Events

Past Event

Constitutional Cities: Sanctuary Jurisdictions, Local Voice, and Individual Liberty

March 4, 2019
12:10 PM - 1:10 AM
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Jerome Greene Hall, Room 107

Event #3 of the Columbia Human Rights Law Review’s 50th Anniversary Symposium Series

Article: Constitutional Cities: Sanctuary Jurisdictions, Local Voice, and Individual Liberty
Authors: Toni M. Massaro, Regent’s Professor, Milton O. Riepe Chair in Constitutional Law, and Shefali Milczarek-Desai, Director, Workers Rights

Clinic and Professor of Practice of the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law

The United States is deeply divided on matters that range from immigration to religion to fracking. “Blue” states resist “red” federal policies and intra-state disputes pit state legislatures against recalcitrant local governments. One of these intergovernmental policy flare-ups involves so-called “sanctuary jurisdictions”—government actors that object to more aggressive immigration enforcement by slow-walking their voluntary compliance or denying it altogether. In some cases, they have filed lawsuits to voice their dissent.

Professors Toni M. Massaro and Shefali Milczarek-Desai of University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law will discuss the recent wave of sanctuary jurisdiction lawsuits in detail and identifies ways in which they undermine claims that local governments are powerless in the face of  federal or state authority. They will demonstrate how structural and civil liberty constitutional rights may protect local governments from some state and federal mandates, and how local residents too may have resistance options beyond the voting booth and the moving van.

HRLR’s 50th Anniversary Symposium Keynote is co-sponsored by Student Affairs and the Clerkship Office. The Author Series is co-sponsored by CSIL, Rightslink, SIRR, and LaLSA.