Police, Race and Crime in 1950s Chicago: Monroe v. Pape as Legal Noir

Abstract:     
This essay will appear in Civil Rights Stories (Risa Goluboff and Myriam Gilles eds.), forthcoming Fall 2007. In it, I've tried to provide an historical background against which to understand the watershed civil rights case of Monroe v. Pape, where the Supreme Court gave an expansive interpretation to 42 U.S.C. Section 1983's "under color of law" clause. The goal of this essay is to generate a better understanding of the Monroe case itself - how the case came about and why represents an important, watershed moment in the history of civil rights litigation.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 23

Keywords: civil rights, Section 1983, race

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