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An Unduly Restrictive View of Justice on Trial
No full textThe Hon. Roger L. Gregory delivered the annual Leslie Devan Smith, Jr., Lecture at W&L Law on April 10, 2025. The title of his talk was “An Unduly Restrictive View of Justice on Trial.” The lecture took place in the Millhiser Moot Court Room, Sydney Lewis Hall, on the campus of Washington and Lee University. The event was free and open to the public.
Judge Gregory is the first African American to sit on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. On December 27, 2000, he was placed on the Court by recess appointment of President Bill Clinton. Judge Gregory was re-nominated by President George W. Bush and confirmed by the Senate for a lifetime appointment to the Court on July 20, 2001. Judge Gregory is the only person in the history of the United States to be appointed to the United States Court of Appeals by two presidents of different political parties. Judge Gregory served as the Court’s Chief Judge from 2016 through 2023.
Judge Gregory\u27s return to W&L Law for the Smith Lecture continued his long relationship with the school. He delivered the commencement address in 2005, the MLK Day Address in 2019, and the Washington and Lee Law Review hosted its 2021 symposium in honor and celebration of his first twenty years on the Fourth Circuit
The Misfortune of Attending School While Black in a Fifth Circuit State
Full text linkTens of thousands of children, including disproportionate numbers of Black children, are hit in school every year. More than 50 percent of these students live in the Fifth Circuit states of Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. Decades of government data, including the Department of Education’s most recent reports, reveal that Black students receive alarmingly inequitable rates of corporal punishment, demonstrating this education practice to be a legal form of institutionalized racism.
This Article uniquely focuses on the archaic discipline practice’s effects on Black students in Fifth Circuit states. Fifth Circuit law addressing students’ rights in corporal punishment cases has developed into a constitutional wasteland. This creates a perfect storm for children, and particularly Black children, who live in a region where, statistically, they are the most likely to receive physical school punishment and the least likely to receive constitutional protection or any post-punishment relief when excessive abuse results in injuries. The court has taken the isolated position that students are not entitled to constitutional protection for excessive physical discipline if they can pursue alternative remedies in state court—an endeavor that usually fails due to layers of protective shields afforded to schools and educators under state laws. Fifth Circuit jurisprudence misconstrues Supreme Court precedent and sharply deviates from the nine other circuit courts that have found that excessive corporal punishment can violate children’s constitutional rights.
It is time for the United States Supreme Court and Congress to catch up with the rest of the industrialized world. It is time to follow the recommendations of virtually every major medical, psychological, educational, and child advocacy group to recognize a child’s basic human rights—most fundamentally, the right to go to school without fear of being hit. It is time to repudiate this harsh discipline practice administered to children based largely on their skin color and where they live. The future will not look kindly on this practice. We have a responsibility to abandon fidelity to outdated judicial decisions and antiquated laws. We must treat children according to the principles of “liberty and justice for all” they are taught to recite in school
Unraveling the War Powers Resolution’s Role in Cyber Warfare
Full text linkThe evolution of warfare in the digital age has transformed the battlefield. Conflicts are fought with advanced technology, and traditional combat activities grow increasingly obsolete. This shift raises a critical question: Has the existing legal framework, including foundational war powers legislation, kept pace with this technological transformation? In exploring the governance of cyber warfare under the War Powers Resolution, this Note begins by examining the unique characteristics and devastating potential of cyber warfare. The analysis then turns to the War Powers Resolution, providing a historical overview of its enactment, a textual analysis of its provisions, and an exploration of how the executive and legislative branches have interpreted its applicability to cyber operations. Lessons from its application in traditional military contexts serve as a foundation for evaluating its relevance in addressing modern cyberthreats.
This Note further assesses competing interpretations of the War Powers Resolution through the lens of the Youngstown framework by applying its three tiers of presidential authority to hypothetical scenarios involving unilateral cyber warfare with kinetic effects. By weighing arguments for each tier, this analysis provides an answer to the question of the balance of power between the executive and Congress in the cyber domain.
Ultimately, this Note concludes that Congress’s interpretation is correct: The War Powers Resolution is not only applicable but essential for regulating cyber warfare. In an era defined by rapid technological advancements, the continued relevance of congressional oversight is critical to safeguarding national interests and ensuring accountable executive action in the face of evolving threats
The (Self) Identity of the Child Soldier: International Law and Best Practices, in Children’s Right to Identity, Selfhood and International Family Law (Marilyn Freeman & Nicola Taylor eds., 2025)
No full textThis chapter discusses children associated with armed forces or armed groups, colloquially known as ‘child soldiers’. It sets out the legal definition of child soldiers and unpacks international law and policy practices that address children in armed conflict, including Article 38 of the UNCRC, the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, and international criminal law. The law that allocates responsibility for child soldiering and the responsibility of child soldiers for their conduct is reviewed. Return to civilian life is possible through disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration programmes. These must ensure respect for the self-awareness, agency, and identity affirmations of former child soldiers as part of creating durable social reintegration and the cultivation of viable cultures of children\u27s rights to guard against pernicious gerontocracy. The child\u27s perception of self-identity may change during armed conflict, and this ought to be respected rather than ignored or overlooked.https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/fac_books/1208/thumbnail.jp
Brief of Amici Curiae Scholars for the Advancement of Children’s Constitutional Rights in Support of Defendants-Appellants: \u3cem\u3eRoy v. Darren Patterson Christian Academy\u3c/em\u3e
No full textAmici are scholars of children and the law, education law, family law, and anti-discrimination law. Amici draw this Court’s attention to the harms that four-year-olds in the LGBT community – LGBT children and children with LGBT parents – would bear should state-funded religious schools be granted a license to discriminate against them. An exemption to the Colorado Universal Preschool Program’s equal opportunity requirement would allow plaintiffs to discriminate against these children and raise unfair barriers in their paths to a high-quality education. An exemption would also inflict dignitary, psychological, and familial harms upon an entire class of young people – in their formative years – solely because of their or their parents’ LGBT identities. The exemption would also force Colorado to give legal effect to private moral or philosophical viewpoints in violation of state statutory protections and federal constitutional mandates
Foreword: Children and Constitutions in the Anthropocene Era
No full textIn Spring 2025, the Washington and Lee Law Review held its Lara D. Gass Symposium, Children and Constitutions in the Anthropocene Era. It consisted of a keynote address by Julia Olson, Co-Executive Director and Chief Legal Counsel of Our Children’s Trust, and three panels: “Children, Climate Change, and State Constitutions”; “The U.S. Constitutions and the Meaning of ‘We the [Young] People’”; and “Youth-Powered Litigation and Global Constitutionalism.” The heavily attended Symposium was a tour-de-force in the field of children’s rights.
As climate chaos mounts, young people around the world are pressing courts to reconceptualize the meaning of liberty, equality, and the public trust from the perspective of the planet’s youngest inhabitants and future generations. We are fortunate to have these scholars’ excellent contribution to the 2025 Lara D. Gass Law Review Symposium, and we thank all of the student editors and participants who made it a tremendous success
Attendees in the Main Reading Room
No full texthttps://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/scholarcelebration2025/1000/thumbnail.jp
Introductory Remarks - Christensen
No full texthttps://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/scholarcelebration2025/1011/thumbnail.jp