Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons^™

Professional Service And Civic Activities, Cheryl B. Wattley

Cheryl B. Wattley

No abstract provided.

Private Rights Or Public Wrongs? The Crime Victims Rights Act Of 2004 In Historical Context, Christopher J. Truxler

Christopher J. Truxler

Historically, crime victims served as policemen, investigators, and private prosecutors, and were regarded as law enforcement’s most dependable catalyst. The Crime Victim’s Rights Act of 2004 grants crime victims eight substantive and procedural rights and breathes new life into the common law idea that crime is both a public wrong and a private injury. The Act has, however, elicited ardent criticism. Opponents contend that the Act is both bad policy and, most likely, unconstitutional. Without commenting on the Act’s policy or constitutionality, this Note places the Crime Victims’ Rights Act within a broader historical context where victims’ needs can be …

Implicit Bias In Employment Litigation, Melissa R. Hart

Melissa R Hart

Judges exercise enormous discretion in civil litigation, and nowhere more than in employment discrimination litigation, where the trial court’s “common sense” view of what is or is not “plausible” has significant impact on the likelihood that a case will survive summary judgment. As a general matter, doctrinal developments in the past two decades have quite consistently made it more difficult for plaintiffs to assert their claims of discrimination. In addition, many of these doctrines have increased the role of judicial judgment – and the possibility of the court’s implicit bias – in the life cycle of an employment discrimination case. …

Back To The Future: Introducing Constructive Feminism For The Twenty-First Century: A New Paradigm For The Family And Medical Leave Act, Arianne Renan Barzilay Dr.

Arianne Renan Barzilay Dr. (J.S.D., New York University School of Law)

Abstract: At least ninety percent (90%) of American parents, mothers and fathers, say they are experiencing an acute shortage of time spent with family and an intense work-family conflict. This article provides a history and a theory that should inform our conceptualization of work-family regulation. It points to the neglected history of working-class social feminism. It shows how working-class social feminists at the beginning of the twentieth century advocated for “constructive feminism”—government support, by way of labor regulation, of what this article terms “multidimensionalism”—a life enriched by meaningful dimensions of work, family, civic participation, and culture. The Article extends this …

Why Do We (Still) Lack Data On Policing?, Rachel A. Harmon

Rachel A. Harmon

The Wickersham Commission report on The Third Degree, found in the Commission’s famous Report on Lawlessness in Law Enforcement ended with the argument that the “real remedy” for police misconduct “lies in the will of the community,” which in turn depends on evidence about the nature and extent of police abuse. In this brief essay, I argue that the report’s call for information about policing has gone largely unanswered. Eighty years later, we still lack enough data about what the police do to shape their conduct effectively. Public policy and legal decisions about policing depend heavily on empirical judgments, but …

Reciprocal Antidiscrimination Arguments, Yofi Tirosh

Yofi Tirosh

This Article addresses a common characteristic of antidiscrimination law: To what extent should one antidiscrimination campaign be held accountable for other, related, discriminatory structures that it does not and cannot purport to correct? Plaintiffs in antidiscrimination cases are sometimes expected to account for the larger social context in which their claim is made. Defendants invoke this larger context as a way of rebutting the discrimination claim, by arguing that the plaintiff’s claim has “discriminatory residue” that would exacerbate related discriminatory structures. For example, in a case in which same-sex couples seek the right to contract with surrogate mothers, the defendant …

The Right To Be Fat, Yofi Tirosh

Yofi Tirosh

Policy discussions on the increasing weight of Americans, portrayed as a problem of monumental and grim outlook, preoccupy public health experts, scientists, economists, and the popular media. In the legal field, however, discussions have tended to focus on whether weight should be a protected category under antidiscrimination law and on cost-benefit models for creating incentives to lose weight. This Article takes a novel approach to thinking about weight in the legal context. First, it maps the diverse ways in which the law is recruited to “the war against obesity,” thus providing an unprecedented account of what it means to be …

Aging In The United States: Rethinking Justice, Equality, And Identity Across The Lifespan, Nancy J. Knauer

Nancy J. Knauer

Our current aging policies and procedures raise profound questions of individual liberty, autonomy, and equality. Guardianship regimes require the state to balance the interests of vulnerable adults with their right to self-determination. The proliferation of age-specific laws designed to protect elders may actually compromise the civil rights of older individuals by denying their autonomy based solely on their age. The regulation of intimacy in long-term care settings infringes on a core liberty interest essential to human dignity. This essay introduces a new body of work that specifically addresses the civil rights aspects of aging. In many ways, aging represents the …

Islam In The Mind Of American Courts: 1800 To 1960., Marie A. Failinger

Marie A. Failinger

This article surveys mentions of Islam and Muslims in American federal and state court cases from 1800 to 1960.

Finding A Voice Of Challenge: The State Responds To Religious Women And Their Communities, Marie A. Failinger

Marie A. Failinger

The appropriate response of Western nation-states to the situation of religious women who are caught between democratic norms of gender equality and the demands of their religious community has been a source of tension in many Western nations, including the U.S. This article attempts to give voice to the complex nature of women’s religious conduct as tied to their identities, and to propose alternative ways that the state might further its norms of gender equality besides intrusive regulation of religious communities.

