Will the Supreme Court ban the death penalty?

Last term, the U.S. Supreme Court interpreted the “equal protection” clause of the Constitution with a modern, progressive read in requiring all 50 states to recognize same sex marriage. This term, might the Court give a similarly enlightened read to the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment and ban the death penalty? It’s

It’s time to retire “Stand Your Ground” laws

According to a scathing new report from the American Bar Association, “Stand Your Ground” laws increase homicides, foster a shoot-first mentality that is a “license to kill,” disproportionately justify violence against people of color, and endanger police officers. Coincidentally, this occurred during the same week that the infamous shooter most associated with Stand Your Ground,

GOP candidates are running against the Constitution

GOP presidential hopeful Dr. Ben Carson announced on Meet the Press last weekend that he did not think a Muslim should become President of the United States. “I would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation,” said the candidate who has ranked second to Donald Trump in polls. “I absolutely

Dehumanizing transgender people with one simple trick

Of all the inventive methods used to create fear toward People Who Aren’t Like Us, the specter of mixed-use bathrooms is, historically, one of the more common. In the 1950s blacks were forbidden from using white bathrooms in much of the South. In the battle over the Equal Rights Amendment in the 1980s, antifeminist activist

Kim Davis and the limits of religious freedom

How surreal for me to return home from a freewheeling week at Burning Man – the 70,000-strong arts community in the Nevada desert that’s all about inclusion and love – to read about a Kentucky official so opposed to recognizing same-sex marriage that she attempted to shut down all marriages in her county, then went

What the St. Paul’s rape case teaches us

Criminal trials are great at exposing painful social problems but terrible at addressing them. In New Hampshire, a young man faces multiple charges of sexual assault arising out of an incident at an elite private high school, St. Paul’s School. The school boasts graduates like Secretary of State John Kerry, former FBI Director Robert Mueller.

Your legal rights to protest, explained

From police brutality to Wall Street excesses to obscene amounts of money in politics, we have much to protest in 2015 America. I believe wholeheartedly in nonviolent protests. I’ve attended many over my lifetime and in the last year. Demonstrations helped get women the right to vote, shamed the country into ending Jim Crow segregation

The Police Bullying of Sandra Bland

It’s surely small comfort to Sandra Bland’s family that there’s an audio and video recording of her arrest, since she died (off camera) in a Texas jail three days after being pulled over for failing to signal a lane change. A Texas prosecutor said on Thursday that according to medical examiners, the #BlackLivesMatter activist did

Will We Finally Fix Our Broken Prison System?

US politicians have suddenly woken up and realized—finally—that something has to be done about mass incarceration. At the end of my chapter “Mass Incarceration: Young Men Locked Up, Locked Out” in my book Swagger, I wrote: What’s remarkable is that millions of us — mostly young men — have disappeared from American life in just one

Donald Trump’s Textbook Racism

This week I’ve appeared on Dr. Drew’s HLN TV show, Jami Floyd’s WNYC radio show, and several others, talking about race. Reality show star and real estate magnate Donald Trump said of Mexican immigrants a few weeks ago: “They are bringing drugs. They are bringing crime. They are rapists and some I assume, are good