Law and Politics Commons^™

Aiding And Abetting: The Illegality Of Morocco's Nationalist Expansion Into Western Sahara And Their Support From The United States, Rachid H. Yousfi

Master's Theses

This paper will address the illegality of Morocco’s nationalist annexation of Western Sahara and how the United States plays the accommodating role through the selling of arms, economic aid, and diplomatic support. Considered as Africa’s last colony, the Saharawi people have not experienced the basic human right to self-determination and the right for independence. These rights are continued to be withheld for the sake of Moroccan nationalism and their “rightful and ethnic” claims to the territory, disregarding the International Court of Justice (ICJ)’s advisory opinion ruling in favor of Saharawi self-determination. It explores the chronology of the Saharawi population from …

Bruce Ledewitz, American Religious Democracy: Coming To Terms With The End Of Secular Politics, Thomas A. Schweitzer

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

An Overview Of The October 2006 Supreme Court Term, Erwin Chemerinsky

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Perfect Timing: The Rise Of Women’S Political Leadership During Cultural Shifts, Christie E. Pearce

Oglethorpe Journal of Undergraduate Research

America has fallen behind in women's leadership, especially in politics. In the approaching era, there will be more viable female political candidates than ever in the past, but will the public be prepared to elect a woman to high office? Studies suggest that mentalities toward female leadership have taken a shift in a positive direction. The idea of what an 'ideal' politician must offer is more feminine in the modern era than ever before. In the age of social media, female politicians have opportunities to reach more constituents through social media in a more effective way than has been offered …

Supreme Court Of New York Appellate Division, Third Department - Kings Mall, Llc V. Wenk, Steven Fox

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Partisanship Spectrum, Justin Levitt

William & Mary Law Review

In a polarized political environment, allegations of excessive partisanship by public actors are ubiquitous. Commentators, courts, and activists levy these allegations daily. But with remarkable consistency, they do so as if “partisanship” described a single phenomenon. This Article recognizes that the default mode of understanding partisanship is a descriptive and diagnostic failure with meaningful consequences. We mean different things when we discuss partisanship, but we do not have the vocabulary to understand that we are talking past each other.

Without a robust conceptualization of partisanship, it is difficult to treat pathologies of partisan governance. Indeed, an undifferentiated approach to partisanship …

Jlia 3:1 - The Future Of International Criminal Justice

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

No abstract provided.

Voter Identification Laws: The Cost Of Voting And Voter Participation, Isaac Lindstrom

Celebrating Scholarship & Creativity Day (2011-2017)

No abstract provided.

Learning From Our Mistakes: The Belfast Project Litigation And The Need For The Supreme Court To Recognize An Academic Privilege In The United States, Kathryn L. Steffen

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

Through the Belfast Project, researchers sponsored by Boston College began to compile an oral history of the period of violent political conflict in Northern Ireland known as “The Troubles” in a series of interviews. The interviewees’ participation in the project was conditioned on a strict promise of confidentiality. However, when authorities in the United Kingdom became suspicious that the interviews contained evidence of criminal activity, the United Kingdom, pursuant to a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty, requested the United States to subpoena the materials on its behalf. Satisfaction of the subpoena would mean not only turning over the interview recordings, but …

National Security And The Protection Of Constitutional Liberties: How The Foreign Terrorist Organization List Satisfies Procedural Due Process, Aaron Schwartz

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

Foreign terrorist organizations pose a real and constantly evolving threat to U.S. national security. The Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) List seeks to temper that threat by extending the U.S. government an effective legal tool to identify and sanction members of terrorist organizations and those who support them. At the same time, however, the government must also ensure that its efforts to protect U.S. citizens do not trample constitutionally protected rights. This comment begins by exploring the FTO List's authorizing legislation and the policy and goals of that legislation. The comment then reviews and analyzes a series of cases discussing the …

Third Time’S The Charm: Will Basel Iii Have A Measurable Impact On Limiting Future Financial Turmoil?, Erin Pentz

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

The Great Recession of 2008 caused banking failures around the globe. The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision responded swiftly to create new minimum capital requirements for financial institutions in hopes of preventing additional failures and warding off future crises. Although the new capital standards that Basel III proposes are a step in the right direction, those standards alone will not be sufficient to prevent future bank failures in times of economic decline. Rather, true financial sector stability requires adequate capitalization of all institutions in terms of quality and quantity of capital, a strong regulatory framework, and a limitation on the …

International Institutions And The Resource Curse, Patrick Keenan

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

Many countries that are richly endowed with natural resources have failed to turn that resource wealth into sustained development. In many places, a small coterie of elites has become rich while most citizens see little benefit from their country’s vast resource wealth. A principal cause of this problem, often called the resource curse, is weak domestic institutions that permit leaders to enrich themselves and ignore the development needs of the country. From this, most scholars and policymakers have concluded that the way to fix the resource curse is to reform domestic institutions.

