Law Professors Joy Milligan and Bertrall Ross discuss how we should interpret a Constitution that was not written for or drafted by “We the People”. The original constitution excluded women and racial minorities. The drafters and the commentators of the period were exclusively white men. Many of the subsequent amendments were adopted under "undemocratic" conditions and interpreted by courts that did not fairly reflect the population then, or now. However, there is evidence that the language and ...
Apr 02, 2024•46 min•Season 1Ep. 37
Since the mid to late 1980s, an increasingly conservative federal bench has made it more difficult to defend Indian rights under existing treaties and federal law. John Echohawk is an attorney and Executive Director of the Native American Rights Fund (NARF) defending Native American tribes, organizations, and individuals. He joins SideBar to discuss issues such as tribal sovereignty, treaty rights, natural resource protection, voting rights, and Indian education.
Mar 19, 2024•34 min•Season 1Ep. 36
The federal constitution neither explicitly nor implicitly includes the right to vote. Instead, the framers allowed the States to determine the “Time, Places, and Manner of holding Elections.” Rick Hasen, author of A Real Right to Vote: How a Constitutional Amendment Can Safeguard American Democracy, believes that needs to change. He asserts that a constitutional right to vote can deescalate election litigation and can safeguard democracy from election subversion.
Mar 05, 2024•42 min•Season 1Ep. 35
Federal judges have lifetime tenure with little to no oversight. Despite employing thousands of new law school graduates as law clerks, they aren’t subject to anti-discrimination or other workplace laws. How is it possible that federal courts do not have to follow the same federal labor laws they enforce? In this episode, Aliza Shatzman, founder of the Legal Accountability Project, describes the experience that inspired her to create LAP and what needs to change to hold federal judges accountabl...
Feb 20, 2024•38 min•Season 1Ep. 34
Access to an ethically based justice system not only protects free and fair elections, but also impacts the rights that affect our everyday lives. In this episode of SideBar, Professor and Author Renee Knake Jefferson calls for lawyers and judges, including the US Supreme Court, to further commit to ethical access to justice.
Feb 06, 2024•43 min•Season 1Ep. 33
Appellate courts decide what our laws mean and how they affect all aspects of our personal lives: our ability to vote, how we are policed, our religious freedom, the quality of our education, our workplaces, healthcare, immigration protections, and much more. Yet people of color remain greatly underrepresented as both appellate attorneys and judges. Juvaria Khan, founder of The Appellate Project discusses the importance of diversity of lived experience in defining equity and fairness in judicial...
Jan 16, 2024•35 min•Season 1Ep. 32
SideBar cohosts and law deans Jackie Gardina and Mitch Winick look back over the 29 episodes and 25 guests featured in SideBar's incredibly successful first season. If you have been a listener, this episode will highlight key moments from our discussions with expert guests, authors, lawyers, and judges on critical issues facing democracy, the legal system, the Supreme Court, and society. If you haven't been a listener yet, start with this special episode to get a head start on selecting topics a...
Jan 02, 2024•58 min•Season 1Ep. 31
David Pepper, author of Saving Democracy: A User’s Manual for Every American, returns to SideBar to sound the alarm that democracy remains under attack. Although there were shocking lowlights in 2023, David reminds us that there are also signs of hope. Our final SideBar episode of Season One is a reminder that we all have a critical role to play in the battle for democracy.
Dec 19, 2023•37 min•Season 1Ep. 30
Disinformation and deepfakes, accelerated by AI, pose an existential threat to our democracy and elections, and as a country, we are simply not ready says The California Institute for Technology and Democracy (CITED). Drew Liebert and Jonathan Mehta Stein believe that what is needed is an impartial source for policymakers, the press, and the public that will provide expertise related to AI regulation as it applies to campaign communication and election integrity.
Dec 05, 2023•45 min•Season 1Ep. 29
Before killing George Floyd, Officer Devin Chauvin had at least 18 misconduct complaints lodged against him. Despite this history, Chauvin was elevated to training new officers. How could this happen? UCLA Law Professor Joanna Schwartz, author of Shielded: How the Police Became Untouchable, explains how courts have constructed multiple legal barriers to holding police accountable, making it nearly impossible for victims of police misconduct to obtain damages or to seek changes to police departme...
