tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-72381952052224829502024-03-12T20:54:03.319-05:00Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil RightsTJCLCR is a student journal published by The University of Texas School of Law. This is the journal's official blog: your source for news and events related to the journal and to civil rights law in Texas.Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.comBlogger63125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-9823682443506616232013-03-25T12:42:00.002-05:002013-03-25T12:42:43.646-05:00Public Defense: Getting Better, but Still not Good Enough<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: Avenir-Book; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Avenir-Book;">Fifty years after <i>Gideon
v. Wainwright</i>, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/17/gideon-v-wainwright-anniversary_n_2896135.html"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">there's still
a lot of room to improve public defense</span></a>. Acknowledging that fact,
Travis County judges recently made a proposal for the creation an independent
office that would oversee the appointment of attorneys for indigent defendants.
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<span style="font-family: Avenir-Book; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Avenir-Book;">Under the current
system, judges decide which attorneys are qualified to handle indigent defense,
what level of case they're equipped to handle, and how much they and their
experts are paid—a process inconsistent with the independence required by the
ABA's guiding principles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; tab-stops: .5in 1.0in 1.5in 2.0in 2.5in 3.0in 3.5in 4.0in 4.5in 5.0in 5.5in 6.0in; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Avenir-Book; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Avenir-Book;"><a href="http://www.austinchronicle.com/news/2013-02-01/judges-want-to-overhaul-indigent-defense/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">Both lawyers
and judges worry about the inconsistency the current system creates</span></a>.
Different judges may offer different compensation for the same workload; when a
judge is known for refusing to offer extra compensation for extraordinary work,
there's an incentive for attorneys to push their clients into plea bargains.
Attorneys and judges have complain that the system is disorganized and lacks
oversight.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; tab-stops: .5in 1.0in 1.5in 2.0in 2.5in 3.0in 3.5in 4.0in 4.5in 5.0in 5.5in 6.0in; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Avenir-Book; font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Avenir-Book;"><a href="http://www.statesman.com/news/news/crime-law/judges-attorneys-debating-changes-to-public-defens/nW2gZ/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">However, some
attorneys have voiced concerns about the additional layers of bureaucracy the
proposed office would add, as well as the $500,00 annual price tag</span></a>.
The proposal also wouldn't so anything to address the disparity in funding for
defense and prosecution: Travis County spent $9.3 million for indigent defense
in 2011, whereas the 2013 budget includes over $34 million for the prosecution
of felonies and misdemeanors.</span></div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-2803717045774040722013-03-04T21:21:00.000-06:002013-03-04T21:21:12.597-06:00Beyond Standardized Tests: Legislators' Attempts to Revamp Texas K-12 Curriculum
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<span style="font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">With the advent of No Child Left
Behind, high stakes testing took root as a K-12 education policy enacted into
federal law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the past decade, many
groups have criticized the policy of using high stakes testing, which includes
President Obama’s Race to the Top program, to drive improved student
performance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Critics have asserted that
an education system rooted in student performance on standardized tests skews
the learning process toward rote memorization and away from critical
thinking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In addition, critics have
questioned whether standardized tests truly measure what a student has learned
and whether cultural or language differences among students may vary student
performance outcomes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<span style="font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Members of the Texas legislature
have filed bills during the current legislative session to reduce the amount of
standardized tests that K-12 students must complete.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Part of these initiatives stem from
complaints about the STAAR testing regime that replaced TAKS testing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The STAAR includes end-of-course exams that
are included in a student’s GPA in high school, a change from the earlier
testing regime.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Grading changes are only
a part of the change in statewide testing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The STAAR tests include more difficult questions overall.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<span style="font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<span style="font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">One might assume that the many
critics of high stakes standardized testing would welcome the proposed laws by
the Texas legislature to reduce the amount of tests given to students.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, these proposals have also included changes
in high school graduation requirements.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Currently, Texas has a “4 x 4” model that requires math, science,
language arts, and social studies in all four years of high school.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The proposed legislation would allow students
to choose electives to replace some of the “4 x 4” core classes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Proponents of these changes argue that a more
flexible curriculum would help students to begin taking classes to further
their career goals at an earlier stage in their education.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<span style="font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Some critics of the proposed
legislation assert that reducing graduation requirements overcompensates for
the rigidity of high stakes testing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While fewer high stakes standardized tests would arguably allow for a
well-rounded education system that rewards several types of learning and
skills, critics of the proposed laws assert that the ills of teaching to the
test can be removed while still keeping a rigorous curriculum at the high
school level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Enveloping curriculum
reform inside testing reform may have unfavorable consequences overall,
outweighing any benefits of reducing the weight of standardized test scores.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br /></div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-70913218585993267242013-02-27T12:26:00.001-06:002013-02-27T12:26:30.885-06:00Debate without Representation: How Borrowers have been Neglected in the Subprime Mortgage Conversation
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
It is no novel realization that
freedom of speech does not include a right to be heard by the government. Those
in government will only hear those who can hurt it or help it: terrorists and
moneyed interests. People without malice and money have virtually no
representation apart from the occasional benevolent politician who champions
their causes—occasionally. Some human rights movements have gained traction by
appealing to the civil rights and liberties this country champions. However,
oppression excluding the lower classes from opportunities for upward social
mobility does not get such traction. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
However, in the wake of the global
financial crisis, a sector of society used its free speech in Occupy Wall
Street protests, documentaries about foreclosures, and “town halls” held by
local, state and federal politicians, and demanded an end the exploitation
resulting from the financial disparity between borrowers and lenders. This
sector reached such a critical mass, that the federal government had to—at
least appear to—crack down on the moneyed interests they usually cater to. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
The “critical mass” sparked the
debate on mortgage reform, but among whom? The debate is between the government
and the moneyed interests. Who is representing those on whose behalf this debate
is supposedly being conducted? The benevolent politicians? A common thread
woven throughout the literature on how to guard against “subprime” mortgages
suggests not.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
This common thread is a call for a
rise in down payments. This call is problematic for several reasons. However,
most disturbing, is the fact that this “solution” for ending subprime mortgages
would result in less home ownership—an important investment for upward social
mobility—among those on whose behalf this debate is supposedly being conducted:
the people who lost their homes in the subprime mortgage crisis and whose
upward social mobility has been stifled, in part, through lack of access to
safe credit and safe investment. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Again, the government not listening
to the voices of non-moneyed interests is not a new phenomenon. However, this
is a harshly lit example, given (1) the government claims it is responding to
the concerns of those who do not constitute moneyed interests, and (2) the
concerns derive from the fact that these non-moneyed interests have no power
parity with the moneyed interests. More broadly, it is a much more direct
example of how the civil liberties this country cherishes—such as freedom of
speech—are far less potent when not coupled with the economic and social rights
this country largely eschews. </div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-55900173778836725282013-02-24T12:28:00.000-06:002013-02-24T12:28:03.901-06:00Profiting off Prisons: A New Threat to Due Process
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> In 1984, and
amid a wave of scandals concerning the overcrowding of prisons with
ever-increasing numbers of Drug War convictions, the United States began its
experiment with private incarceration. It began simply, with a minor contract with
the state of Tennessee to handle a prison in Hamilton County; the contract was
given to a then-unknown Corrections Corporation of America. The decision was
originally thought to be an innocuous one – after all, prisons have an
established history of using contractors to outsource basic administrative
tasks such as medical services and food preparation. From 1985 onward, private
prison corporations such as CCA and the GEO Group have expanded vigorously, entering
markets in several other states, all while championing a case of efficient
prison administration, cutting costs, and easing the budgetary burden of the
state legislatures.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This expansion has been, in large part, the
result of an extensive lobbying campaign that private corrections firms and
consultancies have employed to influence the preferences of both legislators
and the general public. From the perspective of CCA and GEO, these efforts have
been wildly successful. From 1990-2009, federal and state public prison
populations have doubled, whereas private prison operators have seen a </span><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-donnelly/private-prisons_b_1097667.html"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">17-fold increase</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> in the number of inmates given to their
charge. Advocates of privatization urge that such success is indicative of
state legislatures recognizing the apparent benefits of contracting out
corrections, but the </span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/19/us/19prisons.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">data is inconclusive</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> that efficiency gains made by the
public-private transition are very meaningful, if they exist at all. The
above-referenced link discusses a New York Times analysis of a University of
Utah study and subsequent state investigations that found that, in some cases,
private prisons save states only pennies per day in housing costs, and those
that do save meaningful amounts of money do so by engaging in a worrying
practice of only contracting for healthy inmates and providing fewer and
lower-quality medical and rehabilitative services.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Indeed, one cannot understand the staggering
growth of private prison contracts without acknowledging the substantial degree
of influence that private prison lobbyists exert on the legislative process.
