity In Federal Criminal Sentences, M. Marit Rehavi, Sonja B. Starr

Articles

Using rich data linking federal cases from arrest through to sentencing, we find that initial case and defendant characteristics, including arrest offense and criminal history, can explain most of the large raw racial disparity in federal sentences, but significant gaps remain. Across the distribution, blacks receive sentences that are almost 10 percent longer than those of comparable whites arrested for the same crimes. Most of this disparity can be explained by prosecutors’ initial charging decisions, particularly the filing of charges carrying mandatory minimum sentences. Ceteris paribus, the odds of black arrestees facing such a charge are 1.75 times higher than …

Windsor, Surrogacy, And Race, Khiara Bridges

Faculty Scholarship

Scholars and activists interested in racial justice have long been opposed to surrogacy arrangements, wherein a couple commissions a woman to become pregnant, give birth to a baby, and surrender the baby to the couple to raise as its own. Their fear has been that surrogacy arrangements will magnify racial inequalities inasmuch as wealthy white people will look to poor women of color to carry and give birth to the white babies that the couples covet. However, perhaps critical thinkers about race should reconsider their contempt for surrogacy following the Supreme Court’s recent decision in United States v. Windsor. In …

Conceptualizing Climate Justice In Kivalina, Marissa Knodel

Seattle University Law Review

Due to climate change, indigenous communities in Alaska are forced to develop in ways that adversely affect their livelihoods and culture. For example, decreases in sea ice, increases in the frequency of sea storms, and melting permafrost have so accelerated the erosion of one barrier island that an entire village faces relocation. These indigenous communities, which have contributed little to causing climate change, are limited in their ability to adapt. After examining three broad questions about the effects of climate change on indigenous communities, this Article reaches four preliminary conclusion about relocation as a climate adaptation strategy and its relations …

Fisheries Governance And How It Fits Within The Broader Arctic Governance, Adam Soliman

Seattle University Law Review

Climate change is causing the Arctic ice to melt and fish stocks to change their migration patterns. These changes are increasing access to Arctic fisheries, as well as moving other fish stocks to the north. To prevent the depletion of fish stocks and to protect the Arctic environment, proper fisheries governance requires collaboration between nation-states and specific populations. Fisheries present unique governance and management issues. Unlike other natural resources, fish stocks do not stay in the same place. The non-stationary nature of fish stocks, along with shared sovereignty over the oceans, make coordination between stakeholders the most difficult as well …

United States Policy And Norwegian Commercial Whaling: A Cooperative Approach, Jamie Nystrom

Seattle University Law Review

Both the United States and Norway have a long history of commercial whaling, but the mantle of dominance in the whaling world passed from the United States to Norway in the mid-nineteenth century. As demand for whale-based products declined in the United States over the past century, and environmentalism and conservationism became more popular public ideologies, the United States shifted from a pro-whaling nation to, effectively, an anti-whaling nation. Norway, however, has continued to be the only nation that openly engages in commercial whaling for profit, albeit on a smaller scale in comparison to historical practices. The United States’ past …

Extracting More Than Resources: Human Security And Arctic Indigenous Women, Victoria Sweet

Seattle University Law Review

The circumpolar Arctic region is at the forefront of rapid change, and with change come potential threats to human security. Numerous factors determine what makes a state, a community, or an individual feel secure. For example, extractive industry development can bring economic benefits to an area, but these development projects also bring security concerns, including potential human rights violations. While security concerns connected with development projects have been studied in southern hemisphere countries and countries classified as “developing,” concerns connected with extractive industry development projects in “developed” countries like the United States have received little attention. This Article will change …

Oil And Gas In America's Arctic Ocean: Past Problems Counsel Precaution, Michael Levine, Peter Van Tuyn, Layla Hughes

Seattle University Law Review

This Article provides context for the controversy facing government agencies charged with making decisions about the future of America’s Arctic Ocean. It then distill themes that, if addressed, could help further a lasting solution for this region that respects its natural and human values while crafting a reasonable path forward for decisions about development. First, this Article offers background about the region, the threats facing it, and some of the challenges in managing the natural resources there. Second, it provides an overview of the legal framework through which the United States government makes decisions about whether and under what conditions …

