{"id":94,"date":"2017-01-31T16:41:16","date_gmt":"2017-01-31T21:41:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nlg.org\/nlg-review\/?post_type=article&p=94"},"modified":"2017-01-31T17:04:14","modified_gmt":"2017-01-31T22:04:14","slug":"editors-preface-fall-2016","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/www.nlg.org\/nlg-review\/article\/editors-preface-fall-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"Editor’s Preface: Fall 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Nathan Goetting<\/strong><\/p>\n

The foundation of democracy is universal education\u2014the two exist in tan\u00addem. True democracy means self-government. It also means the abolition of artificial hierarchies and the distinction between the rulers and the ruled. The extension of education to disenfranchised people\u2014giving them the ability to read, write, and self-advocate\u2014is the first step toward the social and political equality democracy requires. This is why, after the 1831 slave uprising led by Nat Turner, whose reading of the Bible led to his unique brand of liberation theology, slaveholding states passed legislation outlawing the teaching of reading to slaves. Open minds can\u2019t abide bodies in chains.<\/p>\n

In the wake of the inauguration of a President whose nominee for Secretary of Education is committed to defunding public schools,1 Malhar Shah\u2019s \u201cThe Fundamental Right to Literacy: Relitigating the Fundamental Right to Educa\u00adtion After Rodriguez<\/em> and Plyler<\/em>\u201d could hardly be more timely. In it Shah argues for a fundamental constitutional right to literacy. The right is fundamental, he argues, both in the sense that it is a right of the highest order according to the standards set by the Supreme Court and that reading and writing are \u201cpreservative of all other rights\u201d\u2014that is, one cannot assert one\u2019s rights within our legal and political system without first reading and understanding them.<\/p>\n

As Amber Penn-Roco points out in \u201cStanding Rock and the Erosion of Tribal Rights,\u201d the Dakota Access Pipeline was a direct attack on the sovereignty of the tribe living on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. A leak in the pipe\u00adline could poison the tribe\u2019s water supply and threaten their very\u00a0 existence. Penn-Roco, an attorney for a native-owned firm that focuses on native rights, explains that the federal government has an obligation to \u201cconsult\u201d with tribes before it allows corporations to launch such projects and that, legally, consulta\u00adtion requires more than just the delivery of bad news\u2014it means a seat at the table where decisions are made. Activists from around the world, including many Guild members, converged on Standing Rock to protest the pipeline. Their courageous opposition in the face of malevolent opposition caused the federal government to halt construction\u2014at least for now. But the fight is far from over. History has shown that as long there are valuable natural resources on tribal land there will be corporations determined to exploit them. Ancient treaties oblige the federal government to protect tribes from such depreda\u00adtions. History has also shown that, without pressure, the government rarely feels compelled to honor these obligations.<\/p>\n

In \u201cThe Future of Diversity,\u201d published in NLGR <\/em>in 2012 before the Supreme Court announced its decision in Fisher v. University of Texas<\/em>, Erwin Chemer\u00adinsky explained what was at stake if, as expected, the Court ruled all forms of race-based affirmative action in higher education unconstitutional. Now, in \u201cA Victory for Education,\u201d Chemerinsky explains the consequences of the Court\u2019s surprising decision to uphold the University of Texas\u2019s affirmative action plan after rehearing the case in 2016. It was Associate Justice Anthony M. Kennedy\u2019s unexpected change of heart in this case that preserved Texas\u2019s modest form of affirmative action from constitutional erasure. As a result, colleges and universi\u00adties can continue to use race as a consideration in their efforts to foster learning by introducing diverse viewpoints on campus.<\/p>\n

President Obama granted either a pardon or commutation of sentence to just under 2,000 federal convicts, many of them in the final weeks of his presidency. Most of the beneficiaries were non-violent drug offenders who had been overpunished as part of the federal government\u2019s notorious \u201cWar on Drugs.\u201d The economic devastation caused by the government\u2019s anti-drug laws over the past few decades, especially in predominately non-white com\u00admunities, has been incalculable. Two thousand acts of clemency is a token gesture when nearly half the federal prison population, 82,415 human beings, are incarcerated for drug offenses.2<\/p>\n

Clemency is a bandage, not a cure. In \u201cWe Must Do Better: The Clemency Case of Charceil Kellam\u201d attorney and NLGR <\/em>editorial board member Richael Faithful gives the context surrounding the conviction of her recently released client, a struggling drug addict and mother of two who was serving life with\u00adout the possibility of parole for a non-violent drug offense. Faithful explains the many flaws and prejudices in the criminal justice system that made her client\u2019s conviction possible.<\/p>\n

Never in the history of the Lawyers Guild has there been a U.S. president so openly and avowedly\u2014and obnoxiously\u2014hostile to our mission and values as Donald J. Trump.\u00a0 In \u201cBuilding on 80 Years of Radical Lawyering in the Age of Trump,\u201d Guild President Natasha Lycia Ora Bannon describes her vision of how we will resist Trump\u2019s agenda while staying true to our own.<\/p>\n

\u2014Nathan Goetting, editor-in-chief<\/em><\/p>\n

_____________________<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Kate Zernike, Betsy DeVos, Trump\u2019s Education Pick, Has Steered Money From Public Schools<\/em>, N.Y. Times (Nov. 23, 2016), https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2016\/11\/23\/us\/politics\/betsy-devos-trumps-education-pick-has-steered-money-from-public-schools.html?_r=0.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Offenses<\/em>, Federal Bureau of Prisons, https:\/\/www.bop.gov\/about\/statistics\/statistics_in\u00admate_offenses.jsp (last updated Dec. 24, 2016).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    By Nathan Goetting The foundation of democracy is universal education\u2014the two exist in tan\u00addem. True democracy means self-government. It also means the abolition of artificial hierarchies and the distinction between the rulers and the ruled. The extension of education to disenfranchised people\u2014giving them the ability to read, write, and self-advocate\u2014is the first step toward the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":111,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"issuem_issue":[38],"class_list":["post-94","article","type-article","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","issuem_issue-nlg-review-vol-73-no-3","post"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t