From creating a labyrinthine series of </span><a href="http://inthesetimes.com/article/6085/ties_that_bind_arizona_politicians_and_the_private_prison_industry"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">“consultancies” and PACs</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> to influence lawmakers at every level of
the executive and legislative process, </span><a href="http://www.thenation.com/article/167216/arizonas-private-prisons-bad-bargain"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">funding the campaigns</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> of conservative and small-government
legislators, </span><a href="http://www.npr.org/2010/10/28/130833741/prison-economics-help-drive-ariz-immigration-law"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">drafting laws</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> that limit judicial discretion and
pursue incarceration even for minor infractions, to out-and-out </span><a href="http://publicampaign.org/reports/unholyalliance"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">corrupting judges</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">
to incentivize them to imprison for longer terms, private prison corporations
and their supporters at ALEC have created what some term a </span><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-w-whitehead/prison-privatization_b_1414467.html"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">prison-industrial complex</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">. The goal of this partnership between
those charged with maintaining the public safety and those that benefit from a
robust and thriving prison population? A seemingly endless chain of
incarceration, an increase in predictable profits, and the wearing down of
legal protections that frustrate their goals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Needless to say, a prison-industrial
complex – even if unintentionally – threatens the basic protections of due
process and fairness of trial upon which the entire criminal justice system
relies. The intersection of money and politics always creates, as it should, a
suspicion of impropriety – of those using nonpublic back channels and significant
resources to secure legislative concessions that would never have been allowed
if the subject of public spectacle. Private corrections is now a multi-billion
dollar industry, and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">some </i>of that
money finds its way back into the hands of those charged with maintaining the
integrity of the system upon which it depends. The perverse incentives for a
legislator to draft harsher sentencing guidelines, for a prosecutor to push for
less leniency, and for judges to give it are too apparent to ignore. Even with
regulatory safeguards, the economic and financial realities of private prisons
will corrupt.</span></div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-63404664365359501962013-02-10T22:57:00.000-06:002013-02-10T22:58:57.936-06:00China’s One-Child Policy: Gender Gap, Loopholes, and the Future When scanning the Asia-Pacific section of the New York
Times, more often than not the articles are focused on China and its booming
economy and population. China currently hosts the largest population in the
world, with an estimate of 1.3 billion people living within its borders. But
with a recent birthrate decline that puts it at one of the lowest in the world,
one article asks, “Will China have to abandon its One-Child Policy?”<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The One-Child
Policy was established in the late 70’s and many experts estimate that it has
prevented between 300-500 million births: a significant amount considering that
is enough unborn children to repopulate the United States. The Chinese
government cites the economic, social, and environmental benefits of a
controlled population, while various humanitarian organizations decry the rise
in abortions of female fetuses that has led many cities to make it illegal for
doctors to reveal the gender of a baby until it has reached the point of
viability. In a society where it is a son’s duty to take care of his aging
parents, most Chinese parents view it as an economic hardship to have a
daughter. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
One-Child Policy is not as all encompassing as most people think. Many families
in rural areas are allowed to have multiple children thanks to the demand for
extra labor on small family-run farms and a higher infant mortality rate as a
result of fewer modern medical facilities. Additionally, parents who themselves
are both only children are allowed to have two children if they so choose.
Families who have the finances and desire simply bypass the One-Child Policy by
taking the hefty fine that comes with having additional children.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>In a world
where countries like Japan and Germany are trying to incentivize couples to
have more children to support quickly aging populations, the long-term effects
of China’s unorthodox method of family planning through the legal system are
hard to foresee. In fact, when I taught in China many of my students came from
rural families and I was surprised to hear that most of them had already had one
or more siblings. However, when I asked them how they felt about the One-Child
Policy their overwhelming response was positive. When asked why they agree with
it most of them simply stated, “China is too crowded.”</div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-29097757857553516242013-02-03T16:15:00.002-06:002013-02-03T16:15:56.118-06:00DOD Women in Combat Policy Catches Up to Reality, but Gender Equality Remains Elusive
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<span style="font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Secretary of
Defense Leon Panetta and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin
Dempsey recently issued a memo purported to pave the way for more women to
serve in direct combat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The memo reversed
the 1994 DOD “Direct Ground Combat Definition and Assignment Rule” which
precluded women from serving in direct combat roles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The memo also opened military occupational
specialties (MOSs) previously open only to males to women.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Though the
memo has made headlines around the world it was behind the times.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was less groundbreaking and more
acknowledging reality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Women have been
serving in convoy guards and security forces for years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These roles, in everything but name, are
combat roles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More to the point, the
wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were a turning point in warfare.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are no more front lines.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All territories are in play.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More than 150 women have died in combat since
2001 despite DOD policy that women did not serve in combat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Despite the
fact women already serve in combat there remain some practical difficulties to
making it “official.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Perhaps the most
practical of concerns: body armor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
body armor typically used by U.S. Army soldiers consists of an Outer Tactical
Vest (OTV) and two Small Arms Protective Insert (SAPI) ballistic plates.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The plates are ceramic, very hard, and not
designed for even a little female comfort.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Maybe the acknowledgment by the DOD will allow them to purchase body
armor in both men’s and women’s sizes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Neither the technology of shaping nor the female form is a recent
development. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">The women in
the military conundrum began long before the 1994 rule.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One memo won’t be enough to put servicewomen
on an even plane with servicemen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Women
in the military remain in near-constant danger of sexual harassment, sexual
assault, and rape.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hopefully the memo is
the first step of a concerted effort to realize<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>gender equity in our armed forces, not merely equity in theory. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-52962215426253366412012-11-05T12:44:00.002-06:002012-11-05T12:44:45.043-06:00A White NBA Team: Automatically Suspicious?
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Minnesota’s NBA franchise, the
Timberwolves, have caught some flak early this season for the team’s racial
composition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The team is 70% white,
including four-fifths of tis starting lineup, in a league that is 93% black.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Civil rights leaders have complained that the
Timberwolves have intentionally constructed their roster to appeal to the
team’s predominantly white fan base. Minnesota’s best player, Kevin Love, is
the NBA’s most prominent American-born white player, though the core of the team
also includes white players from Spain and Russia. The Timberwolves’ general
manager, David Kahn, has defended the roster’s international composition, as
well as through the notion that the ultimate goal is to compose a team that
wins, regardless of color. <br /> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The Timberwolves should not have to
deal with accusations that their team is too racially skewed in one direction
or the other.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As Kahn asserts, the team
includes players from multiple countries, its starting shooting guard (Brandon
Roy) is black, and the team made lucrative free agent offers in the offseason
to black forwards Jordan Hill and Nicolas Batum, who accepted the contract’s
terms but whose original team exercised their right to match the offer and
retain him. Moreover, by indicting the team for trying to appeal to a white fan
base, the civil rights leaders are really indicting the intolerance of the fan
base, not the team.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Recent history does
not support that attitude.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>In 1995, the Minnesota Timberwolves
bucked years of traditional thought by spending its top draft pick on a high
school player (a practice since outlawed by the league), 7’0” black forward
Kevin Garnett.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Garnett spent a full
decade as the unquestioned face of the franchise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>During that time, Minnesota did not struggle
with complaints that the team was catering to a particular racial fan base, nor
did they struggle with low attendance figures. The reason is evident: Garnett,
now an NBA champion with the Boston Celtics, has been the Timberwolves greatest
player and only certain Hall of Famer. The team enjoyed great success and
notoriety with Garnett on the roster, and since he’s left, the Timberwolves
have not had one winning season.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
activists criticizing the Timberwolves should show more respect for the team’s
fan base and acknowledge that Minnesota is more likely trying to adhere to the
model that has, across all sports, proven most successful in raising attendance
and television ratings: if you win, they will watch.</span><span style="color: windowtext; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: #0400; mso-bidi-language: X-NONE; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: #0400;"></span></div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-87534055518973030052012-10-29T20:23:00.001-05:002012-10-29T20:26:11.769-05:00Baseball, Early Voting, Mom, and Apple Pie: According to Husted, One of These Does Not Belong<style>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">As
reported by the </span><a href="http://www.toledoblade.com/Politics/2012/10/20/All-Ohioans-votes-will-count-Husted-says.html"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">Toledo Blade</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">, Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted described a recent federal
court decision by the 6th Circuit to require Ohio to offer early voting to all
voters as an “un-American approach to voting.” Not unconstitutional, not
unauthorized, not difficult to manage, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">un-American</b>.
What in the world does he mean?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<a href="http://www.ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/12a0356p-06.pdf"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">Obama for America v. Husted</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">, the case he is referring to, is a battle in
the larger war that has taken place in the courts this election season over a
variety of new voting laws. In this case, President Obama’s campaign, and the
Democratic National Committee sued Ohio’s Secretary of State to block
enforcement of an Ohio law that allowed military and overseas voters to have
more in-person early voting opportunities than ordinary voters. Specifically,
only military and overseas voters were allowed to early vote in the three days
before the election. Ohio justified this policy by saying military families
face unique challenges in voting and that it was too difficult to administer
early voting for all voters during this period. The District Court concluded
that this law was a violation of the Equal Protection clause and granted an
injunction, which has since been upheld by the Sixth Circuit. The </span><a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/orders/courtorders/101612zr.pdf"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">U.S. Supreme Court</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;"> recently denied Ohio’s request for a stay of
this injunction. While the case matters for voters in Ohio, it is by-and-large
an election administration issue, which shouldn’t ordinarily rise to the level
of un-American activities. So, what is Mr. Husted’s problem?</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">Most
likely he means that the court decision intrudes on states’ rights to
administer elections without interference. While Mr. Husted may feel this way, there
is an extensive history of federal courts imposing their will on states when
states are not running elections in a constitutional way. While Mr. Husted’s
comments may rest on states’ rights ideology, he described the decision as an
“un-American approach to voting” not an un-American approach to election
administration or the treatment of states, which indicates that something else
is at work in these comments. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">Maybe he
means that what President Obama’s campaign is asking will result in a denial of
easy access to the polls by servicemen and women. It seems some military
organizations do believe this, as many expressed support for Husted. However,
as is clear from </span><a href="http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/litigation/documents/BriefforPlaintiffs-Appellees.pdf"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">OFA’s brief</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">, that isn’t at all what they want. What the plaintiffs sought in
this case was equal access to the polls for military and ordinary voters. The
plaintiffs did not want Ohio to end early voting in the 3-day period before the
election. Instead, they wanted to ensure that all eligible voters had the
opportunity to vote in that period. Though Mr. Husted could have reacted to the
decision by eliminating all early voting in the 3-day period, he instead
instituted limited hours early voting for all parties. However, the decision
was entirely Mr. Husted’s, so he can’t mean that the decision was un-American
because it denied early voting access to military families. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">The only
conclusion left is that Mr. Husted thinks early voting is in some way un-American.
