Essentially Elective: The Law and Ideology of Restricting Abortion During the COVID-19 Pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic has put on full display the physical and doctrinal isolation of abortion from health care more generally. In early 2020, several states proclaimed that abortions had to be stopped or delayed for lengthy or indefinitely.
Pandemics, Risks, and Remedies
The coronavirus (“COVID”) pandemic exposed America’s brittle reliance on incarceration as means of promoting justice and social welfare. For each criminal detention site, a single prisoner infection ultimately threatened the entire institutional …
Education, Racial Legal Theory
Restoring Honor: Ending Racial Disparities in University Honor Systems
In student-led academic honor systems, students establish policies governing lying, cheating, or stealing (referred to as “academic misconduct”); adjudicate reports of academic misconduct among their peers; and determine appropriate sanctions..
Federal Courts, International Law
Transatlantic Perspectives on the Political Question Doctrine
On September 24, 2019, the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom (UKSC) unanimously invalidated U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s attempt to suspend (or “prorogue”) Parliament. The UKSC’s decision, R (Miller) v. Prime Minister (Miller/Cherry), was a …
Corporate Law
Designing Business Forms to Pursue Social Goals
The long-standing debate about the purpose and role of business firms has recently regained momentum. Business firms face growing pressure to pursue social goals and benefit corporation statutes proliferate across many U.S. states. This trend is …
Technology
Manipulating Opportunity
Concerns about online manipulation have centered on fears about undermining the autonomy of consumers and citizens. What has been overlooked is the risk that the same techniques of personalizing information online can also threaten equality. When …
Technology
Measuring Algorithmic Fairness
Algorithmic decision making is both increasingly common and increasingly controversial. Critics worry that algorithmic tools are not transparent, accountable, or fair. Assessing the fairness of these tools has been especially fraught as it requires …
Legal History
Colonial Virginia: Incubator of Judicial Review
What is the historical origin of judicial review in the United States? Although scholars have acknowledged that British imperial “disallowance” of colonial law was an influential antecedent, the extant historical scholarship devoted to the mechanics …
Corporate Law
Myopic Consumer Law
People make mistakes with debt, partly because the chance to buy now and pay later tempts them to do things that are not in their long-term interest. Lenders sell credit products that exploit this vulnerability. In this Article, I argue that …
Technology
A Right to a Human Decision
Recent advances in computational technologies have spurred anxiety about a shift of power from human to machine decision makers. From welfare and employment to bail and other risk assessments, state actors increasingly lean on machine-learning tools …
Constitutionalism in Unexpected Places
Before, during, and after the ratification of the Federal Constitution of 1787, Americans believed that they were governed under an unwritten constitution, a constitution that described an arrangement of power, confirmed ancient rights, and …
Self-Portrait in a Complex Mirror: Reflections on The Making of a Justice: Reflections on My First 94 Years by John Paul Stevens
Immediately after his death last year, Justice John Paul Stevens received a number of moving eulogies, several by former law clerks published in the Harvard Law Review, along with a tribute from Chief Justice Roberts..
Criminal Justice
Redefining the Relationship Between Stone and AEDPA
This Note challenges the current conception of the availability of federal habeas corpus relief for state prisoners claiming a violation of the Fourth Amendment. Since the Supreme Court’s 1973 decision in Stone v. Powell, federal courts have …
Antitrust, Corporate Law, Finance & Banking
The New Gatekeepers: Private Firms as Public Enforcers
The world’s largest businesses must routinely police other businesses. By public mandate, Facebook monitors app developers’ privacy safeguards, Citibank audits call centers for deceptive sales practices, and Exxon reviews offshore oil platforms’ …
Constitutional Powers, International Law
Congressional Administration of Foreign Affairs
Longstanding debates over the allocation of foreign affairs power between Congress and the President have reached a stalemate. Wherever the formal line between Congress and the President’s powers is drawn, it is well established that, as a …
Civil Procedure
Intervention
Ever since the late 1960s, many lower federal courts have interpreted the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to give outsiders broad rights to become parties to pending lawsuits. Intervention of this sort affects the dynamics of a lot of cases, …
Bound Electors
In a decision hailed as “a masterpiece of historical analysis and originalist reasoning,” the Tenth Circuit recently held that the Constitution prevents a state from binding its presidential electors to vote for the winner of the state’s popular …
Civil Procedure, Federal Courts
Colorado River Abstention: A Practical Reassessment
When duplicative civil suits proceed simultaneously in both state and federal court, a waste of resources is bound to occur. Nevertheless, the Supreme Court has maintained that federal courts must typically retain jurisdiction over such concurrent …
Criminal Law, State Law & Federalism
Statutory Federalism and Criminal Law
Federal law regularly incorporates state law as its own. And it often does so dynamically so that future changes to state laws affect how federal law will apply. For example, federal law protects against deprivations of property, but states largely …
Constitutional Powers, Jurisprudence Theory
Historical Gloss, Madisonian Liquidation, and the Originalism Debate
The U.S. Constitution is old, relatively brief, and very difficult to amend. In its original form, the Constitution was primarily a framework for a new national government, and for 230 years the national government has operated under that framework …