By Leah Duncan Associate Editor, Vol. 24
Since its creation, social media has evolved well beyond its initial purpose of social connection. Today, social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter--to name a few--are now being used to promote brands, market products, and foster social connections.[1] Beyond these uses, social media has become a tool to promote social justice and civil rights activism. For example, “hashtagging” on social media has become a popular way to spread awareness. #BlackLivesMatter #SocialJustice #WhyIMarch are but a few hashtags that people have used in developing issue awareness and promoting reform. Even further, social media has been used to facilitate protests and other forms of civic engagement. While social media can be a productive tool for change, it can also be a restricting force. In some ways, it can lead to the tokenization of social justice causes and can hamper further action beyond the internet. With this in mind, it is important that social media activism remain connected to the on the ground causes and be viewed not as an end-goal but as a means to an end. Social media has played and continues to play an important role in helping “users bring greater attention to issues through their collective voice.”[2] Through the use of hashtags, tweets, and other types of social media posts, users are able to both “display solidarity with” and “criticize” different social movements.[3] Moreover, through event and group pages or accounts, social media has played a significant role as a springboard for organizing and planning collective action on the ground. One major example of the power of social media in the context of social justice movements is the 2016 Women’s March on Washington. This movement started with Teresa Shook’s Facebook event invite to forty of her friends, and quickly blossomed into a march of hundreds of thousands of people who took to the streets of D.C., along with many other groups who led their own marches in their own cities.[4] The hashtag “#WhyIMarch” was used in conjunction with the marches to not only facilitate further awareness for those unable to attend but also allowed users to find and join marches in their area.[5] In these ways, social media was used as a productive tool of organizing and promoting awareness of a movement intended to further women’s rights. Read More
By Kara Crutcher
Associate Editor, Vol. 24
On March 15th, young people walked out of classrooms across the globe in the name of environmental justice. Following in the footsteps of 16-year-old Greta Thunberg – who’s been protesting Swedish lawmakers’ failure to implement the Paris Climate Agreement – young activists took to the streets to further emphasize that not only is climate change real, but that we need to take it more seriously as a global community.[2] According to GreenAction, a grassroots organization based out of California dedicated to environmental justice work, environmental racism is defined as “the disproportionate impact of environmental hazards on people of color.”[3] This concept is exemplified by two major events within the past two decades – the effects of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and the Flint Water Crisis. In 2013 almost 80% of 9th Ward in New Orleans still had not returned to their homes because the city’s reconstruction efforts were lacking. Flint’s residents drank contaminated water for at least two years due to eroding pipes, highly contaminated water,[5] and a disregard for resident’s safety. Just like those affected in 9th Ward in New Orleans, Flint’s residents are overwhelmingly Black. Read More
By Taylor Jones
Associate Editor, Vol 24
In America, estimates show that six percent of all children and twelve percent of black children will have been placed in foster care by the age of eighteen.[1] As a result of interactions with Child Protective Services, on any given day there are roughly 438,000 children in foster care.[2] When children are taken from their families and placed in the foster system, the parents are charged child support, to be paid to the state. Child support is frequently imposed on families because of the belief that parents should remain responsible for the financial well-being of their children.[3] Although intended to provide for the needs of children in foster care, child support, when imposed on families without sufficient funds, can have a number of negative collateral consequences. One such consequence includes an interference with the return of children to their families based on an inability to pay child support to the state. Child support is imposed on families as a type of cost recovery scheme. The individual child or children involved do not receive money directly from their parents. Instead, child support is collected from parents with children in the foster system in order to reimburse or offset the government’s costs for providing foster care services.[4] The funds collected are meant to serve as revenues for states with limited resources. While the cost of child support varies among states, it does not typically track the child’s actual costs while in foster care. Instead, the amount is typically generated based on the income of the parent or parents. Thus, a parent could be paying more money to the state than their child is spending while in foster care. Such a discrepancy does not raise many eyebrows likely because of the widely held belief and assumption that parents should be responsible for the financial care of their children, especially when the parents are not providing custodial care. Read More
By Meredith Reynolds
Associate Editor, Vol. 24
The Preventing Maternal Deaths Act was signed into law in December 2018.[1] This legislation has been years in the making[2] and part of a growing “birth equity movement” confronting how racism, poverty, and other social inequities are impacting mothers of color and their children.[3] The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (“CDC”) has tracked a significant increase in pregnancy-related deaths per 100,000 live births from 7.2 in 1987 to 18.0 in 2014 for all women in the United States.[4] This reality puts the United States at the bottom when comparing maternal health outcomes across high-income countries.[5] While there are many factors potentially contributing to this drastic rise, including changes in data collection over time and an increase in women with chronic health conditions, one fact is clear: mothers of color, and black mothers in particular, are the ones disproportionately losing their lives.[6] According to the CDC’s 2011-14 data, while the number of deaths per 100,000 live births for white women was 12.4, the number for black women was a staggering 40.0, and the average for women of other races was 17.8.[7] Even when controlling for variables like education and socioeconomic status, black women are more likely to die from pregnancy-related complications.[8] Read More
By Sam Kulhanek
Associate Editor, Vol. 24