While some consider early voting </span><a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/early-voting-reform-ticking-time-bomb_654876.html"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">dangerous</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;"> and many Republicans don’t like it for a variety of reasons, it
seems pretty out-there to suggest early voting is un-American. The general
consensus is that early voting creates more access to the polls and helps to
eliminate burdens for a variety of voters, which ultimately helps in effective
election administration. The typical </span><a href="http://www.thenation.com/blog/169284/ohio-early-voting-cutbacks-disenfranchise-minority-voters"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">early voter is more likely than an election-day
voter to be member of a minority group.</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;"> In a country with such a terrible history of voter suppression,
any policy that improves minority voter access with no impact on election
integrity should be implemented immediately. It is simply common-sense. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">So why
does Mr. Husted so disfavor early voting for non-military voters? While not
wanting to impugn the motives of an elected official of the great state of
Ohio, it seems that politics may lie closer to the heart Husted’s declaration
than he might have Ohio voters believe. </span><a href="http://www.brookings.edu/research/opinions/2012/05/01-race-elections-frey"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">Minority voters tend to vote for Democrats.</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;"> </span><a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/118684/military-veterans-ages-tend-republican.aspx"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">Military voters tend to be Republicans.</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;"> With other excuses eliminated, it seems only
one answer is left.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">Improving
access to the polls? That has been the direction of American history with
Americans from the American Revolution to the Civil Rights Movements fighting
and dying for access to the polls.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;">Opposing
easier voter access at all costs because you don’t like who votes? Now that
sounds un-American.</span></div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-29529470010907486822012-10-24T20:02:00.002-05:002012-10-24T20:06:24.156-05:00The Debate We're Not Having: National Security and Civil Liberties<style>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We live in an age where </span><a href="http://www.aclu.org/blog/technology-and-liberty-national-security/easily-abused-domestic-drones-raise-enormous-privacy"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">police chiefs are seeking funding to purchase drones for
domestic surveillance</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">, where </span><a href="http://openchannel.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/10/02/14187433-homeland-security-fusion-centers-spy-on-citizens-produce-shoddy-work-report-says?lite"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">fusion centers indiscriminately collect information about us
in mega-databases around the country</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">, and </span><a href="http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2012/10/appeals_panel_u.php"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Congress has granted the President the power to indefinitely
detain U.S. citizens</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> – all in the name of national
security.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It’s rather remarkable, then, that in Monday’s
Obama/Romney foreign policy debate – where we heard how everything from math
teacher shortages to Iranian centerfuges impact national security – there was
not one word about how civil liberties might affect our national security
policy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt;">The third </span><a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatches/globalpost-blogs/highway-2012/third-parties-debate-larry-king-stein-anderson-goode-johnson"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt;">party candidate debate –
hosted by Larry King</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt;">
the night after the last Obama/Romney debate <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>– <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>had a
much different tone, and included serious discussion about PATRIOT Act repeal,
cessation of drone strikes, and the status of civil liberties under the NDAA. Remarkably
– </span><a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/10/shift-alt-debate-meet-4-presidential-candidates-the-press-mostly-ignores/264032/"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt;">as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Atlantic’s</i> Conor Friedersdorf lauds</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt;"> – these candidates, “so
ideologically diverse” agreed that “civil liberties are being trampled on by
Democrats and Republicans.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Given the robust
discussion of the relationship between national security and civil liberties at
the third party candidate debate, the silence in the Obama/Romney debate is
even more striking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Perhaps, the silence is an extension of</span><span style="mso-field-code: " HYPERLINK \0022http\:\/\/www\.salon\.com\/2012\/10\/22\/obamas_kill_list_civil_liberties_abuses_democrats_dont_want_to_know\/\0022 \\t \0022_blank\0022 ";"><u><span style="color: blue; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> <a href="http://www.salon.com/2012/10/22/obamas_kill_list_civil_liberties_abuses_democrats_dont_want_to_know/">David Sirota's analysis</a></span></u></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> of DNC Chairwoman's Wasserman Schultz’s profession
last week that she had never heard of Obama's widely reported "kill
lists" (which were in the mainstream media as recently as </span><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/plan-for-hunting-terrorists-signals-us-intends-to-keep-adding-names-to-kill-lists/2012/10/23/4789b2ae-18b3-11e2-a55c-39408fbe6a4b_story.html"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">this week</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">) – </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">the predictable result of a political duopoly
that so fundamentally agrees on extra-constitutional national security and
civil liberties policies, that those policies are no longer permitted to be
part of any “serious” national political discussion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Do we live in an age
where the major political parties consider civil liberties and national
security inappropriate for serious discussion? I certainly hope not. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We, the people, must
stand together and demand some serious discussion on these issues, or pretty
soon, the </span><a href="http://gizmodo.com/5923980/the-secret-government-laser-that-instantly-knows-everything-about-you"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Department of Homeland Security will roll out its new
technology to scan our bodies with a molecular scanner from 164 feet away</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> – and we won’t have even made mention of our
concern.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">By Kali Cohn</span></i></div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-57815457841971260522012-10-21T10:59:00.000-05:002012-10-21T11:12:49.253-05:00The Future of Assault Weapons<style>
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<br />
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">During Tuesday’s Presidential Debate at Hofstra
University, a member of the audience asked what the candidates planned to do to
“limit the availability of assault weapons.”</span></div>
<div class="normal">
<br /></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">The question most likely referred to the shooting
this summer in Aurora, Colorado, where James Holmes used a Smith & Wesson
M&P15 semi-automatic rifle, along with a pistol, shotgun, and other
weapons, to attack people at a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Dark
Knight Rises </i>movie screening. 58 people were injured and 12 were killed,
including 6-year-old Veronica Moser-Sullivan. </span></div>
<div class="normal">
<br /></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">Holmes purchased all of his guns legally at
Colorado sporting goods stores. While assault weapons like the one Holmes
bought had been outlawed in 1994, the assault weapons ban expired in 2004, and
Congress declined to renew it. Holmes’ legally-purchased assault rifle was
capable of firing 100 consecutive shots; a deadly weapon designed for war
combat with power far beyond any conceivable non-military needs. </span></div>
<div class="normal">
<br /></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">Governor Romney reaffirmed his alignment with
conservative gun rights positions, and redirected the topic to automatic
weapons, instead of assault weapons: “I'm not in favor of new pieces of
legislation on guns and taking guns away or making certain guns illegal. We of
course don't want to have automatic weapons, and that's already illegal in this
country to have automatic weapons.”</span></div>
<div class="normal">
<br /></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">Fully automatic weapons are legal to own in the
United States, but are very tightly regulated by The National Firearms Act of 1934, the Gun Control
Act of 1968 and the 1986 Hughes Amendment. Under these regulations, only
automatic weapons manufactured and registered with the federal government
before 1986 can be bought, owned and sold, and purchasing one requires an FBI
background check. </span></div>
<div class="normal">
<br /></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">However, Romney had very little to say about
assault weapons, the original question topic. Instead, he mainly focused on the
idea that changes in culture are needed to reduce gun violence. He mentioned,
in particular, education and family structure. “We need moms and dads helping
raise kids wherever possible,” he said, and added that before having children,
people “ought to think about getting married to someone.” This was likely a
message to more conservative voters who believe that changing values about sex
and marriage, including tolerance for homosexuality, are the true causes to
larger problems in society, including violence. This point also helps resolve a
potentially serious issue for those that argue for more gun rights, by
reconciling support for more gun accessibility with an opposition to violence.
However, the evidence has not shown a connection between single-parent families
and gun violence. <i>See </i>Murnan, J., Dake, J. A. and Price, J. H. (2004), Association
of Selected Risk Factors with Variation in Child and Adolescent Firearm
Mortality by State. Journal of School Health, 74: 335–340. </span></div>
<div class="normal">
<br /></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">President Obama, on the other hand, did not take a
particularly strong position for more gun control. “We're a nation that
believes in the Second Amendment,” he said. And though he did mention the
Aurora shooting and supported getting “an assault weapons ban reintroduced,”
Obama also seemed more interested in non-regulatory approaches to reducing gun
violence such as education and “making sure we catch violent impulses before
they occur.”</span></div>
<div class="normal">
<br /></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">So returning to the original question on whether
much is being planned to reduce availability of assault weapons, the real
answer seems to be “very little, if anything,” under either candidate.</span></div>
<div class="normal">
<br /></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;">But what has gone mostly ignored in this
discussion is that availability of weapons may become a moot issue by the end
of the decade, as the internet and new technology increase access to deadly
weapons beyond what any regulatory approach may be able to keep up with. In
August, an engineer claimed to have printed a working gun using a personal 3D
printer. And a UT Austin Law student has been seeking funding for a
crowdsourcing project to make 3D gun printing easily accessible to anyone via
the internet. As 3D printers become inevitably cheaper and more sophisticated,
and eventually able to print metal objects affordably, even strict gun
regulations may become completely ineffective. It is worth exploring, then,
whether there may be any other effective approaches to reducing violence and
deaths from increasingly powerful, and available, weapons.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;"><br /> </span></div>
<div class="normal">
<span style="font-family: Bodoni; mso-bidi-font-family: Bodoni; mso-fareast-font-family: Bodoni;"><i>By Leonora Camner</i> </span></div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-25637281501822256212012-10-13T12:33:00.003-05:002012-10-13T12:33:55.357-05:00The Eyes of Texas Cannot be Blind to Race
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At The University of Texas we are reminded that we’re Texas
— what starts here changes the world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Currently, our school is making a Texas sized impact on affirmative
action admissions policies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In oral arguments
before the Supreme Court this week, UT’s policy to consider race as a factor
among those students who were not automatically admitted under the Top Ten
Percent Plan is being contested by Abigale Fischer, the petitioner alleging
that the policy is unconstitutional and violates the Court’s 2003 decision in<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Grutter v. Bollinger.</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </i> </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Engaging in
this constitutional debate requires the assumption that a rule forbidding all
consideration of race can even be enforced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Grutter</i> is overturned, will
schools be forced to engage in race-blind admissions?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a practical matter, this would require
negating all cues of racial identity to prevent admissions officers from being
influenced by race.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At a minimum,
applications could not have identifying information such as the student’s name,
their hometown, or their high school.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Involvement in extra curricular activities may even divulge racial
identity if the student was involved in a minority association, or community
service that might suggest an interest in helping one particular minority
group.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Redacting this identifying
information runs the risk of going further than making your admissions
race-blind because admissions officers will now also be blinded to extra
curricular efforts and holistic considerations or a student’s interests.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Furthermore,
admissions essays and personal statements would have to be eliminated
entirely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Universities ask students to
write essays describing someone who has made an impact on their life, or
discussing an issue of importance to the student.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These essays are designed to get to know the
applicant and understand their background, life experience and
perspective.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not surprising that
most students chose to write about their cultural upbringing because these are
the experiences that help forge a human being.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While race may not play a role in some people’s lives, for others race
is a particularly pivotal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Race cannot
be the only factor considered in admission, but race-blind admissions would be
completely impractical in today’s diverse society.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The Deans
of Harvard and Yale Law School recently joined in authoring an <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-race-matters-in-college-admissions/2012/10/05/4ae02056-0f0c-11e2-bb5e-492c0d30bff6_story.html">op-ed piece</a> in
the Washington Post where they agreed “that it is inconsistent with the dignity
of persons to consider only race, we firmly believe that it is equally
inconsistent with their dignity to refuse to hear what applicants have to tell
us about the role that race has played in their lives.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Higher education produces many of society’s
future leaders and role models.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is
essential that these leaders learn in an intellectually diverse environment
ripe with debate and multifaceted experiences.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Requiring law schools to turn a blind eye to race would not only be
impractical, but it would stifle free intellectual discussion among students
with varying cultures and experiences therefore doing a disservice to our
universities as well as out society. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-28567733979047455812012-10-07T10:21:00.002-05:002012-10-07T10:24:10.037-05:00Obama Winning Latinos in Spite of Poor Immigration Record<style>
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NPR recently reported that the Romney campaign has spent $11
million on ads targeting Hispanic voters—nearly 8 times the amount spent in the
last election on the same demographic. Why the new efforts to lure the Latino
vote? It’s a matter of margins really.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
According to most polls, Mitt Romney only trails Obama by an
average of 3 percent in the crucial swing states of Florida, Ohio, and North
Carolina. Though the overall election forecasts anticipate a close race, unless
something drastically changes in upcoming weeks there will be nothing close at
all when it come to the candidates’ share of Latino voters.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i>The Los Angeles Times</i> found that more than 70% of Hispanics
plan to vote for Barack Obama this November compared with 20% who favor Romney.
