Constitutional Law Commons^™

How Nfib V. Sebelius Affects The Constitutional Gestalt, Lawrence B. Solum

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The thesis of this essay is that the most important legal effects of the Supreme Court's decision in NFIB v. Sebelius are likely to be indirect. Sebelius marks a possible shift in what we can call the “constitutional gestalt” regarding the meaning and implications of the so-called “New Deal Settlement.” Before Sebelius, the consensus understanding was that New Deal and Warren Court cases had established a constitutional regime of plenary and virtually unlimited national legislative power under the Commerce Clause (which might be subject to narrow and limited carve outs protective of the core of state sovereignty).

After Sebelius …

Is The Antidiscrimination Project Being Ended?, Michael J. Zimmer

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.

Rights Of Belonging For Women, Rebecca E. Zietlow

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.

Affirmative Action And Academic Freedom: Why The Supreme Court Should Continue Deferring To Faculty Judgments About The Value Of Educational Diversity, Steve Sanders

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.

If A Right To Health Care Is Argued In The Supreme Court, Does Anybody Hear It?, W. David Koeninger

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.

June 4, 2013: “In Our Family, There Was No Clear Line Between Religion And Fly Fishing.”, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “In our family, there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing. “ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Adalah – The Legal Center For Arab Minority Rights In Israel V. Ministry Of Social Affairs, Edna Arbel, Daphne Barak-Erez, Esther Hayut

Translated Opinions

[This abstract is not part of the Court's opinion and is provided for the reader's convenience. It has been translated from a Hebrew version prepared by Nevo Press Ltd. and is used with its kind permission.]

We are concerned with petitions for the revocation of Section 61(2)(d) of the Arrangements Law (Legislative Amendments for Implementation of the Economic Plan for 2009 and 2010), 5769-2009, as it is unconstitutional, which included Amendment no. 113 to the National Insurance Law [Consolidated Version], 5755-1995 (hereinafter: the “Amendment to the Law”) that ordered, inter alia, the reduction of the child allowances paid for …

The Voting Rights Act's Fight To Stay Rational: Shelby County V. Holder, Sudeep Paul

Duke Journal of Constitutional Law & Public Policy Sidebar

This commentary previews an upcoming Supreme Court case, Shelby County v. Holder, in which the Court may decide whether Congress's 2006 reauthorization of Section 5 and Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act was constitutional.

June 1, 2013: The Economy, The Poor And Religion, Bruce Ledewitz

Hallowed Secularism

Blog post, “The Economy, the Poor and Religion“ discusses politics, theology and the law in relation to religion and public life in the democratic United States of America.

Gideon’S Law-Protective Function, Nancy Leong

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Gideon v. Wainwright dramatically affects the rights of indigent defendants by entitling them to representation. But Gideon has another systemic consequence as well. In addition to protecting the rights of individual defendants in particular trials, Gideon also protects the integrity of the development of the law by ensuring that the legal principles courts articulate are the product of a legitimate adversarial process. While law protection was not a central rationale for the outcome in Gideon, the decision’s reasoning and the surrounding historical context resonate with the concern for the integrity of judicial lawmaking. And an examination of subsequent cases reveals …

Are We All Originalists Now? I Hope Not!, James E. Fleming

Faculty Scholarship

In recent years, some have asked: “Are we all originalists now?” My response is: “I hope not!” In the Article, I explain why. But first, I show that there is a trick in the question: Even to pose the question “Are we all originalists now?” suggests that one is presupposing what I shall call “the originalist premise.” To answer the question affirmatively certainly shows that one is presupposing it. The originalist premise is the assumption that originalism, rightly conceived, is the best, or indeed the only, conception of fidelity in constitutional interpretation. Put more strongly, it is the assumption that …

Constitutional Privileging, Michael Coenen

Journal Articles

“Constitutional privileging” occurs when courts treat the constitutional status of a legal claim as a reason to afford it specialized procedural or remedial treatment — in effect providing to that claim a greater degree of judicial care and attention than its nonconstitutional counterparts receive. Though seldom scrutinized by courts and commentators, this practice occurs within a variety of doctrinal settings. For example, a stricter standard of harmless error review governs constitutional claims; district court findings of facts (and mixed findings) are subject to a stricter form of appellate review in constitutional cases; collateral relief from federal court judgments is more …

Collective Action Federalism And Its Discontents, Neil S. Siegel

Faculty Scholarship

An increasing number of scholars argue that the Commerce Clause is best read in light of the collective action problems that the nation faced under the Articles of Confederation. The work of these “collective action theorists” is reflected in Justice Ginsburg’s opinion in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius. Writing for four Justices, she stressed the “collective-action impasse” at the state level to which the Affordable Care Act responds.

