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Articles 1 - 12 of 12

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Rural Access To Justice In The Golden State, Lisa R. Pruitt Dec 2017

Rural Access To Justice In The Golden State, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This working paper analyzes the rural lawyer shortage and discusses other aspects of rural access to justice in the State of California.  The paper provides detailed data on where lawyers are and are not practicing in the state.  It will be published as part of an article comparing rural access to justice in South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Georgia and California.  


Legal Deserts: A Multi-State Perspective On Rural Access To Justice, Lisa R. Pruitt , Amanda L. Kool, Lauren Sudeall Lucas, Michele Statz, Danielle M. Conway, Hannah Haksgaard Dec 2017

Legal Deserts: A Multi-State Perspective On Rural Access To Justice, Lisa R. Pruitt , Amanda L. Kool, Lauren Sudeall Lucas, Michele Statz, Danielle M. Conway, Hannah Haksgaard

Lisa R Pruitt

Rural America faces an increasingly dire access-to-justice crisis, which serves to exacerbate the already disproportionate share of social problems afflicting rural areas. One critical aspect of that crisis is the dearth of information and research regarding the extent of the problem and its impacts. This article begins to fill that gap by providing surveys of rural access to justice in six geographically, demographically, and economically varied states: California, Georgia, Maine, Minnesota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. In addition to providing insights about the distinct rural challenges confronting each of these states, the legal resources available, and existing policy responses, the article …


To Recognize The Tyranny Of Distance: A Spatial Reading Of Whole Women's Health V. Hellerstedt, Lisa R. Pruitt , Michele Statz Aug 2017

To Recognize The Tyranny Of Distance: A Spatial Reading Of Whole Women's Health V. Hellerstedt, Lisa R. Pruitt , Michele Statz

Lisa R Pruitt

            Distance—physical, material distance—is an obviously spatial concept, but one rarely engaged by legal or feminist geographers.  We take up this oversight in relation to the 2016 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, which adjudicated the constitutionality of a Texas law that imposed new regulations on abortion providers.  Because half of the state’s abortion providers were unable to meet these regulations and thus closed, the distance that many Texas women had to travel for abortion services increased dramatically.  In part because of these increases, the Supreme Court ultimately determined that the Texas laws imposed an …


A Case Study In Rural Community Economic Development: Hill County Health & Wellness Center, Lisa R. Pruitt Dec 2016

A Case Study In Rural Community Economic Development: Hill County Health & Wellness Center, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This short article was written for a symposium issue on the role of law and lawyers in community economic development.  The symposium issue arose from an AALS 2017 Discussion Group session about whether “law matters” in the context of community economic development and, if so, how and why law matters.  The case study presented here is about a rural community health care center, Hill Country Health and Wellness, in far northern California’s Shasta County.  The case study tracks the use—or lack thereof—of lawyers by the center’s founder and principal, and it discusses these phenomena against a backdrop of rural lack …


Spatial Inequality As Constitutional Infirmity: Equal Protection, Child Poverty And Place, Lisa R. Pruitt Dec 2009

Spatial Inequality As Constitutional Infirmity: Equal Protection, Child Poverty And Place, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This is the first in a series of articles that maps legal conceptions of (in)equality onto the socio-geographical concept of spatial inequality, with a view to generating legal remedies for those living in places marked by socioeconomic disadvantage. Written for a symposium on “rural law,” this article considers in particular whether the funding and delivery of government services at the county level in the state of Montana violate the state’s constitution because of the grossly disparate abilities among Montana counties to finance and provide such services. Pruitt’s analysis focuses on children as a particularly vulnerable and immobile population, many of …


Latina/Os, Locality, And Law In The Rural South, Lisa R. Pruitt Jan 2009

Latina/Os, Locality, And Law In The Rural South, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

In this era of municipal anti-immigrant ordinances and federal-local cooperation to enforce immigration laws, legal issues associated with immigration are playing out at multiple scales, from the national down to the local. Legal actors at the municipal, county, and state levels have become front-line policymakers and law enforcers in relation to immigrant populations. This essay calls attention to phenomenal surge in Latina/o immigration into the rural South in recent years, and it considers how that socio-spatial milieu may influence these legal matters at the local level.

Among other issues, the essay discusses the enhanced opportunity for racial profiling in the …


Migration, Development And The Promise Of Cedaw For Rural Women, Lisa Pruitt Dec 2008

Migration, Development And The Promise Of Cedaw For Rural Women, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This Article explores the potential of international development efforts and human rights law to enhance the livelihoods of rural women in the developing world. In particular, the Article takes up the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), which enumerates in Article 14 specific rights for rural women as a class. Pruitt’s focus here is on Article 14’s guarantees in relation to land ownership, education, development planning, access to credit, marketing facilities and technology, and other rights that are linked closely to women’s role as the architects of food security. While CEDAW has attracted enormous …


Rural Families And Work-Family Issues, Lisa Pruitt Dec 2007

Rural Families And Work-Family Issues, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This essay, an entry for the on-line Sloan Work and Family Encyclopedia, provides an overview of work-family challenges in the context of rural America. Among the issues addressed are lack of economic diversification and opportunity; deficits in human capital; the dearth of childcare, transportation and other services that facilitate employment; and the deeply entrenched character of gender roles in rural societies. The entry discusses not only concerns related to rural socioeconomic disadvantage, but also those arising from the distances that separate rural residents from work, educational opportunities, and services. The essay notes that rural families are sometimes disserved by policies …


No Black Names On The Letterhead? Efficient Discrimination And The South African Legal Profession, Lisa R. Pruitt Dec 2001

No Black Names On The Letterhead? Efficient Discrimination And The South African Legal Profession, Lisa R. Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

Although there have long been black lawyers in South Africa, during apartheid only a handful joined the ranks of the country’s large commercial firms. Now, in the post-apartheid period, these firms are keenly aware of a range of economic and political incentives to hire black attorneys, and most are doing so at a record pace. Very few black attorneys, however, are enduring the path to partnership in these firms. Based on more than seventy-five interviews conducted in South Africa in 1999 and 2000, this Article both documents and critically examines the reasons for black attrition. While firms’ incentives to integrate …


Law Review Story, Lisa Pruitt Dec 1996

Law Review Story, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This essay is the story of the author’s election as editor-in-chief of the Arkansas Law Review and of her tenure in that role. The story implicates a range of legal issues including hate speech, sexual harassment, sex discrimination, defamation, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. It is also the tale of the author’s feminist epiphany and of the law school’s failure to respond to the harassment. It was published in the 50th anniversary issue of the Arkansas Law Review.


A Survey Of Feminist Jurisprudence, Lisa Pruitt Dec 1993

A Survey Of Feminist Jurisprudence, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This essay articulates a relatively early taxonomy of the various strands of feminist legal theory. Its reach is transnational, including references to works by some European and Australian scholars.


The Law Of Defamation: An Arkansas Primer, Lisa Pruitt Dec 1988

The Law Of Defamation: An Arkansas Primer, Lisa Pruitt

Lisa R Pruitt

This article is a mini-treatise on the law of defamation in Arkansas.