Articles, Essays, & Tributes
Aiming for Answers: Balancing Rights, Safety, and Justice in a Post-Bruen America
By CHAD NOWLAN. Full Text. A foreword to the symposium issue of Minnesota Law Review volume 108.
Firearms Carceralism
By JACOB D. CHARLES. Full Text. Gun violence is a pressing national concern. And it has been for decades. Throughout nearly all that time, the primary tool lawmakers have deployed to stanch the violence has been the machinery of the criminal law. Increased policing, intrusive surveillance, vigorous prosecution, and punitive penalties are showered on gun…
Firearms and the Homeowner: Defending the Castle, the Curtilage, and Beyond
By CYNTHIA LEE. Full Text. In the spring of 2023, a series of back-to-back shootings shook the nation. A Black teenager in Missouri trying to pick up his two younger siblings went to the wrong door and rang the doorbell. The homeowner came to the door with a gun and, without saying a word, fired…
Age Restrictions and the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, 1791–1868
By MEGAN WALSH AND SAUL CORNELL. Full Text. The disproportional misuse of firearms by eighteen-to-twenty-year-olds has long been a problem in America. The concerns are not novel. Nor are legislative responses to this problem a recent development in American law. These limitations are deeply rooted in American legal history. While minimum age gun laws routinely…
Scientific Context, Suicide Prevention, and the Second Amendment After Bruen
By ERIC RUBEN. Full Text. The Supreme Court declared in New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n v. Bruen that modern gun laws must be “consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation” to survive Second Amendment challenges. Scholarship has shown how this test of historical analogy presents difficulties because of how technological, legal,…
Trouble’s Bruen: The Lower Courts Respond
By BRANNON P. DENNING AND GLENN H. REYNOLDS. Full Text. New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n v. Bruen revolutionized the understanding of how Second Amendment cases are to be adjudicated. Rejecting the tiered-scrutiny analysis around which the lower courts had coalesced since the 2008 Heller decision, the Court instructed courts to look to history…
The Second Amendment’s Racial Justice Complexities
By DANIEL S. HARAWA. Full Text. The relationship between the Second Amendment and racial justice is complicated. That’s because the relationship between pe- nal administration and racial justice is complicated. The briefing in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen perfectly proves this point. A group of public defenders favored striking down New…
Notes
Answering the Call: How Reconfiguration of the Nation’s Mental Health Crisis Call Line Can Facilitate Reimagination of Community Well-Being and Public Safety
By LUCY CHIN. Full Text. When the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline went live in Summer 2022, communities across the country began to confront the question of how this new, expanded behavioral health resource would integrate into the country’s preexisting, emergency response systems. The program seemed to promise the solution to an increasingly visible problem—as…
The Mississippi River Basin Compact: A New Governance Structure to Save the Mississippi River
By JOHN STACK. Full Text. The Mississippi River is one of the most significant and yet one of the most imperiled water bodies in the United States. It faces a myriad of problems, from rampant pollution, widespread flooding, wildlife habitat loss, and considerable droughts. Indeed, this is a critical time for the Mississippi River. Fall…
States’ Obligation to Provide for Trans Youth: How Medicaid Requires (Most) States to Provide Access to Puberty Blockers
By GRACE WORCESTER. Full Text. Over the last few years, many states have endeavored to strip minor access to gender-affirming healthcare, and these efforts have seen considerable success. By the end of 2023, twenty-two states had enacted legislation that limits youth access to gender- affirming healthcare. In line with these efforts, many states have created…
Headnotes
Defining Common and Individual Issues in Class Actions: What a Reasonable Jury Could Do
Defining Common and Individual Issues in Class Actions: What a Reasonable Jury Could Do By Aaron D. Van Oort and John L. Rockenbach Full essay here. The distinction between common and individual issues is the single most important concept in the modern class action, and…
The Supreme Court’s Opinion in SEC v. Jarkesy Has the Potential To Be Extremely Destructive
The Supreme Court’s Opinion in SEC v. Jarkesy Has the Potential To Be Extremely Destructive By Richard J. Pierce, Jr. Full essay here. In this essay, Professor Pierce describes the legal framework within which the Supreme Court decided whether an agency could adjudicate a class…
Substance over Symbolism: Do We Need Benefit Corporation Laws?
BY CHENG-CHI (KIRIN) CHANG. Full essay here. Benefit corporation laws have gained traction as mechanisms to integrate societal and environmental objectives into business operations, yet they are arguably superfluous within the existing legal framework. The prevailing belief that corporations must prioritize shareholder wealth above all…
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
DIGITAL ASYLUM: WHAT CAN ONLINE SOCIAL GROUPS TELL US ABOUT THE CURRENT STATE OF U.S. ASYLUM LAW?
