In this Article, we introduce the concept of co-optive constitutionalism, a rhetorical mechanism through which the U.S. Supreme Court dismantles civil rights protections while paradoxically employing civil rights language to legitimize these regressive outcomes. Through a detailed analysis of the majority, concurrences, and dissents in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, we demonstrate how the Court’s conservative majority strategically appropriates progressive ideals, selectively quotes precedent, and redefines equality to justify overturning decades-long precedent permitting race-conscious admissions. We situate co-optive constitutionalism within the broader conservative legal political movement spearheaded by the Federalist Society, revealing how judicial rhetoric aligns with conservative political tactics to reshape American law. This analysis illuminates how the Court’s rhetorical strategies have already triggered a cascade of consequences beyond higher education, including challenges to DEI initiatives, military academy admissions, and corporate diversity programs. By identifying and naming this mechanism, we contribute to scholarly efforts to document and resist the Court’s erosion of civil rights protections.

Health, including pain, suffering, blood, and guts, has always played an outsized role in legal and public analysis of abortion. Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade, the health implications of forced childbirth have returned to the public’s attention, as evidenced by prevalent health exceptions to abortion bans, legal actions in regard to those bans and exceptions, public attention to those cases, and public opinion polling. Recent, highly publicized cases of medical emergencies associated with pregnancy could be expected to reinvigorate a public exploration of the health risks of pregnancy, but the public has consistently refused to acknowledge the full scope of those risks. This Article is an examination of press coverage of two of the most highly publicized health exception cases since the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Content analysis of over 600 U.S. News articles shows that the public still avoids discussing the health implications of abortion, even in press directly related to health threats. This offers an example of the barriers and inertia to social and legal change that are created by accepted and unaccepted narratives; in this case, narratives of “good women,” “deserving women,” and “good mothers.”

Disability discrimination in education is a long-standing and powerful tradition in the United States. Students with disabilities in higher education have historically been, and continue to be, the most powerful harbingers of change in eliminating disability discrimination in education. The birth of the disability rights movement occurred in higher education institutions across the nation in the 1970s, and the movement achieved both cultural and legislative success. Its spirit continues on today in U.S. law schools. Law students with disabilities are utilizing the legislative advances achieved by the disability rights activists of yesteryear in order to create a more equitable system of legal education. With support and buy-in from law schools and the legal community, law students with disabilities can bring about systemic change that would benefit the legal field as a whole. Through the use of strategic litigation from students along with active cooperation and acceptance from law school administrators, individual professors, and fellow students, disability discrimination in legal education can be greatly reduced.