What’s New in Public Law

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—Amir Cahane, PhD student, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

—Carolina Gomide de Araujo, Master’s student, University of São Paulo

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In this weekly feature, I-CONnect publishes a curated reading list of developments in public law. “Developments” may include a selection of links to news, high court decisions, new or recent scholarly books and articles, and blog posts from around the public law blogosphere.

To submit relevant developments for our weekly feature on “What’s New in Public Law,” please email iconnecteditors@gmail.com.

Developments in Constitutional Courts

1. Pursuant to allegations of misconduct which involved harassing a female guest at an Arizona resort, Canadian Supreme Court justice Russel Brown is facing a judicial conduct review and has stepped down from his post.
2. The Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania declared the provisions of the Law on the Legal Status of Foreigners unconstitutional.
3. Benin’s new Constitutional Court began its five-year term.
4. US Supreme Court upholds Indian Adoption Law. The justices voted 7-2 to uphold the Indian Child Welfare Act, a law that prioritizes ensuring Native American children are adopted by Native American families.
5. Brazilian Federal Supreme Court Sets Former President Collor’s Sentence at 8 Years and 10 Months in Prison
6. Japan court rules that a bar on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional

In the News

1. The first constitutional climate suit in US history began, as 16 young residents of Montana allege state officials violated their constitutional rights to a healthy environment
2. Israeli parliamentary opposition declared that the talks at the President’s Residence over the government-proposed judicial reforms are officially frozen until the Judicial Selection Committee forms and begins to act’s win of a seat in the judicial selection committee.
3. The constitutional court of Indonesia dismissed a petition calling to change the election ballot system
4. EU Parliament voted to approve the E.U. AI Act.
5. Boris Johnson is standing down immediately as a Conservative MP after an investigation into the Partygate scandal found he misled parliament and recommended a lengthy suspension from the House of Commons.
6. Thousands protest in Poland against strict abortion law after pregnant woman died in Hospital.
7. Joe Biden vetoes a Republican-backed bill that would’ve rolled back a 2022 EPA rule that set stronger vehicle emissions standards to reduce air pollution.

New Scholarship

1. Kristopher Kinsinger, The Evolving Debate Over Section 33 of the Charter (providing a broadly representative summary of the assessments that have been offered of the notwithstanding clause over the course of the Canadian Charter’s 40-year history)
2. Tsvi Kahana, The Notwithstanding Clause in Canada: The First Forty Years  (Evaluating the use of the notwithstanding clause of the Canadian Charter over the first forty years of its existence)
3. Brett Parker, Polarization in State Supreme Courts, 1980-2020 (Examining whether US state high courts have polarized and to what extent)
4. David Schleicher and David Fontana, The Basketball Court (Considering an emerging form of the private separation of powers: a private supreme court-like institution internal to a single firm, using Meta’s Oversight Board as an example)
5. Bertrall L. Ross, Administrative Constitutionalism as Popular Constitutionalism (Suggesting that various forms of popular engagement with administrative agencies should be understood as forms of popular constitutionalism)
6. Surbhi Karwa, Book Review: Founding mothers of the Indian republic: gender politics of the framing of the constitution (Suggesting that he book should have engaged more critically with the challenges posed to the claim of radicality of the fifteen women constitution makers in India)
7. Matthew Coffin, Abortion at the Margins: The Constitutional Right to Abortion in the Case of Severe Fetal Abnormality (It argues that there exists a robust constitutional right to abortion of severely abnormal fetuses, defined as fetuses whose congenital malformations make their death inevitable in utero or shortly after birth)
8. Emmanuel Arnaud, A More Perfect Union for Whom? (This Piece examines how and why the people of the territories were never meant to be a part of the US)

Calls for Papers and Announcements

1. CFP for The European Human Rights Law Conference 2023. The theme of the  conference, which is scheduled to be held at the University of Cambridge Faculty of Law from 28 September to 29 September 2023, is ‘Human Rights: Prospects, Possibilities, Fears and Limitations’.
2. CFP for a Symposium on Judicial Rhetoric, which is scheduled to be held at the University of Virginia School of Law at April 5, 2024
3. An online launch of the European Implementation Network (EIN)’s and Democracy Reporting International (DRI)’s 2023 report on the non-implementation of regional courts’ judgments will be held on Monday 3 July 2023 between 16:00-17:30 CET.
4. The European Dialogue on Internet Governance (EuroDIG) 2023 will take place in Tampere, Finland, from 19 – 21 June. The theme of this year’s forum is ‘Internet in troubled times: risks, resilience, hope’.
5. Human Rights Council to hold its Fifty-Third Regular Session from 19 June to 14 July 2023

Elsewhere Online

1. Rimdolmsom Jonathan Kabré, Constitutional challenges to cryptocurrencies regulation in the Central African Republic (AfricLaw, May 2, 2023)
2. Laurent Pech, Doing Justice to Poland’s Muzzle Law (Verfassungsblog, June 11, 2023)
3. Gautam Bhatia, Diversity and Religious Freedoms in the Classroom: The Malawi High Court’s Judgment on Dreadlocks in Schools (Indian Constitutional Law and Philosophy, June 11, 2023)
4. Aylin Çırakcı, N. Betül Haliloğlu Pakdil and Ülkü Olcay Uykun Altıntaş, Taking Separation of Powers Seriously: Is it Constitutional for Turkish Ministers Elected as MPs to Continue Their Ministerial Posts? (Verfassungsblog, June 14, 2023)
5. Giulio Fedele, More Protection Than Recognition For Same-Sex Couples In Buhuceanu And Others V Romania, (Strasbourg Observers, 30 May, 2023)
6. Lauren Weber, Caitlin Gilbert and Taylor Lorenz. Documents show how conservative doctors influenced abortion, trans rights. (The Washington Post, June 15, 2023)
7. Neus Vidal Marti. The Key to Ensure Media Pluralism in the EU? A Unified Framework (Verfassungsblog, June 12, 2023)
8. Anthony Boadle and Leonardo Benassatto, Protests flare as Brazil approves bill limiting recognition of tribal lands (Reuters, May 30, 2023)