Law

Let the Decision Stand

Every argument against Roe was squarely rejected in the Supreme Court’s 1992 Casey decision, and nothing has changed since then except the composition of the Court.

November 4, 2021 issue

A Canon for the American Prisoner

“There’s something critically important that books do for us that we can’t get anywhere else—because so much of prison is trying to master the art of becoming.”

October 5, 2021

The Human Costs of AI

Artificial intelligence does not come to us as a deus ex machina but, rather, through a number of dehumanizing extractive practices, of which most of us are unaware.

October 21, 2021 issue

The New Abortion Vigilantism

The abortion bounty law is novel and thus far unique to Texas, but similar civil enforcement regimes have a much darker history.

September 23, 2021

Whose Freedom?

Tyler Stovall demonstrates the potent and noxious ways that people have conflated freedom with whiteness but pays too little attention to the force of freedom as a concept.

September 23, 2021 issue

The Supreme Court’s Originalist Evasions

The justices’ spring session was widely commended for rulings that seemed to check abuses of police powers. But they did so only by studiously ignoring America’s contemporary realities.

August 13, 2021

Merrick Garland’s Moderation to Excess

As attorney general, he is the United States’ top law enforcement officer. But is he enforcing enough?

July 15, 2021

Surprising Consensus at the Supreme Court

With narrow rulings in many of its most controversial cases, the Court defied predictions of a sharp turn to the right.

August 19, 2021 issue

Death Drives

Pedestrian fatalities are rising dramatically in the US, and Angie Schmitt’s Right of Way gives a rare look at why and what might be done about it.

July 22, 2021 issue

More Than Accomplices

How do we determine the agency of female participants in genocidal regimes, where male supremacy often goes hand in hand with ethnic chauvinism?

July 1, 2021 issue