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Incarceration to Incorporation: Economic Empowerment for Returning Citizens through Social Impact Bonds
No full textCivil Arrest? (Another) St. Louis Case Study in Unconstitutionality
No full textThis Article advances a simple claim in need of enforcement in this country right now: no person may be arrested for an alleged violation of civil, as opposed to criminal, law. Indeed, courts have long interpreted the Fourth Amendment as prohibiting arrest except when probable cause exists to believe that a crime has been committed and that the defendant is the person who committed the crime. However, in many places police take citizens into custody without a warrant for the non-criminal conduct of allegedly breaking civil laws. This unfortunate phenomenon received national attention in St. Louis, Missouri following the death of Michael Brown, an unarmed African-American teen shot by City of Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson during a pedestrian stop in 2014.1 The tragic incident resulted in angry protests targeted at local government and police for their history of problematic police practices used primarily against poor and minority residents. But in a cruel irony, such public calls for reform around municipal ordinance enforcement were met with further widespread arrests. Arrests that we believe were, and are, wholly unlawful.
Chaining Kids to the Ever Turning Wheel: Other Contemporary Costs of Juvenile Court Involvement
No full textIn this essay, Candace Johnson and Mae Quinn respond to Tamar Birckhead’s important article The New Peonage, based, in part, on their work and experience representing youth in St. Louis, Missouri. They concur with Professor Birckhead’s conclusions about the unfortunate state of affairs in 21st century America— that we use fines, fees, and other prosecution practices to continue to unjustly punish poverty and oppressively regulate racial minorities. Such contemporary processes are far too reminiscent of historic convict leasing and Jim Crow era efforts intended to perpetuate second-class citizenship for persons of color. Johnson and Quinn add to Professor Birckhead’s critique by further focusing on the plight of children of color and surfacing nonfinancial sanctions in our juvenile courts that similarly marginalize minority youth. They argue these practices— including shackling, intentional and unintentional shaming, and educational deprivation—also work to reproduce a secondary caste in communities across the country
Human Rights Commission Holds Hearing on Refugee Children and Families Seeking Protection
No full textCongressional Management of The District of Columbia Prior to Home Rule: The Struggle to Understand Power Lines in The Nation\u27s Capital
No full textArticle I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution authorizes the U.S.Congress to establish a federal capital and [t]o exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District. \u27 For this reason, Congress has exclusive jurisdiction over the District ofColumbia ( District ), which has neither statehood nor voting representation in Congress. In 1973, Congress enacted the District of Columbia Home Rule Act,which delegated some measure of local self-governance to the District.2Since 1973, District residents have elected their own mayor and city council. Council legislation, however, is still subject to review by Congress, which also approves the annual budget for the District