There are now 11 million registered Hispanic voters nationwide, and in a
neck-in-neck presidential race their votes may very well decide who sits in the
Oval Office next year.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The fact that Latino voters prefer Democrats isn’t exactly
breaking news. No one was surprised by the “Latino’s for Obama” hats that speckled
the audience of the Democratic National Convention. What is surprising is the
Obama administration’s policy towards illegal immigrants—a key issue for many
Latino voters—seems to defy the kind of support Latino voters give the
President.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Over the last 4 years the Obama administration has deported
roughly 1.4 million illegal immigrants, a pace which, if sustained, will put
him on track to nearly double President Bush’s deportation number of<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>2 million in 8 years. The most recent
Democratic president, Bill Clinton, deported only 869,676 in 8 years. Barring
some change in the administration’s policy towards illegal immigrants, if Obama
is reelected, his presidency will deport more illegal immigrants than any
administration in U.S. history. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Obama’s deportation statistics raise some interesting
questions about the Latino vote and about demographic voting trends in general.
With an administration that is more hostile than ever to illegal immigrants—allegedly
a key issue for Latino voters—why does Latino support for the Democratic Party
seem to be as fervent as ever? Are Latino voters simply unaware of these
statistics or are there other issues that supersede immigration concerns?<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Part of the problem might by the fact that Mitt Romney’s has
no clear policy on immigration, making it impossible to compare his and
President’s plans side by side. For now it is sufficient to say that despite
Obama’s schedule to surpass the deportation numbers of any President in
history, Latino Americans appear ready to give him their vote, and theirs is
the vote that looks like it will determine the presidency.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<i></i>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-63837143250350172202012-10-02T10:19:00.001-05:002012-10-02T15:57:45.490-05:00Shark Attacks and Voter Fraud<div style="text-indent: 36pt;">
Have you heard the one
about voter fraud in Florida? This past March, the executive director
of the ACLU of Florida claimed that although the state needed to pass
its voter id law to prevent voter fraud, there were “probably a larger
number of shark attacks in Florida than there are cases of voter fraud.”
PolitiFact (our fav!) compiled<a href="http://www.politifact.com/florida/statements/2012/mar/02/aclu-florida/shark-attacks-are-more-common-voter-fraud-florida/"> a chart</a> using data from the Florida Department
of State, which monitors elections, and the Florida Museum of Natural
History in Gainesville, which monitors shark attacks. </div>
<div style="text-indent: 36pt;">
Over the last four years,
there have been 49 instances of voter fraud and 72 instances of shark
attack (specifically, shark-on-human violence). Note: voter fraud here
includes cases “deemed legally sufficient for an investigation by
the Florida Department of Law Enforcement,” but none of them is presupposed
proven; also, some "cases" may represent multiple counts of
voter fraud, and the number of cases does not include cases investigated
by local supervisors and state attorneys. </div>
<div style="text-indent: 36pt;">
So, in short, we can’t
draw a clear conclusion from these numbers. But wait a minute—this
is ludicrous, isn’t it? I mean, who even cares about the shark attack
analogy (apologies to those attacked)? Look again at that number of
instances of voter fraud in Florida over the past 4 years. 49? In 2010,
there were nearly 8 million voting-age, registered voters in Florida
and <a href="http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/cats/elections/voting-age_population_and_voter_participation.html">5.5 of them voted in the 2010 election</a>.
In that same year, there were <a href="http://www.politifact.com/florida/statements/2012/mar/02/aclu-florida/shark-attacks-are-more-common-voter-fraud-florida/">10 instances</a> of voter fraud “deemed
legally sufficient for an investigation by the Florida Department of
Law Enforcement.”</div>
<div style="text-indent: 36pt;">
But let’s not pick on
Florida. Other states are passing voter id laws, which supporters claim
are necessary to thwart voter fraud. PolitiFact has <a href="http://www.politifact.com/georgia/statements/2012/sep/19/naacp/-person-voter-fraud-very-rare-phenomenon">another great article</a>
on a News21 “analysis of 2,068 cases alleging election fraud.” </div>
<div style="text-indent: 36pt;">
News21’s nationwide
investigation took 7 months and the results were released this August.
The investigators “sent records requests to elections officers in
all 50 states seeking every case of fraudulent elections activity, including
registration fraud, absentee ballot fraud, voter impersonation fraud
and casting an ineligible vote” for the past 12 years. </div>
<div style="text-indent: 36pt;">
It’s important to note
here that the investigators asked for and received information about
several types of fraudulent activities but then narrowed their focus
to the fraud “that voter ID laws are intended to prevent. The News21
team defined that type of fraud as that involving individuals who vote
in person on Election Day by impersonating another registered voter.”