Nov 21, 2023•38 min•Season 1Ep. 28
The COVID pandemic exposed weaknesses in our public health system and exposed the lack of trust in science and government. The change in the Supreme Court’s interpretation of public health law has been equally startling . . . overturning 100+ years of public protection by granting religious ideology priority over science. Northeastern University Law Professor Wendy Parmet also serves as the Faculty Director of the university's Center for Health Policy and Law and is the author of Constitutional ...
Nov 07, 2023•39 min•Season 1Ep. 27
Professor Jeff Kosseff, author of "Liar in a Crowded Theater: Freedom of Speech in a World of Misinformation" examines and defends constitutional protection for false speech. "It's the listener and the reader who gets to choose, not the Government!" says Jeff. His warning is that "Once we give away our freedom of speech, we are unlikely to get it back." Jeff is also the author of "The United States of Anonymous: How the First Amendment Shaped Online Speech" and "The Twenty-Six Words That Created...
Oct 17, 2023•39 min•Season 1Ep. 26
Nationally recognized immigration law expert, Professor Cesar García Hernández of The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law talks about the intersection of criminal and immigration law, including the rights of migrants in the criminal justice system, immigration imprisonment, and race-based immigration policing.
Oct 03, 2023•41 min•Season 1Ep. 25
Professor and Dean Emerita Lisa Kloppenberg, author of The Best Beloved Thing is Justice: The Life of Dorothy Wright Nelson, discusses her mentor, colleague, and friend. Judge Nelson was a true trailblazer for women in the legal profession. She was one of only two women in her class at the UCLA School of Law and one of the first 14 female tenure-track law professors in the United States. She became one of the first women to lead an American law school as Dean of USC Gould School of Law and later...
Sep 19, 2023•33 min•Season 1Ep. 24
Supreme Court Correspondent Nina Totenberg discusses her fifty-year career as a reporter covering some of the most important Supreme Court decisions of our time. As a front-row witness to history, with unique access to Supreme Court Justices and Washington D.C. policymakers, Nina joins SideBar cohosts Jackie Gardina and Mitch Winick to discuss the importance of building relationships - with the Court - within the Court - and most importantly, with the public. Along with Susan Stamberg, Cokie Rob...
Sep 05, 2023•50 min•Season 1Ep. 23
Professor Stephen Vladeck author of the New York Times bestselling book, The Shadow Docket: How the Supreme Court Uses Stealth Rulings to Amass Power and Undermine the Republic, discusses how the Supreme Court has dramatically expanded the use of the little-known - and poorly understood - "Shadow Docket" to approve unconstitutional voting processes, abortion bans, restrictive immigration policies, and expanded religious liberties. Vladeck is a CNN Supreme Court analyst and cohosts an award-winni...
Aug 15, 2023•32 min•Season 1Ep. 22
Professor Julie Suk, author of After Misogyny: How the Law Fails Women and What to Do About It, discusses the legal and economic framework in the United States that fails to fairly recognize and value women's work. Unfortunately, the U.S. remains a leader in unequal pay, no pay, inadequate support for childcare, healthcare, and social services, and irregular parental leave policies and protections. Professor Julie Suk explains how other countries have enacted constitutional protections and inclu...
Aug 01, 2023•40 min•Season 1Ep. 21
After 200 years of racial and ethnic struggle, including the Civil War, Reconstruction, the Civil Rights Era, and Black Lives Matter, where are we now in the effort to achieve the promise of a multi-racial democracy? Dr. Peniel Joseph helps us to understand this struggle and describes our current political environment in a historical context. He holds a joint professorship at the LBJ School of Public Affairs and the History Department in the College of Liberal Arts at The University of Texas at ...
Jul 18, 2023•40 min•Season 1Ep. 20
Damon T. Hewitt, President and Executive Director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law, discusses Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. University of North Carolina and the Supreme Court’s direction on affirmative action. Hewitt explains what Brown v. Board of Education got wrong, exposes the logical fallacy behind the idea that a diversity rationale should have an endpoint, and offers insights on what higher education institutions should do in response to the Court’s decisio...
