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Articles by Richard Schragger
In 20 years, this UVA professor hopes that Dillon’s Rule is a distant memory
Richard Schragger, a professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, encourages his students to look at cities differently. He wants them to understand cities beyond the brick-and-mortar — as representations of laws and social context. He describes how in the 1970s, many white Virginians were concerned about Black constituencies gaining influence in city governments.
The Structure of Religious Preference
A revolution has occurred in the law of religious freedom. At this point, the picture is reasonably clear. The Supreme Court has greatly expanded the scope of the Free Exercise Clause. In almost every Term over the past decade, it has taken cases involving free exercise challenges and sided with religious parties, requiring equal access to public funding and authorizing exemptions from a wide range of state and federal laws.
We Can Build Pro-Worker Cities
Richard Schragger When we talk about “city power,” sometimes we’re talking about cities’ economic wherewithal and by extension their fiscal capacity. Other times we are talking about cities’ formal legal authority in the context of a federal system. One overriding question is: What makes cities thrive, and what leads to their decline? But we also have to ask what we mean when we say cities are thriving. Do we mean that they have high property values and low tax rates?
What Common Good?
This article appears in the April 2022 issue of The American Prospect magazine. Subscribe here. Common Good Constitutionalism By Adrian Vermeule Polity Just as the Supreme Court is poised to achieve many of the stated aims of the conservative legal movement, including overturning Roe v. Wade and striking down affirmative action, leading conservative thinkers are hotly debating alternative approaches to interpreting the Constitution.
Local Control of Land Use: A Partial Defense
The Perils of Land Use Deregulation, my intervention in the land use/housing debate, has now been published by the University of Pennsylvania Law Review. This article has already attracted some critical attention, including by others on this blog, and—as with all things housing-related these days—the disagreement can be sharp. No one will mistake an 80-page article on land use for a tweet.
Richard C. Schragger column: Basic principles of property law support the governor’s decision to remove the Lee statue
Richard C. Schragger column: Basic principles of property law support the governor’s decision to remove the Lee statue 1 of 3 In February, a woman looked through the fencing around the Robert E. Lee statue on Monument Avenue. Fencing went up around the Robert E. Lee statue on Monument Avenue in January. By Richard C. Schragger On June 8, the Virginia Supreme Court will hear arguments in two cases involving the Robert E. Lee statue still standing on Richmond’s Monument Avenue.
Symposium before oral argument in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia Archives
On Monday at 9:30 a.m., the court released orders from the October 30 conference. The justices did not grant oral argument in any new cases, called for the views of the federal government in one pending case, and released unsigned opinions in Mckesson v. Doe and Taylor v. Riojas, summarily overturning the 5th Circuit's judgment in Taylor and ordering further proceedings in McKesson. At 10 a.m., the justices will hear oral argument in U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service v. Sierra Club and Salinas v.
Symposium: Religious privilege in Fulton and beyond
This article is part of a symposium previewing Fulton v. City of Philadelphia. Micah Schwartzman is the Harry Cross Dillard professor of law at the University of Virginia School of Law. Richard Schragger is the Perre Bowen professor of law at the University of Virginia School of Law. Nelson Tebbe is the Jane M.G. Foster professor of law at Cornell Law School. All three joined an amicus brief in support of Philadelphia.
The Separation of Church and State Is Breaking Down Under Trump Original
Religious groups are getting special treatment from the government’s pandemic-relief efforts. June 29, 2020 Getty / The Atlantic The separation of Church and state is supposed to prevent government favoritism of religion in the United States.
Richard Schragger column: Pandemics and our faulty federalism
In Georgia, Gov. Brian Kemp has ordered a relaxing of essential business restrictions, overruling municipal stay-at-home orders. Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms is apoplectic. In New York, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio are at loggerheads over who gets to decide whether schools remained closed or open.
The Constitutional Separation of Church and State Faces Demise - The New York Times
The First Amendment’s Establishment Clause prohibits the government from making any law “respecting an establishment of religion.” This has long been thought to prohibit direct government support for religion. The contours of that idea have been contested, and they have contracted over time. But the commitment to some form of separation of church and state has endured.
Churches are making contradictory First Amendment claims during the pandemic
More and more, churches are challenging stay-at-home orders or bans on large gatherings, with litigation in over a dozen states. In Virginia, for example, Lighthouse Fellowship sued the governor after police cited the church’s pastor for allowing in-person church services with more than 10 people. The U.S. Department of Justice backed the church, a move that puts pressure on the state to lift public health restrictions.
Richard Schragger column: It’s time for home rule in Virginia
In 1969, the drafters of the new Virginia Constitution included a proposed provision stating that “a charter county or a city may exercise any power or perform any function which is not denied to it by this Constitution, by its charter, or by laws enacted by the General Assembly. ...” This proposed “home rule” provision was similar to a number of state constitutional provisions across the country, so to the drafters it likely seemed straightforward and uncontroversial.
