The United States is a separation-of-powers system within which the chief executive has substantially less power over domestic policy than, say, a British prime minister. Despite this, legislation passed by the United States Congress tends to be associated very strongly with the president who signed the bills. The Affordable Care Act—addressing what has been […]

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  My mother Isabel, a very light-skinned African American, once told me of a lunch stand she happily frequented as a 50s-era teenager in her North Carolina Piedmont town. She went there so frequently that the benevolent owners became akin to “second parents.” One day, she motioned to some students from her high school to […]

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  After President Barack Obama announced that the U.S. will reestablish diplomatic relations with Cuba, a collective “Oh no!” permeated the internet. And it persists. Not from right-leaning Cuban Americans in Miami, but from American liberals. The untouched, idyllic island they dreamed of visiting would soon be spoiled by corporate investment. Cuba will be ruined […]

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  At the New York premier of the documentary Citizenfour, Glenn Greenwald explained that the film presented an opportunity for audiences to make up their minds about the type of person Edward Snowden is. The captivating documentary by Pulitzer prize-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras is an account of Snowden setting in motion one of the most […]

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  After 227 years of history, how should we judge the United States Supreme Court? All of my years of studying, teaching, and practicing constitutional law have convinced me that the Supreme Court has rarely lived up to lofty expectations and far more often has upheld discrimination and even egregious violations of basic liberties. My […]

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