They then went on to compare that particular type of fraud to the remaining
types. “After compiling all the information into an election fraud
database, News21 found that 207 cases of other types of election fraud
existed for every case of voter impersonation.” Wait…what? </div>
<div style="text-indent: 36pt;">
Of course, the News21
analysis has been challenged: “by stating that voter impersonation
is the only type of election fraud that voter ID laws could prevent,
the News21 report was result-driven, attempting to prove that voter
ID is not necessary.” Perhaps that’s true to some extent, but “News21
defends its work as ‘substantially complete’ as the largest collection
of election fraud cases gathered by anyone in the country.” <a href="http://votingrights.news21.com/article/election-fraud-explainer/">News21 analysis</a> itself</div>
<div style="text-indent: 36pt;">
In any case, it does bring
up a great point about fraudulent activity regarding elections. If we’re
so concerned with it, shouldn’t we be targeting those instances of
fraud that are, in fact, so much easier to accomplish? </div>
<br />Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-78689906271445318992012-03-25T11:48:00.000-05:002012-03-25T11:48:59.738-05:00Roundup: What Are People Saying About H.R. 347<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Earlier this month, Obama signed H.R. 347 into law after it received an overwhelmingly positive vote in Congress. The bill is officially called the Federal Restricted Buildings and Improvement Act of 2011. You can read the text of the law <a href="http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr347/text"><span style="color: #1155cc;">here</span></a>. Controversially, the law permits criminal prosecution of whoever “knowingly enters or remains in any restricted buildings or grounds without lawful authority.” The law defines “restricted building or grounds” as the White House, the Vice President’s official residence, any building where a “person protected by the secret service is or will be temporarily visiting,” and, most alarmingly, any place designated as the location of “a special event of national significance.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
These last two clauses, while likely facially constitutional, potentially allow government officials the authority to capriciously disperse any protest. Virtually any protest held in Washington D.C. could be dispersed on the basis that a Senator may intend to visit the grounds in the near future. Furthermore, could pro-life groups be forbidden to protest outside the venue of a speech of a prominent pro-choice advocate on the basis that his speech is an event of national significance?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Representative Justin Amash, one of only three “nay” votes in the House, wrote on <a href="http://www.facebook.com/repjustinamash/posts/326045414119502"><span style="color: #1155cc;">Facebook</span></a>: “Current law makes it illegal to enter or remain in an area where certain government officials (more particularly, those with Secret Service protection) will be visiting temporarily if and only if the person knows it's illegal to enter the restricted area but does so anyway. The bill expands current law to make it a crime to enter or remain in an area where an official is visiting even if the person does not know it's illegal to be in that area and has no reason to suspect it's illegal.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The broad language of the bill has been attacked in the media by the left and the right. Slate has advised readers not to believe government officials who defend the anti-protest bill as a “<a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;">small</span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;">tweak</span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;">of</span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;">the</span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;">existing</span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;">law</span></a><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2012/03/the_anti_protest_bill_signed_by_barack_obama_is_a_quiet_attack_on_free_speech_.html"><span style="color: #1155cc;">.</span></a>” Judge Napolitano, writing for Fox News asked “<a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">Can</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">the</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">Secret</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">Service</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">tell</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">you</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">to</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">shut</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">up</span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/15/can-secret-service-tell-to-shut-up/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">?</span></a>” and concluded that the legislation denied protesters the First Amendment guarantee of “useful” political speech.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Eugene Volokh has offered a <a href="http://volokh.com/2012/03/16/the-federal-restricted-buildings-and-grounds-improvement-act-of-2011/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">muted</span></a><a href="http://volokh.com/2012/03/16/the-federal-restricted-buildings-and-grounds-improvement-act-of-2011/"><span style="color: #1155cc;"> </span></a><a href="http://volokh.com/2012/03/16/the-federal-restricted-buildings-and-grounds-improvement-act-of-2011/"><span style="color: #1155cc;">defense</span></a> of the bill. Volokh offers in the law’s defense that it applies only to those who knowingly enter and remain in a restricted building - those who accidentally enter a restricted area are protected from prosecution. He also points out that the most offensive provisions of the law are only slightly changed restatements of the existing <a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1752"><span style="color: #1155cc;">18 </span></a><a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1752"><span style="color: #1155cc;">U</span></a><a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1752"><span style="color: #1155cc;">.</span></a><a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1752"><span style="color: #1155cc;">S</span></a><a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1752"><span style="color: #1155cc;">.</span></a><a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1752"><span style="color: #1155cc;">C</span></a><a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1752"><span style="color: #1155cc;">. § 1752</span></a></span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">, which was made into law in 2006. Volokh states that “the law has been in place for six years, through two administrations, without (to my knowledge) a vast amount of abuse.” However, even Volokh admits that “perhaps the reference to “special event of national significance” is too vague. . . . [and p]erhaps there are ways to let the Secret Service do its job while that would still robustly protect speech. . . .”</span><span style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-51001666730635537972012-03-25T11:46:00.000-05:002012-03-25T11:46:02.450-05:00Martinez v. Ryan: Monstrosity or Mouse?<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">This week the Supreme Court issued its opinion in <i><a href="http://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=8494154171579696403&hl=en&as_sdt=2&as_vis=1&oi=scholarr">Martinez v. Ryan</a></i>. By a 7-2 vote, the court held that: <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Where, under state law, ineffective-assistance-of-trial-counsel claims must be raised in an initial-review collateral proceeding, a procedural default will not bar a federal habeas court from hearing those claims if, in the initial-review collateral proceeding, there was no counsel or counsel in that proceeding was ineffective.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Previously, a claim that has been defaulted by a state court cannot be raised in federal habeas, absent a narrow exception for situations that were external to the inmate—of which attorney error was not one. In so holding, the Court explicitly refused to answer the question that it had actually granted certiorari on, which was whether there is a right to the effective assistance of counsel in an initial review habeas corpus proceeding—that being a proceeding in which a specific claim cannot be raised at any prior time. While the Court’s narrow holding did not provide a new right, it does provide a potential remedy for inmates receiving ineffective assistance of post-conviction counsel.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">While criticizing the majority decision, dissenting Justice Scalia labeled the decision a “monstrosity”, and lamented the major impact that the ruling would have on both the states and the court system. Post <i>Martinez</i>, he argues that states would be insane to not provide inmates with post-conviction counsel, because a failure to do so acts as a free pass to federal habeas. His is also distressed with the amount of time that courts will have to dedicate to this new issue.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">But, is this an accurate view of the impact of <i>Martinez</i>? For all practical effect, a close reading of the opinion reveals that it may have limited practical scope. By not creating a right to post-conviction counsel, most inmates in non-capital cases will still proceed <i>pro se</i>. Claims of ineffective assistance of counsel, as noted by the majority, are nearly impossible to establish without the benefit of an attorney. So, now inmates without counsel may be able to bring a claim that would be previously defaulted, but the chance that they will be able to establish it is slim. Those that do receive counsel for their post-conviction claims still face a nearly impossible burden. They will have to be able to establish that both their trial counsel and post-conviction counsel provide ineffective assistance under the standard outlined in <i><a href="http://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=16585781351150334057&q=Strickland+v.+Washington&hl=en&as_sdt=3,44">Strickland v. Washington</a></i>. This requires both establishing deficient performance and prejudice, and is a difficult burden to meet even one, let alone twice.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>Martinez</i> poses an number of interesting questions going forward, but it appears that while it will, at the very least, result in a pleading revolution based upon this new remedy, the practical effect may be slight. Only time will tell.</span><o:p></o:p></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-30249435942607159492012-03-25T11:39:00.000-05:002012-03-25T11:39:34.984-05:00Does Mad Men get it right?<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No one can deny that <i>Mad Men</i> is one of the best television shows of the past decade. Still, although I’ve seen many episodes, I could never really get into it. Every time I watched <i>Mad Men</i>, I found myself boiling with an inexplicable sense of indignation. Perhaps this feeling was partly induced by the rampant racism, sexism, and ethnocentrism that are so central to the show’s story. And perhaps I simply couldn’t relate to any of the characters. But what really makes me uncomfortable is that the show’s portrayal of the 1960s is – to a large extent – realistic. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In an online discussion for the <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2010/07/25/mad-men-a-conversation-about-the-new-season/">Wall Street Journal’s Speakeasy blog</a>, Former Solicitor General Walter Dellinger reported finding parallels between <i>Mad Men</i> and his early days in law. He was particularly struck at how well the show demonstrates the prevalence of daytime drinking as well as how it deals with changing gender roles on the 1960s. In addition, Dellinger mentioned in an interview with <a href="http://www.law.com/jsp/tal/PubArticleTAL.jsp?id=1202543063455&Maddeningly_Real=&et=editorial&bu=The%20American%20Lawyer&cn=Am_Law_Daily_20120319&src=EMC-Email&pt=Am%20Law%20Daily&kw=%20From%20the%20March%20issue%20of%20The%20American%20Lawyer%3A%20Maddeningly%20Real&slreturn=1">American Lawyer</a> that “<i>Mad Men</i> also shows a 1960s world of closeted homosexuality and casual anti-Semitism, and gets those just right, too.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Dellinger is obviously a huge fan. However, he does concede that “[t]he most serious criticism of the show is that while it takes a stance of disapproving of the benighted ways of that era, it also undeniably takes great pleasure in portraying them.” This criticism explains my biggest problem with <i>Mad Men</i>. In many ways, it’s written is such a way as to idealize the 1960s, and it does not do enough to demonize the social inequalities that were so prevalent during that era. Every time I watch the show, I feel compelled to smoke, drink, and treat women as inferior beings. While I’m kidding about the latter of these, the show does have the potential to make viewers complacent with the economic, social, and cultural environments of the 1960s.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">On the other hand, considering how realistic <i>Mad Men</i> actually is, it does highlight how far we’ve come in the area of civil rights. This is not to say, of course, that we still don’t have a long way to go. But it does show progress and may even educate those who were unaware of how large the gap actually was. While watching <i>Mad Men</i> may occasionally disrupt my moral compass, I do realize that we no longer live in the 1960s. The last fifty years has brought some extraordinary changes in civil rights jurisprudence. And while I am ecstatic to see these changes, I must admit that I am bit disappointed about letting go of the age-old tradition of day drinking. </span><o:p></o:p></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-19833926192042643882012-03-25T11:35:00.000-05:002012-03-25T11:35:57.499-05:00The Conscientious (Patriotic) Objector<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Ask anyone close to Lt. Col. Couch and they will tell you how perfect a fit the Marines are for him. Lt. Col. Couch is a devout Anglican who holds religion central to many of his beliefs. “[On my moral compass], my magnetic north points to Christ.” A firm pro-life advocate, he believes that “millions have been murdered by the hands of abortion.” He carries over his respect for human life to his military dealings – while soldiers are engineered to kill, they must still follow a certain code of ethics. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Mohamedou Ould Slahi, known at Guantanamo (GITMO) as Detainee # 760, had allegedly steered Ramzi bin al-Shibh and three of the 9/11 terrorist hijackers, Mohammed Atta, Ziad Jarrah, and Marwan al-Shehi, to Osama bin Laden. Bin al-Shibh was one of the mastermind planners behind the attack. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">In August of 2003, Couch accepted a lead prosecuting role and was assigned a post in the Office of Military Commissions in Arlington, Virginia. There he was given files on several Guantanamo detainees, <a href="http://online.wsj.com/google_login.html?url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB117529704337355155.html%3Fmod%3Dgooglenews_wsj">one of which was Detainee # 760</a>. <u><span style="color: blue; mso-themecolor: hyperlink;"><o:p></o:p></span></u></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Tired of analyzing case summaries through a bureaucratized web of politics, Couch made his first visit to Guantanamo in October of 2003. His own case on Slahi pointed to some fishy behavior. After a few difficult months, Detainee #760 had repeatedly refused to give in to interrogation tactics. Then mysteriously, he started spilling.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">“After a while, I just couldn’t keep up with him because things were coming out every day. He was giving like a ‘Who’s Who’ of al Qaeda in Germany and all of Europe.” Couch was confused. “I’ve got in the back of mind what I had seen on that first trip. And I’m thinking, okay, why is he being this prolific? What’s going on? You know, is it physical coercion?”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">A colleague hinted to Couch that interrogation methods used on Slahi had been elevated. He had been moved on to the “varsity program,” the nickname given to the Special Interrogation Plan authorized by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for the so-called stubborn detainees. As Couch dug deeper, he corroborated his initial suspicions. This is what he found.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">When Slahi was being relocated to Guantanamo, he was thankful, “this is America not Jordan, and they are not going to beat you,” he expressed at his detention hearing.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Around May of 2003, just about the time when Detainee # 760 was spilling a great deal of information, Slahi was exposed to what Couch believes to be torture. Not-so-coincidentally the recording equipment began to malfunction when Slahi reports to have been beaten, exposed to extreme temperatures, and abused sexually.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">“I was very hurting,” states Slahi’s diary, “for my hands were locked to the floor and I could not stand. Mary was touching me with her sexual parts all over and talking dirty. I am not willing to talk in details about that ugly happen.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">For the next few months, he was physically and psychologically threatened. On July 17, 2003, a masked interrogator mentioned to Slahi that he had had a dream about detainees digging some graves. In the dream, he recalled “a plain, pine casket with [Mr. Slahi’s] identification number painted in orange [being] lowered into the ground.”<a href="file:///C:/Users/A123/Downloads/Case%20Study,%20Lt%20Col%20Couch,%20journal%20(1).docx#_edn1" name="_ednref1" title=""><span class="MsoEndnoteReference"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoEndnoteReference">[i]</span><!--[endif]--></span></a> The same interrogator three days later falsely informed Slahi “that his family was ‘incarcerated.’ ”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Slahi was often threatened for his life. Next, Slahi was taken to a physician, a “doctor who was not a regular doctor [but] part of the team,” he distinctively recalls. “He was cursing me and telling me very bad things. He gave me a lot of medication to make me sleep.” He tolerated for a few weeks but could take it no longer – he broke: “…because they said to me, either I am going to talk or they will continue to do this.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Couch stopped digging. “For me, that was just, enough is enough. I had seen enough, I had heard enough, I had read enough. I said: ‘That’s it.’ ”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">A debate ensued May of 2004 between Colonel Couch and his then-superior chief-prosecutor Army Colonel Bob Swann. Couch had made it clear that he was morally against the techniques and methods being used at Guantanamo and therefore was refusing to partake in the prosecution of any detainees at GITMO. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">When Couch asked Swann to cite legal precedent excusing the 1994 treaty’s mandate over methods of torture, <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=u.n.%20convention%20against%20torture.%20%E2%80%9Ccat%20requirements%20concerning%20the%20criminalization%20of%20torture.%E2%80%9D%20congressional%20research%20service%2C%20order%20code%20rl32438&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CCQQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffpc.state.gov%2Fdocuments%2Forganization%2F101750.pdf&ei=j3NmT_2hOtHIsQLTmYG2Dw&usg=AFQjCNH1-SRfY56PORMcTeor-xGiN4SzKg&sig2=Ig0VYIkzcWJ3n8htWlJcww">he was immediately asked to hand over Slahi’s files</a>. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Although Couch was taken off Slahi’s case, he continued his prosecution of other high-profile detainees.</span></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-49029285663647450582012-03-12T14:23:00.002-05:002012-03-12T14:23:20.392-05:00The Iron First Holds Flowers<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Across the world, authoritarian leaders worry that Arab Spring fever will infect their citizenry. In an effort to inoculate themselves against the ire of democracy-seeking public, many leaders are finding utility in tightly-controlled elections—allowing them to legitimize their governments with referendums and contests whose outcomes are pre-ordained. <span style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In Syria, elections were used a tool to quell uprising against President Bashar al-Assad’s increasingly brutal and repressive regime. In the midst of a civil war that (<a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/syria/story-e6frg6so-1226283528915">by some reports</a>) has left over 7600 civilians dead, Assad’s government proposed a new draft of the Constitution. Facially, the proposal provided for the establishment of opposition parties, while still leaving the chief executive with broad-ranging and largely unchecked powers. On February 26, 2012, the same day in which at least 59 civilians were killed, state-sponsored media reported 57% of voting-eligible Syrians went the polls to vote on the proposed constitution—which passed with almost 90% affirmative vote. <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/120227/syria-referendum-constitution-vote-assad-protests-crackdown-homs">Western Diplomats in Damascus estimated actual turnout at around 5%, however, with many voters intimidated by the presence of the Assad regime</a>. Dismissing the elections as “cynical,” U.S. State Department <span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland explained that “the referendum that they put forward is ridiculous in that it requires that the state approve any of these patriotic opposition groups." Time will tell whether Assad’s constitutional referendum, along with recent calls to label opposition forces “terrorists,” will succeed in capturing the narrative of legitimacy—and ultimately deter foreign intervention.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The great power to the north, Russia, undertook elections of its own on March 4<sup>th</sup> .The contest decided who would hold the country’s Presidency for the next six years, and was closely followed after protests in the wake of December’s Duma (parliamentary) elections. In the Presidential election, and as expected, current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin coasted to victory with 63% of the vote, <a href="http://www.minnpost.com/politics-policy/2012/03/only-one-surprise-russian-election-putins-tears">tearing up as he addressed his supporters during his election night victory speech</a>. International media and human rights groups have been quick to point out election violations, however, with the head <span style="background: white;">Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe</span> (OSCE) observer Tonino Picula concluding that <span style="background: white;">"[t]here was no real competition, and abuse of government resources ensured that the ultimate winner of the election was never in doubt." Illustrating this point was an <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/05/russia-election-2012-ballot-box-stuffing_n_1321379.html">Associated Press video appearing to show a ballot box being stuffed at a polling station in Dagestan</a>. In the day following the election, some 20,000 protesters flocked to Moscow’s Pushkin Square to call for Putin’s resignation. They were met by 12,000 police dispatched to restore order, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/06/russians-crackdown-anti-putin-protest">with hundreds of violent detainments reported by the Guardian</a>. Although it is unclear the trajectory these protests will take, Putin’s Kremlin has been notoriously strict in cracking down on civil unrest. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It’s whether such stagecraft will help pacify, or only intensify, public outcry for democratic representation. It is clear, however, that the faux election is becoming a go-to tool of iron-fisted leaders seeking the appearance of reformers. Drawing back the curtain and exposing this election engineering, while publicly pushing for meaningful reform to election administration, are among the increasing-needed roles for media outlets and human rights groups alike. </span><span style="font-family: Garamond, serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-30059688517447073052012-03-12T14:19:00.000-05:002012-03-12T14:19:02.882-05:00A New Round of School Finance Litigation Underway<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Texas Constitution pays explicit homage to Thomas Jefferson’s educational ideal that the “diffusion of knowledge” is a necessary component of a free society:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">A general diffusion of knowledge being essential to the preservation of liberties and rights of the people, it shall be the duty of the Legislature of the State to establish and make suitable provision for the support and maintenance of an efficient system of public free schools.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Despite this constitutional guarantee of a funded public school system, the Texas Legislature has repeatedly failed to create or maintain a viable school finance framework.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">In late 2005, the Supreme Court of Texas warned that the state’s school finance system was “drift[ing] toward constitutional inadequacy.” The governor responded by calling a special legislative session during which state lawmakers enacted a plan to address the issues diagnosed by the Court. In the wake of the economic downturn, however, the continuing deficiencies of the system became clear. The 81st Legislature’s “fix” in 2009 was to plug the multi-billion dollar gap in the public education budget with federal stimulus funds, effectively punting the problem to the next biennium.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Faced with dearth of quick fixes in 2011, the 82nd Texas Legislature again avoided the underlying issues and slashed the public education budget by $5.4 billion. Meanwhile, the Rainy Day Fund—the state’s savings account—contains over $6 billion in idle funds. This legislative evasion has had far-reaching consequences, including teacher layoffs and local attempts to raise property taxes, but many school districts are left with few if any options to raise further revenue because they already taxed at the maximum allowable rate. Moreover, both the legislature and the Texas Education Agency have continued to tighten curriculum and performance standards. For the first time, a new standardized testing scheme expressly aims to “increas[e] postsecondary readiness of graduating high school students,” despite only 1 in 4 high school graduates scoring above the state-defined threshold for college readiness on the SAT or ACT. For a state that seems to be <a href="http://www.texastribune.org/texas-politics/2012-presidential-election/santorum-leads-republican-field-texas/">yearning for a Santorum candidacy</a>, these new standards would appear to be the height of <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkjbJOSwq3A">snobbery</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">While the combination of budget reductions and stringent standards may have been enough to send the system into a tailspin, districts have also had to contend with a ballooning and increasingly diverse student population. The number of school-aged children has grown at four times the national rate over the past decade, and 60% of all students now come from economically disadvantaged households. School districts simply can’t keep up.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">All of this has triggered a new round of potentially historic litigation. To date, four major lawsuits have been filed by various coalitions of schools. Two of these involve mostly property-poor districts represented by MALDEF and Equity Center. Another suit was filed by a group of property-rich districts. The fourth and <a href="http://www.thompsonhorton.com/documents/SchoolFinanceLitigationPressRelease.pdf">arguably most significant case</a> includes a diverse collection of plaintiff districts that collectively represent more than 1.5 million Texas children, including some of the largest districts in the state. This suit was recently joined by another plaintiff group of pro-charter school parents.