Articles, Essays, & Tributes
States as Shields
By LINDSAY F. WILEY. Full Text. State laws that aim to shield providers of reproductive health and gender-affirming care from the punitive actions of out-of-state officials raise thorny questions. Can the federal courts, Congress, or the Trump Administration require New York officials to enforce a Texas ban on abortion or gender-affirming care against a New…
AI Companions and the Lessons of Family Law
By CLARE HUNTINGTON. Full Text. Virtual friends and lovers powered by artificial intelligence are rapidly moving to the center of our emotional and social lives. Millions of people turn to AI companions every day for conversation, romance, sexual intimacy, therapy, and education. AI companionship holds promise, potentially reducing loneliness, supporting people without access to mental…
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: A Comparative Constitutional Analysis of Whistleblowing Speech, the Government’s Managerial Domain, and the Imperatives of Democratic Self-Government
By RONALD J. KROTOSZYNSKI, JR. Full Text. Since issuing its 1968 landmark decision in Pickering, which first recognized that the First Amendment protects government employees’ speech about matters of public concern, the U.S. Supreme Court has proceeded to whittle away First Amendment protections for government employees. The Justices have done so by adopting a series…
Securitizing the University
By MARYAM JAMSHIDI. Full Text. Since October 7, 2023, public and private actors have doubled down on efforts to securitize the American university. In large part, these initiatives aim to quash a vocal pro-Palestine movement that has become highly visible across U.S. campuses since October 7th. In targeting this group, these efforts have variously treated…
Notes
Bare Analysis: Prison Visitor Strip and Body-Cavity Searches and Federal Courts’ Insufficient Fourth Amendment Analysis
By TRISTEN LINDELL. Full Text. Strip and body-cavity searches are among the most egregious invasions of personal privacy that the government can impose. The Fourth Amendment, as interpreted by the Supreme Court, demands that courts thoroughly analyze these searches. Courts must consider not only the suspicion that warranted the search, but the way the search…
“Pollution Does Not [sic] Discriminate”: Louisiana v. EPA, Disparate Impact, and the Fight for Environmental Justice in a Hostile Climate
By NAOMI BRIM. Full Text. Human-induced climate change hurts people. Environmental burdens impact a person’s ability to live freely, in good health, and with loved ones. And in the United States, people in positions of political authority and decision-making—who are predominantly white and high-income—use the legal system to push environmental harms disproportionately onto low-income, Black,…
The Penalty Is Declined: The NFL’s Exclusive Streaming Agreements and the Limits of Antitrust Law
By WILLIAM HOLT. Full Text. The National Football League’s (NFL) decision to grant NBCUniversal’s Peacock streaming service exclusive rights to carry the 2023–24 wild-card matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Miami Dolphins signaled a major shift in the league’s media distribution strategy. Football fans that had long depended on free, over-the-air broadcasts for…
Headnotes
Commodification, Precarity, and Identity: A Review of Professor Bridget Crawford’s Taxing Sugar Babies
By TESSA DAVIS. Full text.
The Liminality of Transactional Relationships
By VICTORIA J. HANEMAN. Full Text.
Tax Talk and Taxing Sugar Babies
By BLAINE G. SAITO. Full Text.
John Roberts’ Supreme Court: The Triumph of Partisanship and Ideology Over Precedent
By DAVID SCHULTZ & JACOB BOURGAULT. Full Text.
Critical Curriculum Design: Teaching Law in an Age of Rising Authoritarianism
By RACHEL LÓPEZ. Full Text.