Jul 04, 2023•36 min•Season 1Ep. 19
Dr. Thaddeus Johnson, former police officer, Senior Fellow at the Council on Criminal Justice, and Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice and Criminology at Georgia State University, discusses his research and unique insights on empowering citizens to create safer communities. Public safety requires more than police reform, it requires community reform and in this wide-ranging and motivating conversation, Dr. Johnson details the steps communities can take to reduce crime, increase police accoun...
Jun 20, 2023•47 min•Season 1Ep. 18
Professors Morgan Hazelton and Rachael Hinkle have published a fascinating book on one of the mysteries behind Supreme Court decision-making. "Persuading the Supreme Court: The Significance of Briefs in Judicial Decision-Making" combines research of more than 25,000 party and amicus briefs filed between 1984 and 2015 and interviews with former Supreme Court clerks and attorneys to shed light on the use of amicus briefs, one of the more mysterious and consequential features of Supreme Court cases...
Jun 06, 2023•39 min•Season 1Ep. 17
Nicole Clark, lawyer, entrepreneur, and CEO of Trellis, discusses how the award-winning technology start-up she founded is democratizing access to the law by making state trial court records more accessible and bringing transparency to the judicial system. Nicole describes her vision, reveals the challenges for women entrepreneurs to obtain venture capital, and predicts how legal technology will transform the legal profession.
May 16, 2023•36 min•Season 1Ep. 16
The indomitable, outspoken, brilliant, and thoughtful Elie Mystal, author, columnist, and commentator, joins cohosts Jackie Gardina and Mitch Winick to discuss his book Allow Me to Retort: A Black Guy's Guide to the Constitution. In this wide-ranging conversation, Elie challenges our thinking about how judges should be selected, the myth of judicial ethics, and the false narrative of "originalism".
May 02, 2023•47 min•Season 1Ep. 15
Judge Margaret McKeown discusses her new book Citizen Justice: The Environmental Legacy of William O. Douglas and her research on the Supreme Court Justice's controversial approach to advocacy both on and off the bench. During his 36 years on the bench, Justice Douglas was threatened with impeachment twice, including concerns about private payments received during his long tenure and for a perceived conflict of interest where he refused to recuse himself. Is history repeating itself?
Apr 18, 2023•32 min•Season 1Ep. 14
Law Professor Nomi Stolzenberg discusses the US Supreme Court’s consideration of Conservative Christian ideology as a new protected class under the First Amendment. Seven of the nine members of the Supreme Court are Catholic or raised Catholic. How does this potentially affect the decisions being handed down by the Supreme Court?
Apr 04, 2023•34 min•Season 1Ep. 13
Professor Charles Geyh, an expert in judicial conduct, discusses the ethical obligations of judges and the options available (or not) when judges break the rules - including the U.S. Supreme Court justices. He also weighs the pros and cons of electing vs. appointing judges.
Mar 21, 2023•39 min•Season 1Ep. 12
Professor Joel Rogers describes the rise of American Legislative Council (ALEC), the organization responsible drafting model bills introduced across the country with devastating impacts upon public education, voting rights, and environmental protections, to name a few. He also outlines a strategy for reversing these efforts and provides a message of hope.
Mar 07, 2023•35 min•Season 1Ep. 11
In this SideBar episode, California Assemblymember, Buffy Wicks discusses the power of state legislatures to protect fundamental constitutional rights and the importance of diverse representation.
Feb 21, 2023•38 min•Season 1Ep. 10
In this episode of SideBar, Suzanne Nossel, the Chief Executive Officer of PenAmerica, discusses the dangers of book bans and educational gag orders to our core democratic values. She places these laws within a historical context, explains why they matter, and provides a way forward.
Feb 04, 2023•40 min•Season 1Ep. 9
In this episode of SideBar, Orly Lobel, author and Warren Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law discusses both the opportunities and challenges of harnessing the power AI. Her most recent book, The Equality Machine: Harnessing Digital Technology for a Brighter, More Inclusive Future (PublicAffairs 2022), was named one of The Economist's Best Books of 2022.
Jan 21, 2023•36 min•Season 1Ep. 8