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Fundamental change to the school finance system is long overdue. Many of the issues in these cases were previously addressed by the Supreme Court yet failed to be remedied by the legislature. The various plaintiffs represent a substantial swath of the state’s school districts and bridge the demographic rifts that often divide the legislature—urban/rural, rich/poor, etc. At this point, Texas lawmakers have established an unmistakable record of failing to revamp the system with any lasting measure of change. It is therefore incumbent upon the Supreme Court to heed the lessons of the past and issue the strongest possible mandate on the legislature to address this crisis with a qualitatively significant overhaul of public school financing.</span><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-24985468551117875472012-03-12T14:17:00.002-05:002012-03-12T14:17:56.979-05:00Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins and the Death Penalty<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Dallas County District Attorney <a href="http://dallasda.co/webdev/?page_id=8">Craig Watkins</a> is a perplexing public figure to follow. First elected in November 2006, he quickly gained <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/11/brave-thinkers/7692/12/">widespread</a> <a href="http://www.governing.com/poy/craig-watkins.html">accolades</a> for creating the <a href="http://dallasda.co/webdev/?page_id=73">Conviction Integrity Unit</a> within the District Attorney’s Office, which reviews and re-investigates post-conviction claims of innocence using forensic testing. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Despite this tremendous success, he has been entirely unable to steer clear of controversy. Very few have attacked him over his conviction integrity work. Rather, Watkins, a Democrat, has been accused of <a href="http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/unfairpark/2010/11/prosecutor_says_craig_watkins.php">firing prosecutors for partisan reasons</a> (reminiscent of Bush’ <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dismissal_of_U.S._attorneys_controversy">U.S. Attorney firing controversy</a>), <a href="http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/unfairpark/2010/03/family_affair_district_attorney_craig.php">paying family members out of campaign funds</a>, and <a href="http://dallasmorningviewsblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2010/03/craig-watkins-r.html">struggling with decisions to investigate and prosecute alleged criminal activity by Dallas County constables</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
Even in light of his tumultuous history in office, I was surprised by the most recent story that came out in the news: Watkins’ great-grandfather was <a href="http://thescoopblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2012/02/dallas-da-craig-watkins-says-h.html">executed</a> by the state of Texas in 1932. In and of itself, this is little more than a fascinating item to note in Watkins’ biography. However, the impact of his revelation is worth consideration: Watkins is <a href="http://www.dallasnews.com/news/community-news/dallas/headlines/20120223-for-dallas-da-watkins-views-on-death-penalty-may-be-changing-again.ece">again reconsidering his views on the death penalty</a> [link’s behind a paywall, sorry!].<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">District Attorney Watkins entered office with “a lifelong opposition” to the death penalty, according to the <i>Dallas Morning News</i>. Soon after taking office, he indicated his willingness to seek the death penalty in capital cases, and by 2010, he stated that he ceased having moral concerns about capital punishment. Following the disclosure about his great-grandfather, Watkins told the Associated Press in an <a href="http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/AP-Interview-Texas-DA-seeks-death-penalty-review-3356768.php#page-1">interview</a> that the system of capital punishment in Texas needs to be reviewed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">At first blush, it’s refreshing to have one of Texas’ district attorneys—who are well known for their propensity to push for severe punishment—willing to take a thoughtful approach to the issue of the death penalty. The evidence in recent years about the great likelihood of Texas <a href="http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/Cameron_Todd_Willingham_Wrongfully_Convicted_and_Executed_in_Texas.php">executing an innocent person</a> as well as the considerable research showing the <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=6&ved=0CEkQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.lawschool.cornell.edu%2Fresearch%2Fcornell-law-review%2Fupload%2FBaldus.pdf&ei=NqBOT-2rF46FsgL3magX&">racially disparate impact</a> of the death penalty is troubling, if not for <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCleskey_v._Kemp">constitutional reasons</a>, certainly for moral ones. My initial instinct is thus to praise Watkins for grappling with the same issues that I do about the death penalty and doing so in the public eye.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">On the other hand, Watkins’ ambivalence about the death penalty implicates one of the major concerns held by those who oppose (or question) the death penalty: that it will be imposed in an <a href="http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/arbitrariness">arbitrary and capricious</a> manner. There are quite insidious concerns about arbitrariness, such as greater incidences of death sentences based on race or sex. It’s also troubling that a district attorney might pursue the death penalty in one case because he or she strongly supports it and the next year, not pursue the death penalty in an identical case because of his newfound opposition. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">This isn’t at all to say that I think Watkins should maintain his support for the death penalty rather than vacillate from support to opposition. The road to reform is not often a straight one. Instead, I hope, one day, he can look to his own indecisiveness about the death penalty and the impact it has had on capital cases in Dallas County and cite it as one of many reasons why he anchors himself in the camp opposed to the death penalty.</span><o:p></o:p></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-71900800159231220482012-03-12T14:16:00.000-05:002012-03-12T14:16:43.552-05:00Campaign Finance and a Possible Solution to Citizens United v. FEC<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Electing a candidate of your choice, and publically supporting your political beliefs are at the core of civil liberties. However, with the increasingly more rapid rise of powerful fundraising organizations thanks to recent court cases, navigating an efficient way to allow the arena of political free speech to flourish while also not being dominated by those most flushed with cash has become a hot point for activists. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Supreme Court case, <i>Citizens United v. FEC</i>, has received a wave of negative attention for its linking of political speech to money in overruling portions of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) that put limits on certain types of expenditures. <i>Citizens</i> held that, because money is essentially the only way to effectively diffuse political speech, to limit the amount of expenditures a person or corporation makes in promoting their own beliefs—as opposed to contributions directly to a candidate—is an impermissible limit of free speech, and therefore a violation of the First Amendment. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">In <i>Citizens, </i>the Court acknowledged that while there was an important interest attempting to limit corruption, independent expenditures did not pose the same threat of quid pro quo corruption that direct contributions to a campaign did. The Court ruled that the threat of possible corruption that expenditures posed was less important than the chilling of political speech that the regulation being litigated posed. The Court, however, upheld limits for direct contributions. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">A 2010 D.C. Court of Appeals case, <i>SpeechNOW.org v. FEC</i>, clarified and continued <i>Citizens’ </i>holding by making clear that an organization, officially a “political action committee (PAC),” that was formed only for independent-expenditures—again, meaning that the PAC would only spend under their own discretion, not contribute money directly to a campaign—could raise an unlimited amount of money as long as the PAC didn’t work in concert with a campaign (whatever that means, and no one really seems to know).<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The FEC officially designations Super PACs as Independent-Expenditure PACs, but that is a lot more boring to type out than “Super PACs.” So, hello, Super PACs. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Perhaps the most common critique of these decisions goes something like this: money isn’t speech, and corporations aren’t people with First Amendment rights that we should be worrying about. Therefore, limits on the amount of money spent by Super PACs should be limited in order to prevent corruption. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Now, I don’t like the way campaigning has been altered by the rise of the modern Super PACs. Candidates are forced to be full-time fundraisers, whether they are in or out of office. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">However, I don’t think the answer to overruling <i>Citizens</i> is to deny here that, at least from a functionalist view, political speech does equal money spent to get the message out. Further, while I’m not arguing that corporations aren’t people, we actual people do have a right to assembly. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">This right to assembly is an extremely important right for civil liberties. It is an individual right that gives us the constitutional support to come together as groups to promote, protest, and express our views. This right, paired with the reality of the role money plays in promoting political speech, suggests that attacking the absolute basics of the idea that money is speech in the campaigning world may not be the most sound course to take to defeat <i>Citizens</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Instead, I think looking to different types of approaches is needed to defeat <i>Citizens</i>, as promoted by several constitutional scholars may be the solutions. Generally, these approaches fall into two categories: first, litigation strategies centering around attacking the Court’s reasoning as an impermissible overruling of a content-neutral restriction of free speech; and second, looking towards different types of public financing regulation. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Lawrence Lessig, in particular, promotes many different solutions to the campaign finance problem along the second vein described above. Perhaps most radically, he suggested a new Constitutional Convention that would create an amendment to overturn <i>Citizens</i>. Additionally, he suggests new ways of organizing public financing. However, with the Republican filibuster of the DISCLOSE Act, legislation aimed at defeating <i>Citizens United</i>, legislation may not be the most efficient means to defeating the Court’s extreme protection of independent expenditures. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">Instead, I think the solution to Citizens may be found in the long history of content-neutral/content-based distinction in free speech jurisprudence. Limits on expenditures apply to conservative and progressive groups alike. They are, inherently, content-neutral. Content-neutral restrictions on free speech have been upheld in a variety on contexts as long as the state interest is strong enough. Specifically, the Supreme Court held in <i>Ward v. Rock Against Racism</i>, </span>that content-neutral restrictions on free speech may be upheld if those restrictions, “are justified without reference to the content of the regulated speech, that they are narrowly tailored to serve a significant government interest, and that they leave open ample alternative channels for communication of the information.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">In <i>Citizens</i>, the court essentially dismissed the idea that state interest in preventing corruption was “significant” enough in the context of expenditures to satisfy this content-neutral test; however, the Court did held that in terms of direct contributions, the interest was strong enough. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Time, and this election may be enough to show the Court’s failure in its distinguishing expenditure limits from contribution limits. In the 2010 election in Texas alone, in the wake of <i>Citizens</i>, a study by Texans for Public Justice demonstrated a twelve percent increase in PAC spending. Current projections for the 2012 elections are even more steep and obvious. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Super PAC supporting New Gingrich’s campaign, for example, Winning Our Future is being kept afloat by one family, the Adelsons. If Gingrich were to be elected as the Republican nominee (an unlikely event at this point, to be sure), any court or person would be hard pressed to demonstrate how the infusion of wealth in this manner doesn’t rise the exact same corruption concerns as direct contributions do. </span><span style="font-family: 'Adobe Garamond Pro';"><o:p></o:p></span></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-15690067741737028272012-03-12T14:09:00.003-05:002012-03-12T14:12:07.786-05:00You Keep Using That Word, I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means: How the GOP Became the (Mostly) Boys Who Cried ‘Rape’<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Republican Party has a big problem with rape.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">I’m sorry. I made a mistake there. Let me start over.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Republican Party has a big problem with understanding the meaning of the word rape.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">There, that’s better.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Their problem is that they all seem to think that the definition of “rape” is “Obamacare.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Take for instance the testimony of Dr. C. Ben Mitchell, a biomedical ethics professor at Union University, who testified at Republican Rep. Darrell Issa’s all-male, all-religious hearing on the secular issue of birth control for women. He called Obamacare’s mandate that insurer’s provide birth control for women “nothing less than the rape of the soul.