A Great American Gun Myth: Race and the Naming of the “Saturday Night Special”
By Jennifer L. Behrens and Joseph Blocher. Full Text. At a time when Second Amendment doctrine has taken a strongly historical turn and gun rights advocates have increasingly argued that gun regulation itself is historically racist, it is especially important that historical claims about race…
Refining the Dangerousness Standard in Felon Disarmament
By Jamie G. McWilliam. Full Text. To some, 18 U.S.C. 922(g) is a necessary safeguard that keeps guns out of the hands of dangerous persons. To others, it strips classes of non-violent people of their natural and constitutional rights. This statute makes it a crime…
“Proven” Safety Regulations: Massachusetts 1805 Proving Law As Historical Analogue for Modern Gun Safety Laws
By Billy Clark. Full Text. Concerned by the public health threats posed by certain firearms, the Massachusetts legislature enacts a law to set safety standards for firearms in the Commonwealth. Firearm dealers across the State, including some of the leading manufacturers of the day, not…
Curbing Gun Violence Under PLCAA and Bruen: State Attorney General–Driven Solutions to the Surging Epidemic
By David Lamb. Full Text. At the same time that the deadly toll of gun violence continues to grow in the U.S., now taking nearly 50,000 lives per year, federal lawmakers and courts have increasingly constrained government authorities’ tools for fighting the epidemic. Pursuant to…
De Novo Blog
IS THE GREEN NEW DEAL DEAD ON ARRIVAL? THE CASE FOR “JUSTICE-PROOFING” PROGRESSIVE CLIMATE LEGISLATION IN THE NEW ACB-ERA
By: Alexandria Dolezal, Volume 105 Staff Member On September 18, 2020, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died at age 87, after a long battle with pancreatic cancer.[1] Days before her death she communicated to her granddaughter that her “most fervent wish [was] that [she] not be…
GUILTY UNTIL EXPUNGED: HOW MINNESOTA’S PUBLIC RECORDS POLICIES NEEDLESSLY BURDEN RENTERS
By: Ashley Meeder, Vol. 105 Staff Member If you have $285 for a filing fee and 20 minutes to fill out a form in Minnesota, you can ruin someone’s life.[1] Filing an eviction complaint starts a legal battle, but renters are wounded before they even…
THE LAW DOESN’T CARE ABOUT YOUR FEELINGS: BEN SHAPIRO’S UNSUCCESSFUL FIRST AMENDMENT SUIT AGAINST THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA AND THE CASE FOR PUBLIC SAFETY-BASED SPEECH RESTRICTIONS
By: Alenah Luthens, Volume 105 Staff Member “Facts don’t care about your feelings” is conservative pundit Ben Shaprio’s trademark phrase.[1] And he’s right. Indeed, the phrase proved particularly true in Young America’s Found. v. Kaler where Shapiro’s free speech lawsuit against the University of Minnesota…
CONTRACTS AND COVID-19: DEFENDING NONPERFORMANCE WITH FRUSTRATED PURPOSE AS A SHIELD
By: Brice Michka, Volume 105 Staff Member As the United States trudged through the most grueling months of the COVID-19 pandemic, countless contracts were affected. Many sporting organizations, including the National Basketball Association, Kentucky Derby, NASCAR, Indianapolis 500, Major League Soccer, National Hockey League, and…
NBA PLAYERS PROTEST: WHY THEIR REFUSAL TO PLAY COULD PROVOKE LEGAL RAMIFICATIONS
By: Jason Leadley, Volume 105 Staff Member On August 23, 2020, police officers shot Jacob Blake, a 29-year-old Black man from Kenosha, Wisconsin, sparking protests.[1] Following the shooting, the Milwaukee Bucks decided not to take the floor in their Game 5 playoff matchup against the…
TAKING CARE: HOW THE LAW CAN INCENTIVIZE PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY IN AN AGE OF PANDEMICS
By: Nathan Webster, Volume 105 Managing Editor As the United States confronts the Coronavirus pandemic, experts are devoting considerable thought to discerning the best method for overcoming the crisis. While most overt discussions center on the ways medical science can help treat the disease,…
PRISONER’S DILEMMA? HOW THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT RESOLVED A JURISDICTIONAL ODDITY ARISING FROM FEDERAL HABEAS MOTIONS
By: Spencer Davis-Vanness, Volume 104 Staff Member In a recent case, Ralph Duke—prosecuted and convicted in Minnesota during the early 1990s as one of the state’s biggest-ever drug dealers—successfully challenged elements of his conviction under a habeas petition in federal district court in Wisconsin, where…
UNITED STATES V. NEWSOM: CALIFORNIA’S FIGHT AGAINST PRIVATIZED IMMIGRATION DETENTION
By: Natalie Feeney, Volume 104 Staff Member Private prisons have become a focal point of American criminal justice reform in recent years, especially in regard to solving the problem of mass incarceration.[1] According to data from 2017, the number of individuals incarcerated in privately-owned prisons…
CLIMATE CHANGE ISN’T MATERIAL?: HOW PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK V. EXXON MOBIL CORPORATION HIGHLIGHTS THE NEED FOR MANDATORY GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSION DISCLOSURES
By: Han Li, Volume 104 Staff Member Over the past three years, major climate disasters have cost the U.S. over $450 billion.[1] The rate of extreme weather events have doubled over the past five years, meaning these costs will only increase.[2] The threat is anything…
TAP A BUTTON, GET DENIED: UBER’S NONCOMPLIANCE WITH THE ADA
By: Carmen Carballo, Volume 104 Staff Member I. A CRASH COURSE ON UBER & SERVICE ANIMALS The basic idea behind Uber is simple — “tap a button, get a ride.”[1] With this simple concept, Uber grew from a small app-based company in San Francisco[2] to…
