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Keisha Stokes-Hough
Keisha Stokes-Hough is a deputy director of legal management at the Southern Poverty Law Center.
The Alabama Constitution: Despite a Century of Updates, Traces of its Racist Past Linger
The constitution’s extensive amendments and inclusion of local government rules make Alabama’s constitution the country’s longest
McCombie v. Illinois State Board of Elections
Refused to accept an original action by the state’s house majority leader and voters, claiming that house districts drawn in 2021 are partisan and not compact, finding the complaint untimely and barred by laches because the plaintiffs did not exercise due diligence in bringing suit. The dissenting justice said the majority was wrong to discredit the plaintiffs’ argument that they had to collect data from multiple election cycles. Because the Illinois high court has never adjudicated a state constitutional partisan gerrymandering claim before, he opined, it has not provided guidance on whether such data — which was required for federal constitutional claims until the U.S. Supreme Court in Rucho v. Common Cause (2019) ruled such claims cannot be brought — is applicable for a state constitutional challenge.
Natural Rights in State Courts
State constitutional provisions broadly protecting “inherent rights” do real work.
State v. Dias
Held that the Georgia Supreme Court had previously only ruled that the state constitution's right against self-incrimination precluded admission of a suspect's right to consent to a breath test and had never ruled that drawing someone’s blood implicated the right against compelled self-incrimination
Boline v. JKC Trucking
Held that impecuniosity following an award of sanctions did not violate the open courts provision of state constitution, which guarantees a right to access state courts
McNabb v. Harrison
Held that the state constitution requires a candidate running for municipal judgeship to be a resident of the same municipality to which he will be assigned, both at time of the election and for one year prior
State v. Mercedes
Held that officers were not required to administer warnings pursuant to article I section 7 of the Washington constitution as interpreted by prior caselaw -- informing individuals of their right to refuse, limit, or revoke consent -- prior to the warrantless consensual entries onto the defendant's outdoor property for investigative purposes
People v. Taylor; People v. Czarnecki
Michigan Supreme Court held that mandatory life-without-parole sentences violate the state constitution’s protection against “cruel or unusual” punishment for anyone under age 21 at the time of the offense. The decision extends the court’s 2022 ruling in People v. Parks that such sentences are unconstitutional for those 18 or under.
Simon v. Demuth
Ruled that the quorum clause in Article IV, Section 13, of the Minnesota Constitution requires a majority of the total number of seats of which each house may consist to constitute a quorum, without reference to vacancies
