Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Posts Tagged ‘constitutional law’

Protecting minorities by empowering prosecutors?

In my new CNN.com piece I argue that we shouldn’t let anger over the Zimmerman acquittal shred the rights of criminal defendants: “awarding new powers to prosecutors will likely mean that more black people will end up behind bars.” [CNN](& Steele; thanks for Instalanche to Glenn Reynolds)

P.S. Some may wonder whether a toughening of hate crime laws might be an exception to the general rule that minorities have much to fear from a broadening of grounds for prosecution. Leaving aside whether the hate crime issue has any relation to the Martin/Zimmerman case (few lawyers believe Zimmerman could be found guilty of a hate crime, and when the FBI investigated him last summer it found no evidence of racial motivation; more on this from Michelle Meyer), per FBI statistics for 2011, blacks are actually overrepresented among persons charged with hate crimes, at 21 percent compared with 14 percent of general U.S. population.

Filed under: , , , , ,

“Bill of Rights a live wire, 222 years later”

At Utah’s Deseret News, reporter Eric Schulzke writes on how “the U.S. Bill of Rights remains a work in progress 222 years after it became law — a continuing struggle between government claims for order and security, and the individual’s interest in clarity and freedom. This past year, the struggle played out in numerous areas, including free speech and search and seizure rules, to touch just a few.” He quotes me on the hope of bright-line rules establishing the public’s right to take pictures of law enforcement (recent Hawthorne, Calif. cause celebre here), on the need to focus on state and local police use of DNA databases before the inevitable abuses establish themselves, and on how four significant Fourth Amendment cases made it to the Supreme Court this year: “‘Here we are 200 years later, and a lot of big, interesting questions still haven’t been settled on what the Bill of Rights says about search and seizures,’ Olson said.” A sidebar reviews the year in civil liberties controversies.

Filed under: , ,

Free speech roundup

  • Paleo-diet blogger wins a round in battle with North Carolina occupational licensing [IJ via Alkon, earlier here, here, etc.]
  • If you live in Connecticut or Montana, you have a U.S. Senator who’d go this far to trample rights [Volokh on Tester-Murphy constitutional amendment, earlier] Related: “In Attack On Commercial Speech, Law Professor Sadly Supports Selective Rights” [Richard Samp, WLF, on Columbia’s Tim Wu]
  • Lawyers sue publishers of medical literature for failing to warn about drug side effects [ABA Journal, Drug and Device Law]
  • “Anti-Bullying Bill Could Jail People Who Criticize Politicians” [Ted Balaker, Reason]
  • Regarding the L.A. Times: “So people are really suggesting a city council interfere to make sure a newspaper’s owners have the proper political views. Flabbergasting.” [@radleybalko]
  • “Judge: Rocker must pay Herald $132G in court costs for dismissed defamation suit” [Boston Herald] Second Circuit recognizes scientific-discussion defense to defamation claims [Science World Report]
  • “Does Freedom of Speech Conflict with Freedom of Religion?” [Jacob Mchangama video] “Turkish Blogger Sentenced to 13 Months in Prison for Criticizing Mohammed” [Volokh] So much repression: State Dept. International Religious Freedom Report for 2012 [executive summary]

Filed under: , , , , , , , , ,

Supreme Court and constitutional law roundup

Filed under: , ,

Disabled rights roundup

Filed under: , , , ,

Constitutional law and Supreme Court roundup

  • The 173rd, maybe? “This is not the first time [Linda] Greenhouse has misrepresented the views of her opponents” [Ilya Somin; more from ABA Journal on federalism argument against DOMA as supposed anti-federal-power “Trojan horse”] Was it improper for trial judge Vaughn Walker and appeals judge Stephen Reinhardt not to have recused themselves from Prop 8 case? Legal Ethics Forum bloggers weigh in [John Steele, Richard Painter, etc.] Funny graphic by Cato social media team about Cato’s “odd couple” joint brief with Constitutional Accountability Center [CAC] “Right and Left Continue to Change Where they Stand on Standing” [Ilya Somin] And if you’re going to be on Capitol Hill this Friday and are interested in the DOMA and Prop 8 cases, be sure to attend the panel discussion at which I’ll be joined by Ilya Shapiro and Mary Bonauto;
  • On courts’ role in advancing liberty [Roger Pilon exchange with Ramesh Ponnuru] Incidentally, Cato’s “Mr. U.S. Constitution” is now on Twitter at @Roger_Pilon; and he discusses Cato’s high-profile SCOTUS amicus program [here]
  • Cook County official has creative theories about federal supremacy [Illinois Watchdog]
  • Amicus brief: Congress can’t assert perpetual jurisdiction over anyone and everyone, and that goes for ex-sex offenders too [Trevor Burrus]
  • “What are the Weirdest Constitutional Arguments Ever Asserted in Court?” [Orin Kerr and Volokh readers]
  • As Court considers voting act in Shelby County case, Chief Justice Roberts sees problem with pretending it’s still 1965 [Ilya Shapiro; more on VRA, 2010 Abigail Thernstrom backgrounder, National Affairs]

Filed under: , , , ,

Supreme Court marriage cases: the week ahead

  • If you didn’t see my Saturday post previewing the DOMA and Prop 8 cases that reach the Supreme Court this week, I’ve now got a virtually identical version up at the Cato blog.
  • On Wednesday, immediately after the Court’s oral argument in Windsor, I’ll be moderating a panel at Cato with former Republican National Committee head Ken Mehlman (NPR profile), Freedom to Marry founder Evan Wolfson (BuzzFeed profile), and Cato’s Ilya Shapiro (AFF profile). Details and RSVP here. If you’re in DC, don’t miss it! If not, watch live online at www.cato.org/live and comment via #CatoEvents.
  • A collection of links on the cases is currently headlining the Cato website.
  • I’ll be speaking Wednesday evening about the cases before the Washington, D.C. chapter of Log Cabin Republicans. I also expect to be doing some national broadcast commentary — details to follow.
  • Last week I spoke at a panel in Cato’s social media series with Jimmy LaSalvia (GOProud) and Trevor Burrus (Cato) on conservatives and same-sex marriage, on topics that included the changing poll numbers and demographics. Aside from going through my analysis of November’s election results, I commented on various aspects of the debate such as the difference between civil and religious marriage (“the same as that between a birth certificate and a christening,” I like to say), the non-connectedness of the gay marriage and abortion issues (on which many others seem to agree with me), and the issue of religious exemptions (“As libertarians, we’re ahead of the curve in considering how anti-discrimination law can trample freedom of conscience.”) No video at the moment.
  • By coincidence, that panel happened to be scheduled against a crosstown event making the opposite case at the Heritage Foundation, which suffice it to say is at a very different place from Cato on this topic. On the question of using 11-year-olds to try to tear down other people’s families, by the way, Rob Tisinai at Box Turtle Bulletin has a nice pre-rejoinder to Heritage: “But Gracie, no one is trying to take one of *your* parents away.”
  • I couldn’t help noticing the following from a March 22 Clarus survey of U.S. voters:

    “Do you think each individual state should be allowed to decide whether same-sex couples can legally marry, or not?”

    Should 53%
    Should not 45%

    “Do you think same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry, or not?”

    Do 53%
    Do not 43%

    If these figures are to be credited, at least 6% of the voting public (and possibly much more) overlappingly believes both that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry, and that “each individual state should be allowed to decide” on that same question. I think it may be time for a refresher course in constitutional law.

Filed under: , , ,