Combating Liquorlining: State Controlled Alcohol Distribution Increases Public Welfare For Low Income African Americans, Daivy P. Dambreville

Daivy P Dambreville

One consideration that has not been raised during the persistent debates over alcohol regulation in Pennsylvania is the potential effect that a paradigm switch would have on low income minority communities – in particular, the African American community which makes up the largest percentage of low income inhabitants in Pennsylvania. Low income African American communities are particularly susceptible to legislative changes to liquor laws because they often lack the social and political power to lobby for policies that favor their particular considerations. Moreover, research on issues that disproportionally affect African Americans throughout the United States, such as unusually high levels …

Constructing The Other: U.S. Muslims, Proposed Anti-Sharia Law, And The Constitutional Consequences Of Volatile Intercultural Rhetoric, Carlo A. Pedrioli

Carlo A. Pedrioli

Recently, legislators have proposed, discussed, and passed various laws that aimed to limit the use of foreign law, international law, and Sharia (a branch of Islamic law) in state court systems. Because it became law, one proposed state constitutional amendment that rhetorically linked Sharia to foreign and international law is of particular note. In the 2010 midterm elections, Oklahoma passed State Question 755 (SQ 755), a constitutional amendment that aimed to place restrictions on the use of foreign law, international law, and Sharia in Oklahoma courts.

Laws like Oklahoma’s State Question 755 are problematic for a variety of reasons. One …

Quality Of Healthcare And The Role Of Relationships: Bridging The Medico-Legal Divide, Sagit Mor, Orna Rabinovich-Einy

Sagit Mor

This article focuses on an often overlooked barrier to efforts to enhance the quality of health care: the relationship crisis that currently exists between physicians and patients. This state of affairs has resulted from the divide between the medical and legal worlds. The medical arena has understandably tended to view the doctor-patient relationship as a purely medical issue, ignoring the law’s impact in generating and sustaining problematic relationship patterns. The legal world has yet to fully recognize this state of affairs, and the law’s role in its evolution and persistence. We offer a relational approach to healthcare law as a …

Arctic Justice: Addressing Persistent Organic Pollutants, Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

This article recommends enhanced governance of persistent organic pollutants through incentives to develop environmentally sound, climate friendly technologies as well as caution in developing the Arctic. It highlights the toxicity challenges presented by POPs to Arctic people and ecosystems.

Polar Law And Good Governance, Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

This chapter will assess the Antarctic Treaty System, ask what polar lessons can be learned regarding common pool resources, and analyze law of the sea and related measures. It will consider such substantive areas as Arctic and Antarctic natural resource management and procedural opportunities as inclusive governance structures. Enhancing good governance can occur through trust building forums that bring together stakeholders, share information, and make environmentally sound decisions regarding sustainable development.

Tribes As Essential Partners In Achieving Sustainable Governance, Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Indigenous peoples have modeled sustainable development around the world. Incentivizing the innovation and instillation of wind, solar, and other renewable energy sources can come in the form of public funding, including renewable portfolio standards, feed in tariffs and green tag programs. This article analyzes ways in which tribal communities are helping to expand cooperative good governance.

Inextricably Political: Race, Membership And Tribal Sovereignty, Sarah Krakoff

Sarah Krakoff

Courts address equal protection questions about the distinct legal treatment of American Indian tribes in the following dichotomous way: are classifications concerning American Indians “racial or political?” If the classification is political (i.e. based on federally recognized tribal status or membership in a federally recognized tribe) then courts will not subject it to heightened scrutiny. If the classification is racial rather than political, then courts may apply heightened scrutiny. This article challenges the dichotomy itself. The legal categories “tribe” and “tribal member” are themselves political, and reflect the ways in which tribes and tribal members have been racialized by U.S. …

Common-Law Interpretation Of Appropriate Education: The Road Not Taken In Rowley, Mark C. Weber

Mark C. Weber

Thirty years old in 2012, Board of Education v. Rowley is the case that established a some-benefit or floor-of-opportunity standard for the services public school districts must provide to children who have disabilities. But the some-benefit approach is by no means the only one the Court could have adopted. It could have endorsed the view of the lower courts that each child with a disability must be given the opportunity to achieve his or her potential commensurate with the opportunity offered other children. Or it could have adopted a standard based on achievement of the child’s full potential or the …

Subtraction By Addition?: The Thirteenth And Fourteenth Amendments, Mark A. Graber

Faculty Scholarship

The celebration of the Thirteenth Amendment in many Essays prepared for this Symposium may be premature. That the Thirteenth Amendment arguably protects a different and, perhaps, wider array of rights than the Fourteenth Amendment may be less important than the less controversial claim that the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified after the Thirteenth Amendment. If the Fourteenth Amendment covers similar ground as the Thirteenth Amendment, but protects a narrower set of rights than the Thirteenth Amendment, then the proper inference may be that the Fourteenth Amendment repealed or modified crucial rights originally protected by the Thirteenth Amendment. The broad interpretation of …

Surviving Castle Rock: The Human Rights Of Domestic Violence, Max D. Siegel

Student Articles and Papers

In 2005, the Supreme Court of the United States decided Town of Castle Rock v. Gonzales and held that Jessica Gonzales did not have a constitutional right to police enforcement of a restraining order. The decision highlighted the Court’s reluctance to recognize citizens’ affirmative rights, fortifying a deeply ingrained conceptualization of the Constitution of the United States as a “Negative Constitution” that creates a government with restraints on its actions and extremely limited obligations to its citizens. In August 2011, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights released a report publicizing its finding that by failing to take affirmative measures to …