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Or take Republican Virginia Delegate Bob Marshall, Republican Virginia State Senator Dick Black and Republican Oklahoma State Representative Charles Key who recently submitted an amicus brief to the Supreme Court saying that Obamacare’s individual mandate is “not regulation of voluntary commercial intercourse; it is more akin to forcible economic rape.” See? There’s that word again.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Let’s put aside for the moment the more Birth-of-a-Nation-y aspects of the GOP’s willingness to throw the word “rape” around so flippantly with regards to the singular achievement of the country’s first black president. Suffice it to say, I don’t recall Bill Clinton — who introduced a similar healthcare plan, and who actually was guilty of some degree of sexual misconduct — ever being called a rapist.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Instead, and at the risk of going completely mad, let’s carry the GOP’s position to its logical extreme. Anyone who watched Wednesday’s Arizona debate saw the candidates fall all over themselves to declare which one wants to help rape victims the least. The exchange I have in mind is this one: <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">JOHN KING: It's an issue on which all of you have criticism on the Obama administration, it's an issue on which some of you have also criticized each other.</span></div><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Governor Romney, both Senator Santorum and Speaker Gingrich have said during your tenure as governor, you required Catholic hospitals to provide emergency contraception to rape victims. </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">And Mr. Speaker, you compared the president to President Obama, saying he infringed on Catholics' rights. </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Governor, did you do that?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">MITT ROMNEY: No, absolutely not. Of course not. </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">There was no requirement in Massachusetts for the Catholic Church to provide morning-after pills to rape victims. That was entirely voluntary on their report. There was no such requirement.</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">You know, because when a woman is forcibly assaulted resulting in an unwanted pregnancy, which she must make the difficult decision to terminate, the real victim is the hospital.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">But let’s finish that thought. According to the Republican Party, Obamacare is rape. According to the Republican Party, rape victims shouldn’t have access to birth control.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Deductive reasoning should apply here. Sorry you got Obamacare-raped GOP, but it looks like you’re going to have to carry this healthcare reform baby to term.</span><o:p></o:p></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-1118828521460421062012-03-12T14:06:00.002-05:002012-03-12T14:06:09.427-05:00Economic Analysis of the Law and the Civil Rights Perspective<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">This semester I finally had the chance to take Economic Analysis of the Law here at UT Law School. In this class we examine different legal policies from an economic standpoint in order to determine how best to maximize social welfare. In order to make the analysis work we have to start with certain assumptions about human behavior. Among other things, we assume that people make rational decisions, and that they attempt to maximize their individual welfare. These assumptions are certainly not always true, but they simplify the world into a system that is useful when predicting behavior in the real world.</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">In general the civil rights crowd tends to be hostile to this merging of law and economics. We tend to see rights as intrinsic to human life, and therefore outside this economic system. To a certain extent I agree. After all, it seems impossible to put a price on the freedom of speech. But while you can’t sell your freedom of speech, you can let the government borrow it for a while.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">As lawyers we voluntarily forfeit our freedom of speech whenever we take on a new client. We must respect attorney-client privilege and remain loyal to our clients no matter what our individual political preferences may be. We accept these restrictions on our rights because we feel they are less valuable than our client’s right to fair representation. In situations like these you could say that rights are being traded. Even if there is no money involved, it is clear that one right is valued more highly than the other. Once we acknowledge that some rights are more valuable than others, putting specific prices on them is just a matter of working out the details.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">While a full adoption of the law and economics school of thought is probably unnecessary, we should at least be prepared to think strategically about our options and how best to protect civil rights and civil liberties when they are challenged. Often times protecting one person’s right requires the forfeiture of another person’s right. We should make an effort to balance these interests rather than blindly supporting the creation of rights wherever they can be found. In some instances this may mean reducing them to a variable in an equation. In others it might just mean taking some time to consider the consequences of our policies, whether they are intended or not. </span><o:p></o:p></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-4131493196833433782012-02-21T22:08:00.002-06:002012-02-21T22:08:47.187-06:00Civil Rights Since 9/11 Conference at UT Law<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">I had the good fortune to attend the “<a href="http://www.utexas.edu/law/centers/publicinterest/events/civilrights.html">Civil Rights since 9/11</a>” Conference on Feburary 3rd at the law school. The conference featured several prominent speakers, headlined by Susan Herman, President of the ACLU and author of the recently published book <i>Taking Liberties: The War on Terror and the Erosion of Democracies</i>. I thought I would take a few minutes to summarize and reflect on one of the panels I took in.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The first panel of the day was on the topic of “qualified immunity” as it applies to high-level government officials being sued for promoting policies that led to the violation of constitutional rights in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. The panel featured Rachel Meeropol – Staff Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights, Alexander Reinert – Associate Professor of Law, Cardozo Law School, and Lee Gelernt – Deputy Director, ACLU National Immigrant Rights Project, and was moderated by the law school’s own Jennifer Laurin. The main thrust of the panel’s discussion was that “qualified immunity,” which protects government officials from liability for constitutional violations, presents a major challenge to post 9/11 civil liberties litigation. No surprises there. None of the panelists were optimistic that the present Supreme Court was about to reverse course and open the courts to litigants seeking discovery from high-level national security and justice officials, let alone hold these officials liable for violating the constitutional rights of Muslim and Arab-American citizens rounded-up by the FBI and local law enforcement post 9/11. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Despite their sobering message, however, the panelists raised some interesting questions about the future of post 9/11 civil liberties litigation and the courts’ position on qualified immunity. One question raised by the panel was whether the trial courts will permit discovery against lower-level officials (prison guards, FBI agents, etc,) while the appellate courts weigh qualified immunity defenses raised by high-level officials. According to the panel, the trial courts have taken different positions on this issue. Some courts have allowed discovery to advance against low-level defendants even while the appellate courts address qualified immunity issues, while other courts have delayed all discovery until qualified immunity issues have been resolved. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The other interesting question raised by the panel had to do with whether the Supreme Court is likely, in the future, to decide any constitutional issues raised in post 9/11 civil liberties suits <i>before</i> ruling on the question of qualified immunity. Or, whether the Supreme Court is likely to dodge any constitutional issues by upholding the qualified immunity of high-level officials and declining the opportunity to decide any constitutional questions. The answer to this question obviously has major implications for future litigation against high-level government officials for constitutional violations. Civil liberties advocates and their clients hope that the Court shows a willingness to invalidate certain government policies as unconstitutional, even while shielding high-level government officials from liability. The opposite would be truly unfortunate and warrant serious consideration as to whether, for the client’s sake, it is worth naming high-level officials as defendants.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The issues surrounding qualified immunity obviously highlight the tensions between national security interests and civil rights and civil liberties. There are obvious reasons for protecting government officials from private actions seeking to hold them liable for the actions they took to protect the country from serious and imminent threats. We want our officials to act decisively in response to national emergencies and the fear of being sued should not keep them from doing so. On the other hand, by its very definition, qualified immunity is <i>qualified</i> and not absolute. The Court should decide where this immunity ends and what is necessary to overcome it, because fairness and justice require that high-level officials be held equally accountable for policies that lead to severe abuses of constitutional freedoms as the low-level officials who carry out these policies.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7238195205222482950.post-80942493803634629722012-02-21T22:06:00.002-06:002012-02-21T22:06:37.225-06:00A (Small) Victory for the Right to Federal Habeas<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Last month, the Supreme Court issued a decision that marks a victory for death row inmates in post-conviction appeals. The case of <i><a href="http://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=5564781913751654215&hl=en&as_sdt=2&as_vis=1&oi=scholarr">Maples<span style="font-style: normal;"> </span>v. Thomas</a></i> presented a particularly appalling case of ineffective assistance of post-conviction counsel. Cory Maples, an Alabama death row inmate, had been represented <i>pro bono</i> in his state post-conviction proceedings by two attorneys from the New York offices of Sullivan & Cromwell (Alabama is the only state that does not provide court-appointed counsel in post-conviction). Maples was seeking state post-conviction relief on grounds that his trial counsel had been ineffective. While Maples’s petition was pending in the state trial court, his attorneys left Sullivan & Cromwell and did not inform Maples or the court that they would no longer serve as his counsel. The Alabama trial court denied Maples’s petition and sent notice of the order to his attorneys at Sullivan & Cromwell. The mail was returned, unopened, to the trial court clerk, who took no further action. In the meantime, the 42-day period Maples had to file an appeal expired. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">An Alabama Assistant Attorney General sent a letter to Maples, informing him that he had missed the deadline to file an appeal in the state court and that he had four weeks remaining to file a federal habeas petition. Maples filed a petition for federal habeas relief, but the District Court denied his petition on the grounds that the issue was procedurally defaulted because he had failed to timely appeal the state trial court’s order. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Supreme Court, in a 7-2 decision, reversed the Eleventh Circuit, holding that Maples had shown the requisite cause to excuse his procedural default. Generally, a federal court may not review a habeas petition when a state court has declined to address the claims raised because the prisoner failed to meet a state procedural requirement. This procedural bar may be lifted only where the prisoner can show cause for the state court procedural default. The Supreme Court has consistently held that attorney negligence in post-conviction proceedings does not qualify as cause. However, the Court held that the exceptionally egregious facts of Maples’s case constituted cause for the procedural bar. A client, the Court held, “cannot be charged with the acts or omissions of an attorney who has abandoned him.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The victory of <i>Maples</i> may be a small one. It’s likely the holding will be narrowly applied only to cases as extraordinary as that of Cory Maples. But in the realm of federal habeas, where procedural defaults have become the norm and substantive review of the merits the exception, any progress in the rights of indigent petitioners is certainly noteworthy.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">On the same day the Supreme Court heard oral argument for <i>Maples</i>, it also heard oral argument for <i>Martinez v. Ryan</i>. <i>Martinez</i> presents the question whether a prisoner has a right to effective assistance of state habeas counsel where state habeas presents the first opportunity to raise an ineffective-assistance-of-trial-counsel claim. The Court has yet to issue its opinion in <i>Martinez</i>. Here’s hoping the Court will continue on the trajectory of upholding, rather than constricting, the rights of indigents in post-conviction proceedings. </span><o:p></o:p></div>Texas Journal on Civil Liberties and Civil Rightshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14831053383176660706noreply@blogger.com1