Legal History Commons^™

Living Property, Joseph William Singer

Seattle University Law Review

The Supreme Court has increasingly defined property rights that are per se exempt from regulation in the absence of compensation, most recently in Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid (2021) and Tyler v. Hennepin County (2023). The Court claims that it can identify property rights that are categorically protected from regulation by reference to history, tradition, and precedent. Yet this approach is oddly ahistorical; it is inconsistent with the fact that property law changed dramatically over U.S. history, as well as varying tremendously among the states. It is also inconsistent with the historical context of the Founding era. At that time, …

Table Of Contents

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

The Roots Of Credit Inequality, Andrea Freeman

Seattle University Law Review

Debt oppression began before the United States became a country. Settlers enslaved Africans and Indigenous people, treating them as property that they could buy and sell for their economic and personal benefit. When enslavement became illegal, new economic systems and laws that included sharecropping, Black Codes, and Jim Crow kept Black people in servitude. Laws that prohibited enslaved people from owning property or selling goods to white people evolved into restrictions on Black people’s occupations and market participation, both formal and informal. When Black entrepreneurs overcame these obstacles and built wealth within Black business enclaves, white people enforced their racist …

“A Plain Denial”: Reclaiming Equal Protection In American Juvenile Law, Addie C. Rolnick, David S. Tanenhaus, Justin Iverson, Danielle L. Silvestri

Seattle University Law Review

Juvenile courts are based on the premise that children are different from adults and should therefore be treated differently. Children may be treated more informally by courts, punished for different purposes, and brought before the court for different behaviors. Since In re Gault, the Supreme Court has been clear that there are limits to how different juvenile courts can be. Juveniles are entitled to many of the same procedural protections as adult criminal defendants, although the Court has preserved some procedural differences where it has determined that their benefit is outweighed by the need to preserve the informality, flexibility, …

Redefining Section 230 Immunity, Lucas Dini

Seattle University Law Review

Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act has provided broad immunity to online platforms for third-party content which was the foundation for the internet's growth. However, the rise in the use of artificial intelligence (AI) to produce algorithms to curate content to users of online services has blurred the line between being a passive host of third party content and active editorial control. This Note examines the legal, policy, and constitutional implications of applying Section 230 immunity to platforms that use AI to curate and promote third-party content. This analysis argues that algorithmic promotion of third-party content constitutes a platform's …

Overcrowding The System: Rethinking Juvenile Justice In Washington State, Mckenna White

Seattle University Law Review

The recent crisis at Green Hill School highlights the detrimental consequences of severe overcrowding in Washington State’s Juvenile Rehabilitation system—a problem exacerbated by the implementation of the JR to 25 legislation. This Note argues that the juvenile rehabilitation system, which is currently struggling to manage a wide age range of offenders, necessitates a fundamental rethinking of juvenile justice practices. By examining neurological research indicating continued brain development into the mid-twenties, along with the high prevalence of trauma among justice-involved youth, this Note proposes the creation of a dedicated third system of care within the Department of Children, Youth, and Families …

Addressing The Root Of Housing Insecurity: Washington Should Divest From “Crime-Free” Housing Programs, Sarah Cerdena

Seattle University Law Review

Crime-Free Rental Housing Properties (CFRHPs) have proven to be an ineffective and inequitable approach to public safety. Often, tenants in these properties are evicted—at times, extrajudicially—as a result of conduct that does not rise to violations of their lease provisions, much less criminal behavior. By placing extraordinary power in the hands of local law enforcement to carry out these ordinances, CFRHPs predictably pose significant harm to Black and Latinx communities, survivors of domestic violence, disabled tenants, and low-income tenants generally. Recently, the Washington State Supreme Court grappled with the tensions arising between CFRHPs and the enforcement of Washington landlord-tenant law. …

Volume 49 Masthead

Seattle University Law Review

Volume 49 Masthead

Esg Investing Breaches Erisa Fiduciary Duties? A Closer Look At Spence V. American Airlines, Inc., Eric Chin-Ru Chang

Seattle University Law Review

In Spence v. American Airlines, Inc., the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas found that American Airlines breached its fiduciary duties due to BlackRock’s ESG investing practices. Contrary to some reports suggesting that the ruling prohibits ESG investing under ERISA, a closer look at the ruling shows that the court only targeted American Airlines’ failure to manage conflicts of interest appropriately, rather than the legality of ESG investing itself. In light of the intensifying ESG backlash in the United States, this Article cautions against further restrictive measures on ESG investing. Such measures would exacerbate the widening …

Mandating Fluoride: A Constitutional Exercise Of Police Power, Anita Jahangiri

Seattle University Law Review

This Note addresses the ongoing debate over fluoridation: the regulation of fluoride levels in public water systems. Extensive research indicates fluoridation, when regulated at the recommended concentration, is both safe and highly effective in preventing dental caries. Better known as cavities, dental caries is a preventable yet widespread health issue that disproportionately affects low-income populations. Reducing dental health disparities among economic classes is a pressing public health issue. Fluoridation is not merely a policy option, but a critical, proven tool to address such disparities and uphold the collective welfare of Washingtonians. This Note focuses on fluoridation as a public health …

Neurodiversity In The Courtroom: Expanding Jury Service Accessibility Beyond Physical Disability, Samantha L. Mabe

Seattle University Law Review

The Americans with Disabilities Act has required equal access to jury service for decades; however, efforts to accommodate jurors with disabilities have been slow to develop beyond some minor accommodations for physical disabilities. While neurodivergent people frequently struggle to navigate a world catered toward neurotypical people, jury service remains inaccessible for many neurodivergent people who need accommodations to attend trial and engage in jury deliberations. If courts and advocates do not consider how to develop accommodations to secure the service of neurodivergent jurors, they will miss out on the unique skillsets that neurodivergent people can bring to resolving disputes.

