Scholars have devoted substantial attention to both the overrepresentation of black defendants on federal death row and the disproportionate number of federal defendants charged capitally for the murder of white victims. This attention has not explained (much less resolved) these disquieting racial disparities. Little research has addressed the unusual geography of the federal death penalty, in which a small number of jurisdictions are responsible for the vast majority of federal death sentences. By addressing the unique geography, we identify a possible explanation for the racial distortions in the federal death penalty: that federal death sentences are sought disproportionately where the expansion of the venire from the county to the district level has a dramatic demographic impact on the racial make-up of the jury. This inquiry demonstrates that the conversation concerning who should make up the jury of twelve neighbors and peers'a discussion begun well before the founding of our Constitution'continues to have relevance today. This Article documents the historical and racial relationships between place and the ability to seat an impartial jury. We then discuss the unique impact demographic shifts in the jury pool have on death penalty decision making. Finally, we propose three possible solutions: (1) a simple, democracyenhancing fix through a return to the historical conception of the county as the place of vicinage in federal capital trials; (2) a Batson-type three-step process for rooting out the influence of race on the decision to prosecute federally; and/or (3) voluntary measures by the Attorney General to mask demographic and location identifiers when deciding whether to provide federal death-authorization. We explain why a return to county-level jury pools in federal capital cases (whether through statutory construction, legislative change, or through the authority of a fair-minded Attorney General) prospectively limits the impact of race on the operation of the federal death penalty, without establishing the intractability of the federal death penalty as a whole. Finally, we observe that any effort to study the federal death penalty cannot merely address those federal cases in which the Attorney General has considered whether to approve an effort to seek the death penalty, but must also include an assessment of the cases prosecuted in state court that could be prosecuted federally and the prosecutorial decision concerning when and whether to prosecute in federal court.

Voters adopted Washington's Public Records Act (PRA) in 1972 as part of a broader ballot measure to enhance openness in state government. The PRA requires state government agencies, including statewide agencies and municipalities, to establish procedures so that the public can request copies of records agencies generate. The PRA exempts certain records from disclosure, and other statutes and case law supply additional exemptions. When an agency refuses to disclose records, the requester may ask a court to determine whether an exemption applies. If no exemption applies, the court may compel disclosure of the records and impose monetary penalties against the non-compliant agency, including attorney fees. Under the PRA, courts review denials de novo and in light of legislative intent, erring on the side of broad public access. In addition to reviewing denials, courts have recently been asked to consider whether an agency's procedural rules under the PRA are reasonable. In analyzing procedural rules, some courts have applied the same broad interpretation used for substantive PRA questions, refusing to presume that an agency's procedural regulations are valid despite administrative law and municipal law doctrines requiring such a presumption. As a result, courts have imposed heavy penalties on public agencies at great taxpayer expense. This Comment argues that courts should presume an agency's procedural rules adopted for purposes of the PRA are valid as long as they are consistent with the statute's mandate.

In June 2009, the Washington State Court of Appeals, Division II, reversed Kristina Grier's second-degree murder conviction in State v. Grier.1 The court concluded that Grier had received ineffective assistance of counsel because her attorney failed to request jury instructions for any lesser-included offenses, choosing instead to pursue an all-ornothing defense strategy. That same month, Division I issued a contrary opinion, finding the pursuit of an all-or-nothing strategy reasonable. The Washington State Supreme Court has granted certiorari and will soon hear oral arguments in Grier. This Comment reviews federal and state courts' approaches to questions of ineffective assistance of counsel involving all-ornothing strategies and argues that, when the Washington State Supreme Court resolves State v. Grier, it should review attorneys' strategic decisions under a highly deferential standard. This standard would align with state precedent and federal practice and would preserve trial attorneys' discretion, provide defendants with a true adversarial process, and repair the split State v. Grier created.

The torts of negligent hiring, supervision, and retention place a duty on employers to prevent their employees from using the places, things, or tasks entrusted to them to harm foreseeable victims. The negligent employment torts create an independent duty under which plaintiffs may pursue an action when suits brought under a vicarious liability or breach of fiduciary duty theory would fail. For victims of sexual misconduct by religious leaders, negligent supervision claims against religious organizations are a crucial means of remedying serious and lasting injuries. Washington state law recognizes negligent supervision, and Washington courts have applied it to religious organizations, but these claims typically implicate First Amendment religious freedom concerns. A short series of Washington appellate cases affirming grants of summary judgment to religious organization defendants on First Amendment grounds has made it more difficult for plaintiffs to assert negligent supervision claims against religious entities. This Comment argues that Washington courts have granted religious organizations an impermissibly broad level of First Amendment protection from claims of negligent supervision, and suggests a more deliberate analytical framework for evaluating the constitutionality of such claims.

The Washington State Constitution makes education Washington State's top priority. Article IX, section 1 proclaims that '[i]t is the paramount duty of the state to make ample provision for the education of all children residing within its borders . . . .'1 In the 1978 case of Seattle School District v. State,2 the Washington State Supreme Court interpreted this language as a command to the state legislature. The Court ordered the legislature to fulfill its constitutional duty by defining and fully funding 'basic education' and a 'basic program of education.'3 The legislature attempted to comply by passing and subsequently amending the Basic Education Act and, in 2009, by passing H.B. 2261.4 This Comment analyzes the state's school-funding duty in light of these legislative efforts and recent Washington school-funding cases. This Comment concludes that the legislature has not met its constitutional duty because it has not adequately defined a 'basic program of education,' and therefore recommends that the legislature amend H.B. 2261 to bring the state into compliance with article IX, section 1 of the Washington State Constitution.

Section 5 of the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA)1 authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to acquire and hold land in trust for the purpose of providing land for Indians. In 2009, the Supreme Court held in Carcieri v. Salazar2 that to qualify for the benefits of Section 5, tribes must show they were under federal jurisdiction at the time the IRA was enacted in 1934.3 The Carcieri Court then determined that the Narragansett tribe, which obtained federal recognition in 1983 under the 25 C.F.R. Part 83 recognition process, had not proven that it was under federal jurisdiction in 1934.4 Carcieri was the first case in which the Court decoupled jurisdiction from recognition for purposes of the IRA. It could be read to suggest that federal recognition on its own is not enough to prove federal jurisdiction for purposes of the IRA and thus threatens the interests of all tribes; especially at risk are tribes that obtained federal recognition after Congress enacted the IRA. Many of those tribes were simply overlooked and excluded from a list of recognized tribes compiled upon enactment of the IRA, and all of them have demonstrable historical relationships with the federal government. While the Carcieri Court limited its holding to the timing question'that the phrase 'now under federal jurisdiction' in the IRA means that a tribe must prove federal jurisdiction existed in 1934'it did not consider how tribes might prove such jurisdiction existed. This Comment argues that tribes recognized after the enactment of the IRA, through either traditional recognition processes or the recognition procedures set forth in 25 C.F.R. Part 83, were necessarily under federal jurisdiction in 1934 and should therefore qualify under the IRA's Section 5 trust-land provisions. It argues that Congress should respond to Carcieri with legislation clarifying that all federally recognized tribes were necessarily under federal jurisdiction in 1934. It further argues that until Congress acts, courts should allow tribes recognized after 1934 to prove through additional evidence that such jurisdiction existed.