In its purest form, a collective action approach maintains that the existence of a significant problem of collective action facing two or more states is both necessary and sufficient for …

Defining Corruption And Constitutionalizing Democracy, Deborah Hellman

Michigan Law Review

The central front in the battle over campaign finance laws is the definition of corruption. The Supreme Court has allowed restrictions on the giving and spending of money in connection with elections only when they serve to avoid corruption or the appearance of corruption. The constitutionality of such laws, therefore, depends on how the Court defines corruption. Over the years, campaign finance cases have conceived of corruption in both broad and narrow terms, with the most recent cases defining it especially narrowly. While supporters and critics of campaign finance laws have argued for and against these different formulations, both sides …

Plea Bargaining And The Right To Counsel At Bail Hearings, Charlie Gerstein

Michigan Law Review

A couple million indigent defendants in this country face bail hearings each year and most of them do so without court-appointed lawyers. In two recent companion cases, Lafler v. Cooper and Missouri v. Frye, the Supreme Court held that the loss of a favorable plea bargain can satisfy the prejudice prong of an ineffective assistance of counsel claim. If the Constitution requires effective assistance of counsel to protect plea bargains, it requires the presence of counsel at proceedings that have the capacity to prejudice those bargains. Pretrial detention has the capacity to prejudice a plea bargain because a defendant held …

Statutory Interdependence In Severability Analysis, Rachel J. Ezzell

Michigan Law Review

According to conventional wisdom, when a court rules a statutory provision unconstitutional, it must sever that provision or strike down the entire statute. This understanding is incomplete. In practice, courts may engage in compound severance: invalidating additional, otherwise constitutional provisions of the statute without striking down the entire statute. They reason that the degree of interrelation between those provisions is so significant that severance of one compels severance of the other. As a result, a subset of the statute remains law. The power to craft such subsets raises constitutional concerns, and yet the jurisprudence concerning statutory interdependence is inconsistent and …

The New Textualism, Progressive Constitutionalism, And Abortion Rights: A Reply To Jeffrey Rosen, Neil S. Siegel

Faculty Scholarship

In this Essay, I offer a few thoughts in response to Jeffrey Rosen's contribution to this symposium on Jack Balkin's "Living Originalism". I will first focus on what he writes about the "new textualism." I will then reply to what he intimates about the continuing validity of Roe v. Wade. In short, I will argue that Rosen offers progressives little reason to accept the new textualism or to reject Roe in the name of legal fidelity.

If the abortion right is ultra vires because a lack of decisive warrant in text, structure, and history trumps mediating equality principles and legal …

The Plea-Bargain Crisis For Noncitizens In Misdemeanor Court, Jason A. Cade

Cardozo Law Review

This Article considers three factors contributing to a plea-bargain crisis for noncitizens charged with misdemeanors: 1) the expansion of deportation laws to include very minor offenses with little opportunity for discretionary relief from removal; 2) the integration of federal immigration enforcement programs with the criminal justice system; and 3) the institutional norms in non-federal lower criminal courts, where little attention is paid to evidence or individual equities and where bail and other process costs generally outweigh perceived incentives to fight charges. The Article contends that these factors increase the likelihood that a noncitizen's low-level conviction will not reliably indicate guilt …

Session 3-2-B: Paspa: An Unconstitutional Patent, Kevin P. Braig

International Conference on Gambling & Risk Taking

The Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (“PASPA”) is a patent monopoly because the statute (A) imitates the Crown’s practice of allocating markets by patent; (B) functions like a patent issued under the United States Patent Code; and (C) imposes monopoly-like costs upon the public. The Constitution’s Patent Clause is a brilliant public financing scheme and unique in that it is the only grant of power to Congress in the Constitution that begins with a specific prescription of proper legislative purpose. Congress cannot grant just any person a patent monopoly for any purpose. Rather, Congress can grant a patent monopoly …

Summary Of City Of Sparks V. Sparks Mun. Court, 129 Adv. Op. 38, Ivy Hensel

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Municipal Court disputed the City’s ability to require it to reduce the salaries of Municipal Court employees who were exempt from the city charter provisions and civil service rules that govern City employees. The Court determined whether the separation of powers doctrine and the Municipal Court’s inherent authority bar the City of Sparks from interfering with the Municipal Court’s control over personnel decisions.