Critical Legal Research, Artificial Intelligence, and Systemic Racism: Teaching with Jim Crow Text-Mining

Abstract

On the Books: Jim Crow and Algorithms of Existence is a text-mining project undertaken by University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill libraries to identify racially based laws passed in the state between 1865 and 1967. In the fall 2022, I used the On the Books project to teach a module in my Advanced Legal Research class on critical legal research and artificial intelligence and legal analytics. This article examines the benefits of those modules for teaching critical thinking about legal research structures and legacies of racism in the American legal system.

Keywords:

• DEI
• critical legal research
• AI
• algorithms
• pedagogy
• Jim Crow
• racial discrimination

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 On the Books: Jim Crow and the Algorithms of Resistance, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Libraries, https://onthebooks.lib.unc.edu/.

2 Pauli Murray, States’ Laws on Race and Color (1951).

3 William Sturkey, The Laws in Context, On the Books: Jim Crow and the Algorithms of Resistance, https://onthebooks.lib.unc.edu/laws/the-laws-in-context/.

4 UNC BLSA, BLSA’s Expectations of Administration & Faculty at UNC Law, Daily Tar Heel (June 28, 2020, 8:23 P.M. EDT), www.dailytarheel.com/gallery/blsa-gallery.

5 For context, my ALR course is a 3-credit, full semester, experiential graded course. I cover secondary sources and primary law in the first two-thirds of the semester, and then shift to special topics in the last third. I taught the OTB modules on CLR and AI in the special topics section in early November 2022.

6 Nicholas Mignanelli, Critical Legal Research: Who Needs It, 112 Law Lib. J. 327 (2020).

7 Nicholas Mignanelli, Legal Research and Its Discontents: A Bibliographic Essay on Critical Approaches to Legal Research, 113 Law Lib. J. 101, 102 (2021); Nicholas F. Stump, Following New Lights: Critical Legal Research Strategies as a Spark for Law Reform in Appalachia, 23 Am. U. J. Gender Soc. Pol’y & L. 573 (2014–2015).

8 Id. generally.

9 Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic, Why Do We Tell the Same Stories: Law Reform, Critical Librarianship, and the Triple Helix Dilemma, 42 Stan. L. Rev. 207 (1989).

10 Id. citing Crenshaw, Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Policies, 139 University of Chicago Legal Forum 1989

11 Id.

12 See, e.g., Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic, Why Do We Ask the Same Questions—The Triple Helix Dilemma Revisited, 99 Law Lib. J. 307 (2007).

13 Id.

14 Christopher Stone, Should Trees Have Standing − Toward Legal Rights for Natural Objects, 45 southern california law review 450 (1972).

15 Yasmin Sokkar Harker, Invisible Hands and the Triple (Quadruple?) Helix Dilemma: Helping Students Free Their Minds, in Online Symposium: Critical Legal Research: The Next Wave (A Panel in Honor of Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic), 101 Boston University Law Review Online 17–25 (2021).

16 William Sturkey, The Laws in Context, On the Books: Jim Crow and the Algorithms of Resistance, https://onthebooks.lib.unc.edu/laws/the-laws-in-context/

17 Leandro v. State, 488 S.E.2d 249 (1997) (known as “Leandro I”); Hoke County Board of Education v. State, 599 S.E.2d 365 (2004) (known as “Leandro II”); and Hoke County Board of Education v. State, 879 S.E.2d 193 (2022) (as far as I know, this one doesn’t have a nickname yet).

18 See, e.g., Leandro v. State of NC: Background & Resources, Public School Forum of North Carolina, www.ncforum.org/leandro/ and Tori Newby, The Leandro Case: A Summary of the Ongoing Debate about Educational Funding, The Daily Tar Heel (November 30, 2022, 12:40 AM EDT) www.dailytarheel.com/article/2022/11/city-leandro-case-supreme-court-ruling.

19 I always include a joke about this being difficult to bill in six-minutes increments, because I want to remind students that we need to think practically about our research as well.

20 Susan Nevelow Mart, Every Algorithm Has a Point of View, 22 AALL Spectrum 40 (2017).

21 Hannah Jacobs, Algorithms of Resistance, On the Books: Jim Crow and the Algorithms of Resistance, https://onthebooks.lib.unc.edu/about/algorithms-of-resistance/

22 Id.

23 Id.