Introduction

Author(s):  
Michael J. Pfeifer

This introductory chapter discusses how the origins of American lynching can best be understood as a national, and a transnational, process of cultural and legal formation. Diverging significantly from England and western Europe, the United States' transition to a capitalist economy was not accompanied by the emergence of a strong, centralized national state that claimed and enforced an exclusive monopoly over violence and the administration of criminal justice to secure the rule of law. Rather, American criminal justice developed along a distinctive path that emphasized local authority and opinion, self-help and ad hoc law enforcement practices, and the toleration of extralegal violence. Lynching was an important aspect of this distinctive American trajectory from the late eighteenth through the early twentieth centuries.

Author(s):  
David Alan Sklansky

Criminal law and immigration law, once separate fields of governance in the United States, are rapidly growing less distinct. Immigration crimes now account for a majority of all federal prosecutions; deportation is widely seen as a key tool of crime control; immigration authorities run the nation’s largest prison system; and state and local law enforcement officers work hand-in-hand with federal immigration officials. This article traces these trends and assesses their significance. The rise of an intertwined regime of “crimmigration” law has generally been attributed to some combination of nativism, overcriminalization, and a cultural obsession with security, but it also exemplifies, and has helped to reinforce, a crucial and underappreciated development in U.S. legal culture—a rising tendency to treat legal rules and legal procedures as interchangeable tools, to be brought to bear pragmatically and instrumentally on an ad hoc basis. Ad hoc instrumentalism of this kind has genuine strengths, but it also raises significant concerns about the rule of law and political accountability. The accountability concerns, in particular, are exacerbated by two other features of our newly merged system of immigration enforcement and criminal justice: its bureaucratic opacity and its selective application.


2021 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Keith Cherry

Around the world, the current political conjuncture is one of profound challenges for constitutionalism and the rule of law. In the United States, the executive has willfully engaged in a prolonged attempt to weaponize the machinery of the state and radicalize public opinion in order to undermine a democratic election. In the European Union, the increasingly authoritarian relationship between the executive and the judiciary in Poland and Hungary is posing the most profound threat to European constitutionalism in decades. In Hong Kong, the Chinese state is actively seeking to undermine legislative and judicial independence in the face of unprecedented pro-democracy mobilizations. In India, Lebanon, Bolivia, and elsewhere mass mobilizations are challenging, and being suppressed in the name of, the rule of law. Here in Canada, the Wet’suwet’en and their supporters, as well as the Tsleil Waututh, Haudenosaunee, L’nu (Mi’kmaq), Inuit, and members of countless other Indigenous nations are contesting the very nature of the rule of law, as they assert Indigenous laws against the law enforcement of the colonial state. Around the world, the use of emergency powers in response to the COVID-19 pandemic is also raising profound constitutional concerns.


Author(s):  
Daniel C. Richman

Although police departments and prosecutor’s offices must closely collaborate, their organizational roles and networks, and the distinctive perspectives of their personnel, will inevitably and regularly lead to forceful dialogue and disruptive friction. Such friction can occasionally undermine thoughtful deliberation about public safety, the rule of law, and community values. Viewed more broadly, however, these interactions promote just such deliberation, which will become even healthier when the dialogue breaks out of the closed world of criminal justice bureaucracies and includes the public to which these bureaucracies are ultimately responsible. This chapter explores such organizational interactions and their value.


Author(s):  
Martin S. Flaherty

This introductory chapter discusses the Youngstown Sheet ﹠ Tube Co. v. Sawyer (1952) case. Also known as the “Steel Seizure case,” Youngstown became controversial after President Truman, facing a national steelworkers strike during the Korean War, ordered an emergency federal takeover of steel mills to keep them running. The chapter reveals that, during this trial, Justice Robert Jackson wrote an opinion that has ever since served as a classic framework for thinking about how the judiciary should resolve rival claims of authority between the president and Congress. In addition, six unelected lawyers in black robes told a president of the United States that he was powerless to take an action he thought to be essential for conducting a war. Through this case, the chapter demonstrates the awesome power of the American judiciary to maintain the rule of law, the Constitution, and, with them, basic rights.