Opinion/Commentary: Stakes high in statue litigation
A Charlottesville circuit judge recently ruled that two statues of Confederate generals — Robert E. Lee and Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson — that sit in Charlottesville city parks are "war memorials" under a Virginia state statute that bars their removal. Those statues were the site of the white-supremacist rally in the summer of 2017, in which a counterprotester, Heather Heyer, was murdered by a self-avowed white supremacist.
Richard Schragger column: High stakes in the Charlottesville monuments litigation
A Charlottesville circuit judge recently ruled that two statues of Confederate generals — Robert E. Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson — that sit in Charlottesville city parks are “war memorials” under a Virginia state statute that bars their removal. Those statues were the site of the white supremacist rally in the summer of 2017, in which a counter-protester, Heather Heyer, was murdered by a self-avowed white supremacist.
Richard Schragger column: It's the city's right to remove Confederate monuments
It has been more than a year and a half since white supremacists rallied in Charlottesville to protest the city’s decision to remove statues of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. A counterprotester, Heather Heyer, was killed by one of those white supremacists. Yet the General Assembly still can’t see its way to adopting a law that would clarify that cities and towns in Virginia have the authority to take down the many Confederate monuments that are scattered around the commonwealth.
Perspective | The Bladensburg Peace Cross sends the message that some citizens are less valued than others
The Supreme Court should embrace the idea that our public institutions belong equally to people of all faiths. The Memorial Peace Cross, in Bladensburg, Md., is at the center of a crucial Establishment Clause case before the Supreme Court. (Mark Gail/FOR THE WASHINGTON POST) Richard C.
City Versus State | Boston Review
The past two decades have celebrated the idea of “the city resurgent.” Cities in the United States and around the world have seen their populations stabilize and their wealth increase. Moreover, a new and emerging city-led urban liberalism has been touted as our best hope in the face of regressive and reactionary policies at the state and national level. The city “triumphant” has been held up and lionized, its progressive possibilities encouraged.
Three Problems with President Trump’s Guantánamo Tweet
In case you missed it, this morning’s tweetstorm from the White House began with this missive: 122 vicious prisoners, released by the Obama Administration from Gitmo, have returned to the battlefield. Just another terrible decision! — Donald J.
Just Security Posts on Trump's Executive Order on Refugees and Immigration
Published by The Lawfare Institute in Cooperation With Over the days since President Trump signed his executive order banning immigrants and refugees from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the United States, Lawfare has produced a great deal of commentary and analysis on the subject. But our readers should also be aware that Just Security has had some first-rate coverage of the executive order, particularly on many technical questions of immigration law.
Trump wasn’t elected as a culture warrior. He may govern as one.
Before the election, it was common to hear experts say the “culture wars” were over, and that the left had won. True, there were debates about how progressives could most effectively consolidate their gains, and about whether they should be magnanimous in victory. But participants in these debates shared an assumption that, for instance, women’s right to choose and marriage equality were secure. After the election, all that has changed.
Four Counterintuitive Things the Next President Needs to Do for Cities
This feature has been adapted from City Power. Donate to Next City and receive a copy of the book. In the early to mid-20th century, American cities were the engines of opportunity and mobility in the industrial United States. Economic growth was synonymous with city growth.
Seven Sisters are open to Obamacare contraception compromise
This week, the Little Sisters of the Poor told the Supreme Court that they are finally willing to let the government accommodate their religious beliefs. In a case argued last month, Zubik v. Burwell, the order of nuns challenged the government’s efforts to work around their religious objections to paying for health insurance that covers contraception.
Ted Cruz is an originalist hypocrite over Antonin Scalia.
Justice Antonin Scalia’s death had barely been announced before the fight over his potential successor began to reach a fever pitch. Republicans are saying that there shouldn’t be another appointment until the next president is in office. Democrats, meanwhile, are arguing that the Republican-controlled Senate has a constitutional responsibility to consider Obama’s appointment.
Flint Was Denied Democracy. That’s One Reason Nobody Acted When Its Water Was Poisoned.
In the last few weeks, the water poisoning scandal in Flint, Michigan, has revealed a lot about our cities, from the entrenched inequities in America’s basic infrastructure to the amount of damage incompetent or negligent officials can wreak upon their citizenry. It also revealed a deep flaw in how the U.S. Supreme Court treats cities: When it comes to local government, Americans have no constitutional rights.
Obergefell and the End of Religious Reasons for Lawmaking
In Obergefell v. Hodges, marriage equality for same-sex couples became the law of the land. In the wake of the decision on Friday, focus has intensified on religious freedom for traditionalists. Few of the questions about religious accommodation are novel—they had been playing out in the states for some time.
The Utah Compromise is no model for the nation.
Last week, Utah’s governor signed a historic bill that extends state antidiscrimination protection to LGBT people in housing and employment. The law will extend needed protection to tens of thousands of Utah’s citizens. Remarkably, this has happened in a state with a Republican legislature and a Republican governor. That development is remarkable and salutary.
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