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
MICHIGAN’S NEW POINT OF NO RETURN: EVOLVING AGE RESTRICTIONS ON MANDATORY LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE
By Chad Berryman, Volume 108 Staff Member In July 2022, the Michigan Supreme Court decided People v. Parks, in which it held that mandatory life without parole sentences for eighteen-year-olds convicted of first-degree murder violate the Michigan Constitution’s prohibition of cruel or unusual punishment.[1] This ruling…
GRISHAM FLEXES HER GUNS: HOW TO FIRE BACK AT STATE EXECUTIVE ACTION
By: Sam Black, Volume 108 Staff Member On Friday, September 8th, New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham issued an emergency order suspending the right to carry firearms in public across Albuquerque and the surrounding county for at least thirty days in response to a spate…
WHEN TOTAL DOESN’T MEAN COMPLETE: WHY COURTS SHOULD ADOPT THE STATE CREATED NEED THEORY
By: Dylan Schepers, Volume 107 Staff Member Introduction It was the black of midnight in mid-March 2020. Four police officers approached the front door of an apartment in Louisville Kentucky prepared to execute a drug-related search warrant.[1] Breonna Taylor and her boyfriend Kenneth Walker were…
STATE CONSTITUTIONAL A(MN)DMENTS: NOW IS THE TIME FOR THE MINNESOTA LEGISLATURE TO AMEND THE MINNESOTA CONSTITUTION WITH THE EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT
By: Evan Dale, Volume 107 Staff Member As the U.S. Supreme Court has retreated on its protection of individual rights,[1] state constitutions have taken on a renewed interest. This became as evident as ever in 2022. With the Supreme Court stripping the rights of women…
MIFPA WITHOUT ICWA: ASSESSING THE FATE OF THE MINNESOTA INDIAN FAMILY PRESERVATION ACT IF THE INDIAN CHILD WELFARE ACT IS OVERTURNED IN BRACKEEN v. HAALAND
By: Ryan Liston, Volume 107 Staff Member The United States and the colonies that predated it have a sordid past when it comes to the treatment of Indigenous people.[1] Among the countless examples of mistreatment, one particularly shameful practice was separating Indigenous children from their…
A TEST OF PRECEDENT, POLICY & HUMANITY: AN ANALYSIS OF FLORIDA’S PROPOSED EXPANSIONS TO STATE CAPITAL PUNISHMENT LAW
By: Adam Kolb, Volume 107 Staff Member The death penalty is primitive.[1] The death penalty is ineffective and garners increasing disapproval.[2] The death penalty—though constitutionally challenged and curtailed[3]—is legal in the United States.[4] Now, the extent of its legality is set to be tested yet…
THE CONFEDERATE STAKES OF AMERICAN LAW: THE PARTISAN RISK TO THE FULL FAITH AND CREDIT CLAUSE AND A CONSTITUTIONAL CRISIS IN THE MAKING
By: Jordan Boudreaux, Volume 107 Staff Member Article IV, Section 1 of the Constitution requires that “Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other state.”[1] Conceptually, the Full Faith and Credit Clause…
FREE SPEECH ON CAMPUS SIDEWALKS: SUPREME COURT MAY TAKE AIM AT FIRST AMENDMENT FORUM BALANCING TEST IN KEISTER
By: John M. Stack, Volume 107 Staff Member Keister v. Bell is the latest major case petitioned to the Supreme Court to confront classifying the status of a public forum for First Amendment purposes.[1] While the Court is unlikely to grant certiorari, if they do…
I (DON’T) KNOW IT WHEN I SEE IT: THE DANGERS OF DEEPFAKES
By: Ryken Kreps, Vol. 107 Staff Member[1] Deepfakes are images, videos, or audio clips created by artificial intelligence that show people doing whatever the deepfake creator wants to show them doing with eerie accuracy.[2] Part I of this Post discusses the background of deepfakes and…
HABITABILITY DEFENSE ON THE FRITZ: RENT POSTING REQUIREMENTS AND CHALLENGES IN MINNESOTA
Lucy Dougherty, Volume 107 Staff Member When tenants face an eviction for non-payment of rent in Hennepin County, they may have an affirmative defense to the eviction action if the landlord has broken the covenant of habitability.[1] The covenant of habitability is a statutory right…