On February 15, 2019, President Trump declared a national emergency in order to push forward his long-standing plans to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.[1] Earlier that same day, Trump had signed an act of Congress appropriating $1.375 billion for the border wall, which fell far short of his desired $5.7 billion and also came with certain restrictions.[2] Trump then announced his intention to declare a national emergency pursuant to the National Emergencies Act[3] in order to get the rest of his desired funding for the wall. Trump’s declaration is now under attack on several fronts as lawmakers, states, landowners, and advocates challenge this attempted “end run” around Congress.[4] In his proclamation declaring the emergency, Trump stated that the southern border “presents a border security and humanitarian crisis that threatens core national security interests,” and that it was necessary for additional troops and funding for military construction to be made available.[5] Trump now claims that he will have up to $8.1 billion at his disposal in order to build the border wall and finally fulfill his long-time campaign promise.[6] However, Trump is also facing numerous lawsuits challenging the legality of his actions, which many view as an attempt to access funds that Congress explicitly refused to give him, thereby violating the constitutional separation of powers.[7] Read More
By Mackenzie Walz
Associate Editor, Vol. 24
Within days of regaining control of the House of Representatives after an invigorating midterm election, several Democrats vowed to focus their legislative efforts on restoring ethics and transparency in our democratic institutions.[1] As promised, the first bill introduced in the 116th Congress was an ethics reform package titled “For the People.” Also known as HR 1, this act is a sweeping bill aimed at improving three specific aspects of the voting franchise: campaign finance, election security, and voting rights.[2] While Democrats have touted HR 1 as promoting the public interest, Republicans have objected, finding it unnecessary and in furtherance of a partisan agenda.[3] J Christian Adams, president and general counsel of the Public Interest Legal Foundation who served on President Trump’s voter-fraud commission, testified to the House Judiciary Committee that the revisions HR 1 proposes are unnecessary: it has never been easier to vote and it is even difficult to avoid opportunities to register to vote.[4] Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell went even further in his opposition, characterizing the bill as the “Democrat Politician Protection Act.”[5] As one of the most outspoken critics of HR 1, McConnell penned an op-ed for The Washington Post, arguing HR 1 is an “attempt to change the rules of American politics to benefit one party.”[6] While McConnell has taken issue with some provisions more than others, he has continuously expressed that he has no intention of introducing any part of HR 1 in the Senate.[7] Whether or not every provision of HR 1 is necessary or the Act was motivated by partisan interests, studies suggest many provisions of HR 1, individually and collectively, would increase participation among minority voters.[8] There are several structural barriers throughout the political process that impede voter turnout, disproportionately among minority voters: felon disenfranchisement, conducting elections on a Tuesday, arbitrary registration deadlines, and a lack of early voting options. HR 1 seeks to subdue or eliminate these structural barriers, which would increase opportunities for minority participation and, subsequently, increase overall voter turnout. Read More
The Michigan Journal of Race & Law hosted a talk with Professor Sha-Shana Crichton, Associate Professor of Lawyering Skills and Director of the Legal Writing Program at Howard University, on her forthcoming MJR&L article. [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P5HJBgMC14] Incorporating Social Justice in the 1L Legal Writing Course: A Tool… Read More
By Rose Lapp Associate Editor, Vol. 24 “Good schools can’t solve structural inequality on their own, but neither can it be solved without them. Without an effective education, our children’s futures are all but guaranteed to succumb to the imposed conditions of their lineage and location.”[1] So warns… Read More
By Chris Hemry
Executive Editor, Vol. 24.
The police have a lot of power over civilians. This is especially palpable on the roads.[1] The police can pull you over for a “broken taillight,” order everyone out of the car, frisk everyone, arrest the driver for the broken taillight, impound the car, and then search every container inside.[2] Of course, where there is power, there are abuses of power, and discretion is often abused along racial lines. Police pull over more non-white drivers for minor infractions.[3] They also search non-white drivers more often and issue them more tickets.[4] Police kill Black motorists at much higher rates, and use non-lethal force against them more than twice as often.[5] At the same time, “[p]eople who are police, are related to the police, hold positions of power and authority, or who frequently work with or come in friendly contact with the police are largely immune from traffic enforcement.”[6] So what can we do about it? One solution would be to simply stop enforcing traffic laws. This option seems pretty attractive, given everything above.[7] For places with smaller populations, it may even be feasible. Several European cities have experimented with the idea of eliminating traffic controls with surprising success.[8] Nonetheless, traffic safety is a serious concern; every year, there are over five million crashes, resulting in over thirty thousand deaths.[9] Studies consistently show that reduced enforcement results in more crashes.[10] Conversely, “highly visible, sustained, and widespread” enforcement has been shown to be the most effective.[11] Read More
By Elizabeth Morales
Associate Editor, Vol, 24
On the first day of February, as temperatures in East Coast dropped below-freezing, a video showing inmates banging on the walls and windows of their cells at a Brooklyn jail went viral. The inmates were trying to alert people on the outside that their building had been with little to no heat for six days. Their call for help was successful, and a sea of protestors quickly formed on the streets below. More videos of activists chanting “turn on the heat!” made the social media rounds bringing worldwide attention to the conditions inside the jail. The jail in question is the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC Brooklyn). MDC Brooklyn is a pre-trial detention facility in Brooklyn, NY that houses more than 1,600 inmates at all security levels.[1] most of whom are awaiting trial or are there due to their inability to make bail.[2] Problems with the building’s heating system started on January 27th when an electrical fire broke out in the jail’s west building which houses only men.[3] The fire caused a partial power outage [4] and engaged the jail’s emergency power system.[5] There is dispute as to whether heat and hot water in the jail’s housing units was affected.[6] The jail’s warden, Herman Quay, responded to the public outcry stating via a spokeswoman that “[c]ells have heat and hot water, there is lighting in the common areas and inmates are receiving hot meals.”[7] Local public defenders and union leaders paint a different story.[8] They report receiving dozens of calls from inmates via a dedicated line inside the jail that directly connects the inmates with the federal defenders offices.[9] Inmates allegedly complained of frigid temperatures, ill health, pitch-black cells, and lack of access to essentials like extra blankets and additional sweaters.[10] Read More
