Fourteenth Amendment

June 20, 2026

Juneteenth in North Carolina | Freedom, Citizenship, and the Long Arc of History

Juneteenth, the Wilmington Coup of 1898, and the Wilmington Ten are separated by decades, yet each raises many of the same legal questions. What happens when constitutional rights exist on paper but are not fully protected in practice? What role should courts play when political pressure, public opinion, or government power collide with individual liberty? How should lawyers respond when the legal system itself becomes part of the controversy?

These events are frequently discussed through the lens of race, politics, or social change. Those subjects are undeniably part of the historical record. For lawyers, judges, and students of legal history, however, another perspective deserves equal attention. Each episode reveals something about the rule of law, due process of law, equal protection, voting rights, freedom of expression, and the ability of legal institutions to uphold constitutional principles during periods of conflict and uncertainty.

This article is not intended as a partisan argument. It does not seek to assign modern political labels to historical events. The political actors, parties, and public debates changed dramatically between 1865, 1898, and 1971. The constitutional principles at stake remained remarkably consistent.

May 30, 2026

Racial Bias in Jury Selection | Batson Challenges

by Carolina Attorneys

On May 29, 2026, reporting surrounding the United States Supreme Court’s review of a Mississippi death penalty case again pushed one of the oldest constitutional problems in American criminal law back into public discussion. The issue involves racial discrimination in jury selection under Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 (1986), and whether prosecutors improperly struck black jurors during a capital murder trial.

The opinion matters far beyond Mississippi. Jury selection disputes are a regular aspect of criminal trials in North Carolina. Prosecutors, defense lawyers, and trial judges still wrestle with the practical reality that Batson litigation remains one of the hardest constitutional violations to prove cleanly and one of the easiest constitutional protections to weaken through procedural language. Readers should care because jury selection determines who exercises the power of judgment in a criminal courtroom. A constitutional right means little if discriminatory conduct can be repackaged as “strategy,” “demeanor,” or “trial preference.”

TL;DR Batson Challenges |Racial Bias During Voir Dire Jury Selection

May 9, 2026

Stare Decisis | When the Supreme Court Changes the Law by Changing Its Mind

by Carolina Attorneys

Stare decisis (“to stand by things decided”) sounds like a dry Latin phrase until the Supreme Court changes course in a way that affects constitutional rights, voting rules, criminal procedure, business regulation, privacy, speech, or the structure of government. Then the doctrine becomes something much larger than a law school definition. It becomes a question about institutional trust.

Stare decisis means courts generally stand by what has already been decided. Put simply, they don’t change “settled law” willy-nilly, on a whim, under political pressure, or in response to prevailing popular/public opinion or feelings.

It also does not mean every old case remains untouchable. It does not mean a wrong decision must remain law forever. It means the legal system has memory. Judges do not write on a blank slate every time a case reaches the courthouse. Prior decisions matter because people, legislatures, lawyers, businesses, prosecutors, defendants, courts, and public officials build their conduct around settled law.

October 12, 2025

Due Process in North Carolina and American Jurisprudence

by Carolina Attorneys

Due process is one of the most enduring phrases in the American constitutional tradition. It appears in the Fifth Amendment, binding the federal government, and in the Fourteenth Amendment, extending the guarantee to the states.

North Carolina’s Constitution also secures due process through Article I, Section 19, which provides that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property except by the “law of the land.”

Far from being ornamental language, due process reflects a working system of legal discipline that reaches from Magna Carta through North Carolina’s founding conventions into the daily practice of its courts.