This article challenges the conventional wisdom and argues …

The Arab Spring’S Four Seasons: International Protections And The Sovereignty Problem, Jillian Blake, Aqsa Mahmud

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

In December 2010, public demonstrations erupted throughout the Middle East against autocratic regimes, igniting a regional political transformation known as the Arab Spring. Depending on events, modern international criminal and humanitarian law provided certain protections to vulnerable populations. However, international law did not provide a uniform degree of protection to civilians and combatants who faced similar circumstances. This Article argues for a uniform standard of protections for all populations affected by armed conflict, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. It evaluates each of five major Arab Spring uprisings (Tunisia, Bahrain, Egypt, Syria, and Libya) and describes the legal protections that …

The Impact Of The Icty On Atrocity-Related Prosecutions In The Courts Of Bosnia And Herzegovina, Yaël Ronen

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

The International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia was not mandated to proactively promote domestic prosecutions of war-related crimes. However, its operation may have had some impact on domestic proceedings concerning war-related crimes in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The object of this article is to identify and explain this impact, with respect to qualitative (institutional legal capacities), quantitative (rates of prosecution and trends in sentencing), and normative (the adoption and application of criminal law norms) benchmarks.

The Limits Of Judicial Idealism: Should The International Criminal Court Engage With Consequentialist Aspirations?, Shahram Dana

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

Idealism about what international criminal justice mechanisms can achieve has lead to ideologically driven judicial decision-making in international criminal law (ICL). ICL idealism manifests itself in the belief that international criminal prosecutions can achieve an awesome array of goals. These include retribution, deterrence, reconciliation, rehabilitation, incapacitation, restoration, building a historical record, preventing revisionism, expressive and didactic functions, crystallizing international norms, general affirmative prevention, establishing peace, preventing war, vindicating international law prohibitions, setting standards for fair trials, combating impunity, and more. Ironically, this idealistic overreach, although usually well intended, has actually contributed to the politicization of the international judicial process.

The …

No Witness, No Case: An Assessment Of The Conduct And Quality Of Icc Investigations, Dermot Groome

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

The conduct and quality of investigations pursued by the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court have come under increasing scrutiny and criticism from judges on the Court. Criticism is directed at the time and length of investigations; the quality of the evidence advanced in court; the inappropriate delegation of investigative functions, and the failure to interview witnesses in a way that is consistent with the Prosecution’s obligation to conduct investigations fairly under Article 54 of the Rome Statute. This essay explores these criticisms and concludes that the judges are justified in their concerns regarding the Prosecution’s investigative …

Foreword, Claudio Grossman

Penn State Journal of Law & International Affairs (2012 - Present)

No abstract provided.

Some Reflections On The Past, Present And State-Dependent Future Of Lotteries In American Gaming Law, Stephen J. Leacock

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Art Of Racial Dissent: African American Political Discourse In The Age Of Obama, Kareem U. Crayton

Chicago-Kent Law Review

What does the art of dissent from a group look like in the context of race and politics? How does this element of political discourse resemble dissent in the more typical settings, such as the courts? And how might this brand of dissent be distinguished from the more common forms of the enterprise? In this piece, I develop a thesis of “racial dissent,” defined here as the act of speaking against a prevailing norm or principle within a given racial group. I outline a general argument for how racial dissent operates, including the review of structural pressures that racial dissenters …

Beyond Backlash: Legal History, Polarization, And Roe V. Wade, Mary Ziegler

Scholarly Publications

On its fortieth anniversary, Roe v. Wade serves as the most prominent example of the damage judicial review can do to the larger society. Scholars from across the ideological spectrum have related how Roe helped to entrench the ideological positions held by those on either side of the abortion issue, precluding any form of productive compromise. This criticism, which the Article calls the “beyond backlash” argument, has profound legal consequences, serving as both a justification for overruling Roe and as a case study of the benefits of varying interpretive methods.

This Article reevaluates the beyond backlash claim through a careful …