An Unfinished Joruney: Arctic Indigenous Rights, Lands, And Jurisdiction?, Tony Penikett

Seattle University Law Review

The indigenous rights movement has been defined as a struggle for land and jurisdiction. Over the last forty years, American and Canadian governments made much progress on the land question in the Arctic and sub-Arctic; however, from an irrational fear of the unknown, politicians in Washington, D.C. and Ottawa have effectively blocked the pathways to aboriginal jurisdiction or self-government. During the late-twentieth century in the Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut, as well as in Nisga’a territory, indigenous governments negotiated local government powers, but continent-wide progress on the question of indigenous jurisdiction has stalled. This Article considers the formation and implementation …

Changes In Latitudes Call For Changes In Attitudes: Towards Recognition Of A Global Imperative For Stewardship, Not Exploitation, In The Arctic, Taylor Simpson-Wood

Seattle University Law Review

For more than two centuries, the imagination of mariners has been captured by visions of a trade route across the Arctic Sea allowing vessels to travel from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. Known as the Northwest Passage, this fabled route is a time- and money-saving sea lane running from the Atlantic Ocean Arctic Circle to the Pacific Ocean Arctic Circle. Now, the thinning of the ice in the Arctic may transform what was once only a dream into a reality. New shipping lanes linking the Atlantic and Pacific oceans are likely to open between 2040 and 2059. If loss …

Closing The Doors To Justice: A Critique Of Pimentel V. Dreyfus And The Application Of Legal Formalism To The Elimination Of Food Assistance Benefits For Legal Immigrants, Hannah Zommick

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment contends that the Ninth Circuit’s opinion in Pimentel v. Dreyfus employed a legal formalist approach and that by applying this framework, the court prevented legal immigrants, who were caught between the strict eligibility restrictions of welfare reform, from asserting their rights through the justice system. The legal formalist approach “treats the law as a set of scientific formulae or principles that are derived from the study of case law. These principles create an internal analytical framework which, when applied to a set of facts, leads the decision maker, through logical deduction, to the correct outcome in a case.” …

We Don't Need A "Right To Be Forgotten." We Need A Right To Evolve, Dawinder S. Sidhu

Faculty Scholarship

The sad symptom of a judgmental culture

Do Away With Race-Based Annual Academic Data, Tan K. B. Eugene

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In a commentary, SMU Associate Professor of Law and former Nominated Member of Parliament Eugene Tan urged for the Ministry of Education to stop publishing race-based academic data for national examinations. This includes the Primary School Leaving Examination, and the GCE O- and A-Levels. He felt that at a time when the Chinese, Malay, Indian and Others racial classification is less relevant, with more inter-racial and international marriages, we must do away with racial stereotypes or notions of cultural deficits, because they undermine the very students we seek to help.

And Stay Out! The Dangers Of Using Anti-Immigrant Sentiment As A Basis For Social Policy: America Should Take Heed Of Disturbing Lessons From Great Britain's Past, Kevin C. Wilson

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Why The Supreme Court Beard Case Matters, Dawinder S. Sidhu

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Importance Of Conversation In Transitional Justice: A Study Of Land Restitution In South Africa, Bernadette Atuahene

All Faculty Scholarship

One of the most replicated findings of the procedural justice literature is that people who receive unfavorable outcomes are more likely to believe that the process was nonetheless legitimate if they thought that it was fair. Using interviews of 150 people compensated through the South African land restitution program, this article examines whether these findings apply in the transitional justice context where it is often unclear who the winners and losers are. The question explored is: When all outcomes are unfavorable or incomplete, how do people make fairness assessments? The central observation was that the ability of respondents and land …

Taking A Dip In The Supreme Court Clerk Pool: Gender-Based Discrepancies In Clerk Selection, John J. Szmer, Erin B. Kaheny, Robert K. Christensen

