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10 Crim. L.F. 273 (1999)
The Defence of "Black Rage"

handle is hein.journals/crimlfm10 and id is 268 raw text is: CHARLES JONES* THE DEFENCE OF BLACK RAGE Reviewing: Paul Harris, Black Rage Confronts the Law, New York: New York University Press, 304 pp. In a post-script to his book, Black Rage Confronts The Law, based upon a book tour, Paul Harris reflects upon some of the complex issues that permeate this well-conceived, researched and written book and reader responses to it.1 First, he explores his burden as an author of such a complex book, particularly his position as a leftist writer. For example, he obviously agrees with a neighbour, commenting on the need for writing the book, that it's important political work; you have a left voice that needs to be heard This is instructive, for Paul Harris clearly identifies with critical legal and critical race scholars in the purpose for writing. One of the tenets of critical race scholars, which Harris fully exploits, is that law is political, a-historical, non-objective and requires interpretation aided by historical and social scientific analyses. It is a book written not just to inform the reader about how the black rage defence has been constructed, but to engage the reader in political activity, to show how lawyers and defendants may collaborate in the construction of a criminal defence that displays society's role as agent of certain kinds of crime. He is an author who is concerned that the reader properly understands the scope and limitations of this kind of defence and he leads the audience on a factory tour of how it works in practice. The second observation Harris makes, based upon comments most frequently heard on the tour, is that readers had two major concerns: (1) whether the black rage defence is an excuse for irresponsibility and criminal behaviour; and, (2) how such a defence relates to the fear of crime. Detractors of criminal defences similar to black rage - battered wife syndrome, rotten social background, e.g., predicated upon societal * Associate professor of law, Rutgers University, Newark Law School. J.D., University of Illinois 1959; M.P.A., Harvard University 1970. 1 See: 54 Guild Practitioner 183 (1997). rA Criminal Law Forum 10: 273-280, 1999. O © 1999 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

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