Portside

Trump’s three executive orders on policing, the large number of state legislatures dominated by Republicans, the pro-policing and pro-business attitude of the current administration, and the constant and growing spontaneous demonstrations protesting Trump all combine to produce an atmosphere in which many powerful interests have a stake in suppressing mass dissent.

As Justice Kennedy writes: “Yet the law responds to proper evidence and valid inferences in ever-changing circumstances, as it learns more about ways in which its commands are circumvented.” This is a strong signal to lower courts not to apply prior cases formalistically or mechanically, but to ferret out unconstitutional racial gerrymanders that take ever-evolving form.

Scholars from multiple disciplines around the world, weigh in on the social, psychological and political issues impacting transgender students.

Courts are scrambling to rule on state election laws in time for the elections being held later this year.

There is a lesson in the past fifty years of litigation. When the fight for equal rights for women narrowed to a fight for reproductive rights, defended on the ground of privacy, it weakened. But when the fight for gay rights became a fight for same-sex marriage, asserted on the ground of equality, it got stronger and stronger.

Union-backed groups mount new strikes, announce a potential federal complaint, and promise a big Black Friday.

Just how bad is the state of public defense in America? The charts below detail some of the biggest challenges plaguing the system.