About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline

2007 Wis. L. Rev. 283 (2007)
Taking the Garbage out in Tulia, Texas: The Taboo on Black-White Romance and Racial Profiling in the War on Drugs

handle is hein.journals/wlr2007 and id is 295 raw text is: TAKING THE GARBAGE OUT IN TULIA, TEXAS: THE
TABOO ON BLACK-WHITE ROMANCE AND RACIAL
PROFILING IN THE WAR ON DRUGS
KEVIN R. JOHNSON*
I.  Introduction  ................................................................................ 284
II. The Tulia Sting, or Round Up the Usual Suspects ............... 286
A .  T he  Sting  ............................................................................. 288
B.   Vindication  of the  Accused ................................................. 291
III. The Continuing Evil of Race-Mixing: Tulia as a Case Study .... 294
A. The Legal and Social Prohibition of Black-White
R elationships ....................................................................... 295
1. The Persistence of Social Separation ............................ 297
2. The Lingering Stigma of Blackness .............................. 299
3. Evidence of the Enduring Taboo ................................... 299
B.   The  Taboo  at W ork  in  Tulia ................................................ 303
IV. Tulia as Race-Based Law Enforcement American-Style ........... 305
A .  The  W ar  on  D rugs. .......................................................... 305
1. Profiles and More Profiles: Racial Profiling in the
W ar  on  D rugs  ................................................................ 308
2. The Law's Role in the War on Drugs ............................ 311
B. Tulia as Part and Parcel of the War on Drugs .............. 313
1. A Model for Restorative Justice? .................................. 313
2. The Problem with the Tulia Strategy .......................316
V .  C onclusion  .................................................................................. 3 18
*     Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, School of Law, University of
California at Davis, Mabie-Apallas Professor of Public Interest Law and Chicana/o
Studies; A.B., University of California, Berkeley; J.D., Harvard University. Rick Banks,
Jennifer M. Chac6n, George A. Martfnez, Adele Morrison, Camille Nelson, Reggie Oh,
Angela Onwuachi-Willig, Carla Pratt, and Catherine Smith offered helpful comments on
a draft of this Article. Thanks to the other symposium participants for their inspiration.
Special thanks to Angela Onwuachi-Willig and Camille Nelson for working long and
hard to organize this symposium. The Mabie-Apallas Chair, the UC-Davis School of
Law, and Dean Rex Perschbacher provided generous financial support for this research.
Law student Stella Schmidel provided excellent research and editorial assistance. Finally,
I am indebted to my colleague Jennifer M. Chac6n for bringing the Tulia case to my
attention.

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

profiles profiles most