Abstract Like the overall well-being of Indigenous peoples, Native reproductive health has been deeply impacted by the direct and collateral consequences of settler colonialism. Today, Natives experience some of the most dire reproductive health disparities. Unlike other health care systems, however, Native health care is sui generis. The federal government has treaty, trust, and statutory...
Indigenous Peoples in International (Treaty) Diplomacy
Abstract International diplomacy has traditionally been considered the exclusive prerogative of states, who engage with each other on matters of peace, conflict, and trade with an eye to national interests and global wellbeing. This is one of a series of works considering “Indigenous Diplomacy”—a practice in which Indigenous Peoples engage with states, as well as other Indigenous Peoples, groups...
Welcome to Red Rising: The Shifting Legal Landscape of Tribal Sovereignty
Juridicial Occasions for Racial Formation: The Freedmen's Bureau, Labor, and Private Law
Abstract The Reconstruction Era has garnered renewed attention from legal historians and scholars of the critical race tradition. Yet Reconstruction’s central institutional actor, the Freedmen’s Bureau—a federal agency created to aid emancipated persons’ transition to freedom—has largely eluded theoretical scrutiny. Building upon legal scholarship on Reconstruction, this Essay pans focus away...
Landback as Federal Policy
Abstract Demands for the return of land to tribal nations have become much louder and more compelling in recent years. While “landback” has been part of federal policy for nearly a century, lawmakers and presidents from both parties have embraced landback initiatives more firmly in the last half century. But the quantity of lands returned is almost insignificant in comparison to the vast lands...
How Does an Immigrant Become an “American”? Exclusion and Assimilation in U.S. Naturalization Law
Ugly fears of unassimilated immigrants have persisted throughout American history, influencing immigration law for centuries. From Chinese exclusion in the late 1800s, to President Trump’s Muslim ban in 2017, to his continued emphasis on securing our borders today, American history is rich with examples of exclusionary immigration policies. Though many of these laws impose obstacles to entering...
Major Questions in the Plenary Power Domain
Immigration law has been described as a field of constitutional oddity. Under the plenary power doctrine, courts have deferred to government decisions on immigration policy that would plainly violate constitutional rights outside of the immigration context. Courts have wielded the plenary power doctrine as a tool of systemic racism, using it to uphold racially discriminatory immigration policies...
Privacy and the Impossibility of Borders
This Article argues that a meaningful conception of privacy renders borders illegitimate. For those present in a nation state without legal authorization, pursuit of their basic rights carries the real risk that identifying information collected will expose them to immigration enforcement. Such a phenomenon is becoming more real considering an expanding border enforcement apparatus that relies on...