Among the many perks of being a law professor is the platform it
provides. When I am fired up about something, I can write about it-an oped,
an article, or a book-and get it published. Such was the case in 2018. I
got so tired of reading posts on social media misunderstanding Section 4 of
the Twenty-Fifth Amendment that I resolved to write a…[Read more]

I have always liked the old joke about the professor attending a
presentation on a cure for cancer. During the Q & A he raised his hand
and said, “I am sure that will work perfectly in practice . . .but how would
it work in theory?” I enjoy theoretical discussions as much as the next
person, but I am very happy to be here discussing Section 4…[Read more]

For many, art is an essential component of life. It offers beauty, fulfillment, inspiration, and meaning. But art can also be used as an effective teaching tool. In my American Legal History course, I use art to inculcate a deeper understanding of the time period under discussion. I have found, and believe, it helps my students understand the…[Read more]

No one paying attention needs to be told the verdict on Batson v. Kentucky.’
Batson intended to eliminate the influence of race on jury selection, 2 which is
essential both to conducting fair and just trials’ and to protecting the reputation of
the justice system. 4 Batson failed.’ A growing collection of empirical studies
documents this…[Read more]

The influence of race on the administration of capital punishment had a major role in the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1972 decision in Furman v. Georgia to invalidate death penalty statutes across the United States. To avoid discriminatory and capricious application of capital punishment, the Supreme Court held that the Eighth Amendment requires…[Read more]

The Eighth Amendment’s “narrowing” requirement for capital punishment eligibility has challenged states since it was recognized in Furman v. Georgia in 1972. This article examines whether California’s death penalty scheme complies with this requirement by enpirically analyzing 27,453 California convictions for first-degree murder, second-degree…[Read more]

The National Registry of Exonerations (the Registry) reports all known exonerations in the United States since 1989. Of the more than 2,400 exonerated defendants currently in the database, 281 are classified as Latinx. In many ways, their cases resemble those of other exonerees. The same factors that produced false convictions of non-Latinx…[Read more]

This study of individualized jury selection for 792 potentialjurors across 12 North Carolina capital cases, selected with purposive case selection, analyzes the conversations that occur during voir dire to examine the process that produces decisions about who serves on juries. Lawyers question prospective jurors in voir dire partly to gather…[Read more]

Scott Phillips and Justin Marceau add a new layer to our understanding
of the role of race in the administration of capital punishment. In so doing,
they join a very small but hopefully expanding body of literature that is
shifting our focus to the act of execution itself.’ Indeed, the body of complex
studies of the administration of capital…[Read more]

Anthony Amsterdam urged litigators and scholars to focus on
individual prosecutors’ offices or counties and to identify “a set of local
institutions, conventions, and practices which are manifestly the
residues of classic Southern apartheid”; to “conduct analyses of the
impact of race in the sentencing patterns … in those specific…[Read more]

It is often stated that the Fair Housing Act of 1968, the last of the great
civil rights laws from the 1960s, was “fast-tracked” after the brutal
murder of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4, 1968.1 The late
Massachusetts Senator, Edward Kennedy, who was a senator at the time,
wrote the following of the law’s passage:

On April…[Read more]

In this Article, I will focus on the appointment of Louis D.
Brandeis to the United States Supreme Court as a significant landmark
in the history of the federal judiciary. I explore this topic initially
through a comparison of President Woodrow Wilson’s 1916
appointment of Louis Brandeis with President Lyndon Johnson’s
appointment of Thurgood…[Read more]

When the Modern Games began in 1896, women did not compete.5
The founder of the modern Games adamantly opposed female competition
on the basis of a natural law principle it believed governed the role of
women. Its leadership held that female competition would violate “the
laws of nature” and would be “the most unaesthetic sight human…[Read more]

Darren Wilson’s shooting of an unarmed nineteen-year-old Black
man, Michael Brown, was the tip of an iceberg of racial
subordination and despair. The deep outrage over that shooting
displayed in the small town of Ferguson, Missouri,6 the nation,7 and
all over the world8 suggests that the shooting of Michael Brown was
more than an isolated…[Read more]

Critical Race Theory (CRT) emerged from two movements in legal
education. One was the Critical Legal Studies movement, which fostered
a power critique about American law and emerged at the University of
Wisconsin in 19771 and continued through meetings and scholarship until
about 1992.2 The second movement, which came to be known as…[Read more]

This article contends that the battle to preserve and place the
principles of Brown v. Board of Education’ at the center of the
quest for educational equality is more important than ever before.
Initially, this article notes that the United States Supreme Court’s
stewardship of Brown has been uneven, and the decision’s
precedential force has…[Read more]

President Trump’s border wall has evolved from an ambitious campaign
promise into a real opportunity to explore presidential versus Congressional
authority to determine how the president spends Congressionally
appropriatedfu nds. The president’s arguments that he has the power to
build the wall under either the National Emergencies Act or the…[Read more]

In her remarks to the 1971 National Women’s Political Caucus, civil rights
leader Fannie Lou Hamer described the quest for individual freedom as coextensive
with the pursuit of liberation for all people.2 Almost fifty years later,
this belief undergirds the work of the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo
movements. Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors,…[Read more]

The Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) is in a unique position to frustrate
the federal venue statute.3 In contrast to most state departments of
corrections, the BOP bears the unilateral power to transfer prisoners in its
custody to prisons across federal judicial districts. At times, the agency
exercises this power over prisoners involved in…[Read more]

As of November 12, 2020, at least 182,593 people incarcerated in American prisons, jails, and detention centers have tested positive for COVID-19; 1,412 incarcerated people have died.1 As the disease spread rapidly across the country (and world) in March 2020, public and prison health experts warned that jails and prisons could become incubators…[Read more]