2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 207
Author(s):  
Achmad Sulchan

In the implementation of law enforcement does not always correspond with what is written in the legislation. Law is created, grow and thrive in the community with the aim to regulate people's lives in order to create order, peace, tranquility and prosperity in society. This is reflected from one of the statutory functions as a tool of social control. Related criminal in the theft with violence as stipulated in Article 365 Book of the Criminal Justice Act. Application of the law against the crime of theft with violence shall comply with the applicable substantive criminal provisions and requirements can dipidananya defendant based on the facts revealed in court, there are two valid evidence, sworn testimony of witnesses who based their religion and beliefs of judges in deciding a defendant, to consider things that are burdensome and ease; To achieve the rule of law and the rule of law and justice with dignity, the judge legally consider also that the discovery of things that can release the defendant from criminal liability, either as an excuse or reason pemaaaf, the existence of a fault, is against the law and the absence of any reason as criminal eraser, so the judge can be found sane defendant considered to be able to be responsible


Jurnal Hukum ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 1737
Author(s):  
Ira Alia Maerani

Abstract                Indonesian Criminal Justice System consists of the police, public prosecutor and the courts. The role of the police investigators is certainly vital as the frontline in building public confidence in the rule of law in Indonesia. The role of the investigator is quite important in realizing society’s  justice. The era of globalization requires a pattern fast-paced, instant, measurable, and transparent of life and it requires investigators to follow the times by optimizing the use of technology. The aim of this study is to give effect to the rule of law in Indonesia that provides fairness, expediency and certainty. However, it considers to have priority of Pancasila values in the process of inquiry and investigation. The values of supreme divinity, God (religious), humanity, unity, democracy and justice are values that establish a balance (harmony) in enforcing the law. Law and its implementation can create product which meets the demands for social justice. This paper will examine the role of the investigator according to positive law currently in force as well as the role of investigator in implementing the values of Pancasila, accompanied by optimizing the use of technology. Keywords: Re-actualizing, Investigation, Police, values of Pancasila, Technology   AbstrakSistem Peradilan Pidana Indonesia meliputi institusi kepolisian, kejaksaan, dan pengadilan. Peran penyidik dalam institusi kepolisian tentunya amat vital sebagai garda terdepan dalam membangun kepercayaan masyarakat terhadap penegakan hukum di Indonesia. Peran penyidik amat besar dalam terwujudnya keadilan di masyarakat. Era globalisasi yang menuntut pola kehidupan yang serba cepat, instan, terukur, dan transparan menuntut penyidik untuk mengikuti perkembangan zaman dengan mengoptimalkan pemanfaatan teknologi. Tujuannya adalah untuk memberikan arti bagi penegakan hukum di Indonesia yakni memberikan keadilan, kemanfaatan, dan kepastian. Namun yang harus diperhatikan adalah mengutamakan nilai-nilai Pancasila dalam melakukan proses penyelidikan dan penyidikan. Nilai-nilai ketuhanan yang maha esa (religius), kemanusiaan, persatuan, kerakyatan dan keadilan merupakan nilai-nilai yang membangun keseimbangan (harmoni) dalam menegakkan hukum. Sehingga produk hukum dan pelaksanaannya memenuhi rasa keadilan masyarakat. Tulisan ini akan mengkaji tentang peran penyidik menurut hukum positif yang saat ini berlaku serta peran penyidik dalam mengimplementasikan  nilai-nilai Pancasila dengan diiringi optimalisasi pemanfaatan teknologi.Kata Kunci: Reaktualisasi,Penyidikan,Kepolisian,Nilai-nilai Pancasila,Teknologi


Author(s):  
Michael C. Dorf ◽  
Michael S. Chu

Lawyers played a key role in challenging the Trump administration’s Travel Ban on entry into the United States of nationals from various majority-Muslim nations. Responding to calls from nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), which were amplified by social media, lawyers responded to the Travel Ban’s chaotic rollout by providing assistance to foreign travelers at airports. Their efforts led to initial court victories, which in turn led the government to soften the Ban somewhat in two superseding executive actions. The lawyers’ work also contributed to the broader resistance to the Trump administration by dramatizing its bigotry, callousness, cruelty, and lawlessness. The efficacy of the lawyers’ resistance to the Travel Ban shows that, contrary to strong claims about the limits of court action, litigation can promote social change. General lessons about lawyer activism in ordinary times are difficult to draw, however, because of the extraordinary threat Trump poses to civil rights and the rule of law.


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