By: Cooper Christiancy, Volume 104 Staff Member In William Gibson’s 1984 cyberpunk novel Neuromancer, a dystopian technological landscape bounds social identity around lines of class, legality, and cyber-implants.[1] Neuromancer follows the trail of a washed-up antihero whose identity is structured around his interactions with “the…
PUBLIC HEALTH—1, ANTI-VAXXERS—0: WHY YOUR RELIGIOUS BELIEFS SHOULDN’T JEOPARDIZE OUR CHILDREN’S HEALTH AND SAFETY
By: Jessica Szuminski, Volume 104 Staff Member What’s more important: the right to freely practice religion, or the right of children to not die from deadly but eradicable diseases? The state of New York determined that the latter was more pressing on August 23, 2019,…
CRIMINAL PROCEDURE AT 30,000 FEET: FINDING A PROPER VENUE FOR CRIMES COMMITTED DURING AIR TRAVEL
By: Ryan Plasencia, Volume 104 Staff Member Commercial air travel is ubiquitous and essential to the American traveler. Indeed, in 2017 alone, United States citizens accounted for 632 million flight passengers.[1] Outside of the occasional delay or cancellation, the vast majority of these flights were…
GIVE ME YOUR TIRED, YOUR HUNGRY, WHO CAN AFFORD RENT: WHY THE PUBLIC CHARGE RULE IS ARBITRARY AND CAPRICIOUS
By: Mimi Alworth, Volume 104 Staff Member Since the late 1800s, the United States’ immigration policy has maintained that a foreign person seeking to enter the United States can be turned away if she is a “Public Charge.” The definition historically includes only the most…
HOUSING IS JUSTICE: THE MINNEAPOLIS RENTERS PROTECTION ORDINANCE IS A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION FOR CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM
By: Olivia Levinson, Volume 104 Staff Member A single interaction with the criminal justice system can permanently label someone a “dangerous neighbor” and unwanted in communities.[1] Over the summer of 2019, the Minneapolis City Council recently debated how criminal records can be a barrier to…
THE PATH IS CLEARED: A GROWING BODY OF CASE LAW UPHOLDS STATES’ REMOVAL OF NON-MEDICAL VACCINATION EXEMPTIONS; MINNESOTA SHOULD BE NEXT
By: Meredith Gingold, Volume 104 Staff Member INTRODUCTION So far in 2019, two events have taken place: (1) more than 1,200 cases of measles have been reported in the United States, in 31 states so far,[1] and (2) 20 states have introduced legislation to expand…
CARPENTER V. MURPHY: A REEXAMINATION OF THE CREEK NATION IN OKLAHOMA
By: Aron Mozes, Volume 104 Staff Member The pending Supreme Court case Carpenter v. Murphy[i] presents an intersection of the history, laws, and legislative actions surrounding the Creek Nation in Oklahoma, as well as a broader re-examination of the relationship between Native American tribes and…
NO LEG TO STAND ON: HOW THE FEDERAL CIRCUIT IMPROPERLY RESTRICTED THE APPLICATION OF THE COMPETITOR STANDING DOCTRINE TO PATENT CHALLENGERS WHEN ESTABLISHING ARTICLE III STANDING UPON APPEALING AN INTER PARTES REVIEW
By: Ryan Fitzgerald, Volume 104 Staff Member The Federal Circuit’s recent holding in General Electric Co. v United Technologies Corp.[i] increases the difficulty for competitors to challenge the validity of a patent in court after an adverse inter partes review (IPR) decision.[ii] An IPR allows…
A REGULATORY FUMBLE: THE CHANGING REGULATORY SCHEME SURROUNDING GAMBLING AND DAILY FANTASY SPORTS
By: Paul Strey, Volume 104 Staff Member INTRODUCTION On September 26, 2019, the National Football League formally announced that DraftKings would be the official daily fantasy provider for professional football.[1] The partnership allows DraftKings to use the official NFL logo, special highlight reels, and the…
SEVENTH CIRCUIT’S LEGAL PRUDISHNESS: INCORRECT DECISION IN TRAN CREATES A SPLIT
By: Zach Wright, Volume 104 Staff Member The Seventh Circuit decided Tran v. Minnesota Life Ins. Co. (“Tran”) in April of 2019.[I] Tran stemmed from a beneficiary’s claim for benefits under an ERISA-governed life insurance policy after their spouse died engaging in autoerotic asphyxiation.[ii] The court held…
