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The rightwing is carrying out its most recent effort to install an authoritarian regime in America, which has been boosted by Donald Trump's white supremacist rhetoric and actions before, during, and after his four years holding the Office of the President of the United States. Resolute in the effort to destabilize American Democracy by forcing on to the populist, among other messages, "The Big Lie," the rightwing is committed to a coordinated strategy of attacking and delegitimizing democratic institutions for the purpose of retaining economic and political power. The attack on Critical Race Theory ("CRT") is one element of the strategy to assault liberal democracy that has caught fire. Though CRT is in the crosshairs, higher education institutions represent the larger target, because they are the places and spaces where critical thinking, public discourse, and reasoned debate are practiced in furtherance of liberal, democratic ideals. Thus, the targeting of CRT is intended to chill specific speech representing various perspectives and viewpoints that critique the dominant white hierarchy. The objective of the rightwing assault is to propagate unreality, division, and fear to thwart the outcomes of a liberal democracy—equality, multiculturalism, and intellectualism. The attacks on CRT are only one in a salvo of new and growing incursions on conveying truth in educational spaces. The intention is to whitewash America's history of racism and racial oppression, while at the same time eliminating the critical roles that dissent and contestation play in strengthening the "democratic health of [American] society." The unjustified barrage on CRT is a pretext for the erosion of freedom of thought and inquiry in our higher education institutions. Higher education institutions have the resources to archive truth, intellectual inquiry, dissent, and contestation and, therefore, must be out front in the battle for the hearts and minds of the next generation of critical thinkers. This Essay discusses one approach for ...

America is at an unprecedented time with self-determination for Black women, and this phase of the movement is reverberating throughout this nation and around the world. There is no confusion for those who identify as Black women that this movement is perpetual, dating back to the enslavement of Black people in America by act and by law. One need only look to the intersecting crises of 2020 to discern the reality of Black women's—and by extension the Black community and by further extension individuals and groups marginalized, subordinated, and oppressed by white patriarchy—perpetual struggle for civil and human rights. To appreciate the genealogy of this perpetual struggle for civil and human rights, it is instructive to look back on the 100th Anniversary of the 19th Amendment and to be immersed in the stories and the legacies of Black women suffragists to gain insights about modern contestations against limiting the franchise. In the forming of this nation, Black women were intentionally excluded and erased from conceptions of humanity. This exclusion and erasure of Black women's voices and contributions from the annals of social, political, and economic movements throughout history, such as abolitionist and women's suffrage movements, tarnish the legitimacy of our democratic institutions, our laws, and our collective progress toward equality. This article centers Black women's lived experiences in the struggle for universal suffrage while also leading and supporting their communities in the fight against racial inequality and oppression. By making the sojourn through history using the lens of Black women, an opening is created to understand the perpetuation of racial injustice and oppression through the practices of withholding citizenship and the franchise. It also offers a window into the expertise and resilience of Black women in building and maintaining relationships, alliances, and coalitions to press for the larger vision of universal suffrage, even when their putative partners choose self-interest over ...

Rural communities – as well as other marginalized communities – see their access to legal infrastructure declining, so much so that they feel disconnected from the rule of law. Current complex law and legal infrastructure focus on big "I" innovation, which is hyper-transactional and benefits the few. Rural communities, and others, would find law and legal infrastructure more relevant if they focused more on small "i" innovation, which centers on negotiating real, societal relationships.