Disabled …

Bandung And The Future Of Africa’S Pasts, Rabiat Akande, Olufemi Elias

Articles & Book Chapters

The idea of decolonization that animated the spirit of the 1955 Bandung Conference continues to power imaginations of an alternative to the world Bandung inhabited. In this essay, we look upon Africa from Bandung, and simultaneously from Africa to Bandung, to recover an “otherwise”—a seeing of the future from Africa’s pasts. In the future envisioned in Bandung and beyond, flag independence was regarded as the first stop in the project of decolonization.1 The conference was to provide both “guidance to mankind … [on] the way which it must take to attain safety and peace” and “evidence that Asia and Africa …

Take In Case Of Emergency: Reconciling Necessity Takings With The Original Meaning Of The Takings Clause, Tony Smith

Northwestern University Law Review

Does the Fifth Amendment’s Takings Clause permit the state to destroy property without compensation whenever it declares an emergency? The long-standing doctrine of necessity empowers the state to do exactly that.

Courts dating back to common law England have permitted governments to claim a privilege of necessity to avoid paying for private property they destroy in times of crisis. The privilege rests on the principle that the public good sometimes outweighs the harm the individual suffers. Today’s courts and academics stretch this principle to its limits, arguing necessity should be used as a vehicle for combating all manner of social …

The Roberts Court Paradox, John C. P. Goldberg, Benjamin C. Zipursky

Fordham Law Review

As perhaps the most conservative Supreme Court of the past century, the Roberts Court regularly touts its commitment to traditional ideals, including the rule of law. Yet Trump v. United States seems ready to place presidents entirely or largely above the law by granting them absolute or near absolute immunity from criminal prosecutions for official conduct. And Trump is not a one-off: from judicial recusal to qualified immunity to due process decisions, the Court frequently seems to display indifference to values of accountability and impartiality that have long been thought integral to the rule of law. What is going on? …

The Evolution Of The Second Amendment And The American Gun Violence Epidemic: A Historical Analysis Of Political Self-Sabotage, Amanda Tureaud

Senior Theses

From the conception of the Bill of Rights until the 21st century, the Second Amendment was read and understood by the American population, both ordinary citizens and government officials, branches, and agencies inclusively, to allow the nation to have an armed military but not for private citizens to own and/or carry firearms. Since 2008, however, the Second Amendment has been interpreted as an absolute freedom for private citizens to own and carry semiautomatic assault weapons in the name of personal protection. This thesis holds that the evolution of society’s attitude on guns and gun control is specifically denoted by the …

Reclaiming Sound: Copyright Restoration As Cultural And Economic Justice For Black Musicians, James Roberts Jr.

Senior Theses

This paper examines copyright restoration as both a legal mechanism and a form of cultural reparations for Black musicians historically excluded from ownership and profit in the American music industry. It traces the evolution of U.S. copyright law from its earliest forms to the Music Modernization Act of 2018, highlighting how shifting statutory frameworks have gradually extended protection and restoration rights to artists who were once denied them. The analysis situates this legal trajectory within a broader history of racialized exploitation in the recording industry, where inequitable contracts and systemic power imbalances functioned as modern forms of artistic sharecropping. Through …

Rethinking Courtroom Presence In The Virtual Era, Jenia Iontcheva Turner

Indiana Law Journal

Technological innovation has made virtual appearances by criminal defendants increasingly common. These appearances have advanced efficiency but also raised questions about the scope of both the right and the duty of defendants to be physically present in court. Should judges, for example, be allowed to hold virtual arraignments, even if a defendant wishes to appear in person? Can defendants opt for virtual appearances at will? While courts are beginning to address these questions, they have yet to develop a coherent framework to evaluate when virtual appearances are constitutional and appropriate. This Article seeks to contribute to this project by examining …

Judicial Enforcement Of Evidence Law, G. Alexander Nunn

Faculty Scholarship

The truth matters. At least it should. In the courtroom, truth can serve as the cornerstone of justice, liberating the innocent, vindicating victims, and holding the guilty to account. Indeed, truth is such a normative imperative that an entire legal discipline now focuses on fostering its discovery at trial—evidence law. By regulating both the reliability of proof and the rationality of cognitive inferences, evidence law seeks to help factfinders discern truth and reach an accurate verdict. And given the importance of that role, one might naturally assume that the strict enforcement of evidence law would be a legal mandate of …

The Uniform Commercial Code Survey: Introduction, Jennifer S. Martin, Colin P. Marks, Wayne Barnes

Faculty Scholarship

The survey that follows highlights the most important developments of 2024 dealing with domestic and international sales of goods, personal property leases, payments, letters of credit, documents of title, investment securities, and secured transactions. Along with the usual descriptions of interesting judicial decisions highlighted in the survey, there has also been legislative progress. The 2022 Amendments to the Uniform Commercial Code ("U.C.C.") (the "2022 Amendments")' have been adopted in thirty-one states plus the District of Colombia and introduced in six states.

The Crime Of Being Immoral, Randy D. Gordon

Faculty Scholarship

Despite a general abhorrence of retrospective laws as a matter of legal theory and Constitutional dictate, US. courts continue-in es sence-to create new crimes by injecting fazzy moral considerations into determinations under the federal fraud statutes. They do so by deeming a failure to act with "moral uprightness" sufficient to consti tute criminal fraud. Under such an amorphous standard, the unwitting find themselves in a legal bind, even though their conduct may not in volve any of the traditional elements of common-law fraud. This Article traces the roots of novel fraud theories with tools drawn from legal theory, linguistics, and …