The discussions for Module 2 were thought-provoking and excellent. I learned a great deal from your insights.
LAWS AND SOCIAL CHANGE
One of the questions discussed was whether laws cause social change, or whether social and cultural change has to take place before laws can become effective. This is a complicated question, one which legal scholars have debated for years. In fact, there is a Law and Society group of law professors and other academics who debate these questions every year at a conference. The answer is, I think, that law and society work in a critical interaction with each other—laws cause social change; social change is reflected in laws, and you have to push hard and persistently on both fronts to achieve real progress.
To achieve change in domestic violence, the laws have been useful tools. When law enforcement doesn’t respond appropriately, you can go higher up in the chain of command until you find someone who is interested in enforcing the laws. If you’re having trouble with a local police chief, you can go to the state’s attorney. (Every county has a local prosecutor, usually called the district attorney or state’s attorney; every state has one attorney general, who usually has some oversight authority over the state’s attorneys.) I used to work for Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris, who was very effective at educating the state’s attorneys and police chiefs on domestic violence. He even went so far as to “offer” to take over a certain state’s attorney’s grand jury after it became clear that the state’s attorney was infected with gender bias and was not properly prosecuting domestic assaults. The state’s attorney shaped up a bit, then lost a re-election bid. Women and men who care about domestic violence must realize their power of electing state’s attorneys and the real difference that can make in women’s lives.
COORDINATED COMMUNITY RESPONSES
A key question raised was can we really protect women? I think that we can—but it has to be a highly coordinated response that sends the message that the criminal justice system, in conjunction with other social services, takes violence against women very seriously. As the Carol Cross case demonstrates, women are very aware of the extent to which they will be protected from male violence. They will seek help when they think the assistance will be meaningful—but they know that a less than meaningful response will jeopardize their safety even more than if they didn’t turn to the system in the first place. It is, quite simply, our right as women, to demand protection from the state. And again, equal protection might mean something different for women, given the amount of male violence against us. It might require additional protection to make the response effective. This is not pie-in-the-sky wishing—rather, we have amassed much information about domestic violence that should enable law enforcement to build responses around it that are truly effective.
THE CIVIL RIGHTS REMEDY
Some of the comments on the civil rights remedy were brilliant! The civil right to live without violence for the whole family was appealing, for example. The observations that financial repercussions would matter are quite accurate—I think the civil rights remedy could go a long way to making the promise of freedom from gender motivated violence a reality. My fervent hope is that the Supreme Court upholds the civil rights remedy. I attended the Supreme Court arguments on January 11, and was quite surprised at the hostility toward the remedy, as if it was Congress gone mad and seeking to regulate something it had no business doing. It was offensive that most of the arguments focused on the economic issues of interstate commerce rather than any equal protection questions. Taylor’s contribution of thoughts on the ‘economics of the Brzonkala case’ were powerful and original. I’d like to send it on to the Court somehow. As far as I know, this point was not argued in this way—yet, it’s a great argument! Good job.
Finally, the point was raised about changing the questions we ask from why doesn’t she leave to why does he hit? Bonnie Campbell, Director of the Violence Against Women Office at the US Dept. of Justice, says that batterers hit because they can, it gets them what they want, and there are no consequences for it. Throughout the rest of this series, I do want to focus on changing the questions, and changing the focus of our answers to look at stopping the abusive male from abusing. As a society, we will all benefit from this. It is a public health question for women and for men—as well as for children.
Thanks to all who participated for a really stimulating discussion.