Marquette Law Review

Former U.S. Supreme Court clerks are heavily recruited by select law firms, and many eventually find their way to policy “elite” positions in the government or in the legal academy. A number of former clerks have returned to the Court as litigators, and a subset has returned to the Court as Justices. We are interested in clerk selection for two reasons. First, clerks influence key aspects of the judicial process while serving in their clerkship capacity, and second, many seem to be in a good position to influence legal policy well after their clerkships have ended. With this in mind, …

Diversity And Supreme Court Law Clerks, Tony Mauro

Marquette Law Review

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Coercive Assimilationism: The Perils Of Muslim Women's Identity Performance In The Workplace, Sahar F. Aziz

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

Should employees have the legal right to “be themselves” at work? Most Americans would answer in the negative because work is a privilege, not an entitlement. But what if being oneself entails behaviors, mannerisms, and values integrally linked to the employee’s gender, race, or religion? And what if the basis for the employer’s workplace rules and professionalism standards rely on negative racial, ethnic or gender stereotypes that disparately impact some employees over others? Currently, Title VII fails to take into account such forms of second-generation discrimination, thereby limiting statutory protections to phenotypical or morphological bases. Drawing on social psychology and …

Tales Of Color And Colonialism: Racial Realism And Settler Colonial Theory, Natsu T. Saito

Faculty Publications By Year

More than a half-century after the Civil Rights Era, people of color remain disproportionately impoverished and incarcerated, excluded and vulnerable. Legal remedies rooted in the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection remain elusive. This article argues that the “racial realism” advocated by the late Professor Derrick Bell compels us to look critically at the purposes served by racial hierarchy. By stepping outside the master narrative’s depiction of the United States as a “nation of immigrants” with opportunity for all, we can recognize it as a settler state, much like Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. It could not exist without the occupation …

Satellite Remote Sensing And Database Management: Who Owns The Digitized Information Relating To Indigenous People And Their Artifacts, Brenda Reddix-Smalls

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

Post-9/11 Illegal Immigrant Detention And Deportation: Terrorism And The Criminalization Of Immigration, Stefany N. Laun

Student Publications

This paper analyzes the changes in immigration policy since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 in terms of how immigrants are viewed in the United States. The goal is to address the recent criminalization of immigration in that the perceptions of terrorists and immigrants have become relatively synonymous since 2001. Although deportations have decreased, immigrant detention has increased significantly. Detention centers pose threats to the basic human rights of the immigrants residing in them, as well as perpetuate the culture of fear enveloping recent immigrants, whether they are legally or illegally in the country, and native United States citizens …

Shelby County V. Holder - Brief Contextualized, Mark W. Wolfe

Student Publications

This paper begins with three major factors that set the stage for Shelby: first, a history of the VRA; second, an overview of Northwest Austin with a focus on how it led directly to Shelby; and finally, Shelby County’s motivations for bringing the suit. An examination of racial demographics compared to statistics on voter registration and minority officeholders in Alabama and Louisiana—two states originally subject to preclearance—follows in light of the Court’s claims on the matter. A conclusion will take a brief look at laws passed since Shelby with an eye towards a future critique. [excerpt]

Fisher V. Ut Austin - Contextualized Brief, Lauren H. Sobotka

Student Publications

Contextualization of the 2013 Supreme Court case, Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin, in which Abigail Fisher was denied admission. This paper also analyzes past Court cases dealing with affirmative action in the admissions process.

How Critical Race Theory Marginalizes The African American Christian Tradition, Brandon Paradise

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

This Article offers the first comprehensive account of the marginalization of the African American Christian tradition in the movement of race and law scholarship known as critical race theory. While committed to grounding itself in the perspectives of communities of color, critical race theory has virtually ignored the significance of the fact that the civil rights movement came out of the Black church and that today more than eighty percent of African Americans self-identify as Christian. In practical terms, critical race theory’s neglect of the Christian tradition has meant that arguments developed in race and law scholarship are sometimes incompatible …