Mitchell Hamline School of Law
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Black Livelihoods Matter: Access to Credit as a Civil Right and Striving for a More Perfect Capitalism Through Inclusive Economics
No full textFollowing the murder of an unarmed African-American male by a white police officer, in 2020 the nation erupted in protest, rallying to the call of Black Lives Matter, shining a light on the systemic racism engendered in American society. While the dialogue on racial inequality often focuses on police brutality and the political rights of African-Americans, one of the best illustrations of racial disparity can be found in the stark difference in access to credit. In the past century, capitalism has been blamed for countless ills in the United States. From the Great Depression to the Great Recession to the ever-growing disparity of income, the scapegoat has been capitalism--a reasonable reaction to today\u27s economy that is so unfettered it resembles a multi-national financial oligarchy. But a more careful analysis of today\u27s growing inequality reveals a different conclusion--that the disparity of income between the Anglo-Saxon majority and the historically disenfranchised is a result of discrimination by race rather than any inherent feature of capitalism. Rather, a more perfect capitalism would mean greater access to capital for all, based on merit and not race. Thus, a nation with as diverse a population of the U.S. would thrive with a more diverse set of financial products than what is readily available today. Currently, most lending mechanisms are sized to maximize the greatest opportunity per single transaction, using a criterion that is ineffective at gauging risk, and instead, primarily serves the wealthy and historically privileged, regardless of their likelihood to repay. More effective and more inclusive financial products would help the historically disenfranchised to acclimate to the code and culture buried in the mysteries of credit underwriting. If effectively and efficiently deployed, such tools would remove barriers to access and result in a smaller disparity in income and thus, serve to equalize political power. The concept of access to capital as a civil right has roots in several activist thinkers throughout history, including civil rights leaders Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. Concrete solutions have manifested themselves in market-based pilot projects experimented with through a variety of mechanisms during the New Deal, and even more recently via the Americans Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, and afterward. Some of these solutions include financial literacy programming, fintech tools, and more inclusive underwriting implementation, to name a few, and are discussed as part of an overarching strategy towards achieving an inclusive economic capitalist system
And What of the “Black” in Black Letter Law?: A BlaQueer Reflection
Get PDFThis is a reflective, analytical essay remarking on the role that Blackness has and continues to play in the construction, understanding and application of black letter law. This essay is written from a Black and BlaQueer perspective and displays how a shift in standpoint--moving from the invisible, standard white reasonable person --underscores and illuminates the current legal and sociopolitical crisis we find ourselves in. It is continuation of the discussion began in my earlier articles Furtive Blackness: On Blackness & Being, The Strict Scrutiny of Black and BlaQueer Life and the working paper Sexual Profiling & BlaQueer Furtivity: BlaQueers On The Run
Wisconsin’s 3/5 Compromise: Prison Gerrymandering in Wisconsin Dilutes Minority Votes to Inflate White Districts’ Population
Get PDFPermanent Homelands Through Treaties with the United States: Restoring Faith in the Tribal Nation-U.S. Relationship in Light of the McGirt Decision
Get PDFCopyright Law Cannot Copyright Law—Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org Inc., 140 S.CT. 1498 (2020)
Get PDFNot an Ocean Away, Only a Moment Away: A Prosecutor\u27s Primer for Obtaining Remotely Stored Data
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