Letter from U.S. Justice Department to Congress, May 30, 2024

• “The Department unequivocally condemns the racist rhetoric and reasoning of the Insular Cases,” calling them “irreconcilable with foundational American principles of equality, justice, and democracy.” It “emphatically agree[d] … that the racist language and logic of the Insular Cases deserve no place in our law.”
• DOJ further announced a commitment to “not rely on or seek to extend the doctrine of territorial incorporation established by the Insular Cases,” instructing its litigators to “not rely on the racist rhetoric and reasoning of the Insular Cases.”

Calls on the Department of Justice and President Biden to Reject Insular Cases

• Capitol Hill Press Conference, April 16, 2024
• Letter by House and Senate Members to AG Garland, April 15, 2024
• Letter by Colegio de Abogado/as de Puerto Rico to AG Garland, April 9, 2024
• Letter by Virgin Islands Governor Albert Bryan, Jr. to AG Garland, March 20, 2024
• Letter by Civil Rights Organizations to President Biden, August 22, 2023
• Letter by Civil Rights Organizations to AG Garland and SG Prelogar, February 10, 2022
• Virtual Press Conference with Civil Rights Organizations and Former SG Neal Katyal, July 12, 2022
• Letter by Members of Congress to President Biden and VP Harris, July 12, 2022
• Letter by Members of Congress to AG Garland and SG Prelogar, September 8, 2021
• Letter by New York State Bar Association to AG Garland, August 22, 2022
• Letter from Virgin Islands Bar Association to AG Garland, August 25, 2022

Calls for Congress to Reject the Insular Cases

• Statement by Congresswoman Uifa’atali Amata Radewagen (R-American Samoa), June 5, 2024
• Letter from Governor Pedro Pierluisi (D-Puerto Rico) to U.S. Civil Rights Commission, June 9, 2023
• Congresswoman Stacey E. Plaskett (D-Virgin Islands), May 12, 2021
• Congresswoman Jenniffer González-Colón (R-Puerto Rico), May 12, 2021
• Congressman Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan (D-Northern Mariana Islands), May 12, 2021
• Guam Governor Lou Leon Guerrero, May 5, 2021
• Vice Speaker of the Guam Legislature, Tina Muña Barnes, May 12, 2021
• CNMI Senate President Jude U. Hofschneider, May 5, 2021
• Attorney Charles v. Ala’ilima, Counsel Fitisemanu v. United States, May 26, 2021
• Neil Weare, President Equally American, May 12, 2021
• Letter of Support from Civil Rights Organizations, December 1, 2022
• New York State Bar Association, November 23, 2022
• American Bar Association, April 17, 2023

Resolutions in Support of Condemning the Insular Cases

• Guam Legislature Resolution, May 28, 2021
• Virgin Islands Legislature Resolution 1899, December 30, 2022
• American Bar Association Resolution 404, August 8, 2022
• New York State Bar Resolution, July 19, 2022

Reports and Scholarship

• Puerto Rico Advisory Committee, USCCR, The Insular Cases and the Doctrine of the Unincorporated Territory and its Effects on the Civil Rights of the Residents of Puerto Rico, February 2024
• Adriel I. Cepeda Derieux, To Lift a Dark Cloud: The Insular Cases’ Stubborn Vitality, Their Place in Civil Rights Law, and the Need to Overrule Them, 56 Suffolk U. L. Rev. 503 (2024)
• Virgin Islands Advisory Committee, USCCR, The Status of Civil Rights in the U.S. Virgin Islands, December 2023
• Christina Duffy Ponsa-Kraus, The Insular Cases Run Amok: Against Constitutional Exceptionalism in the Territories, 131 Yale L.J. 2449 (2022)

• Michael Ramsey, The Non-Originalist Insular Cases, The Originalism Blog (2021)
• Adriel I. Cepeda Derieux & Neil C. Weare, After Aurelius: What Future for the Insular Cases? in Yale Law Journal Forum: “The Insular Cases in Light of Aurelius” (2020)
• Daniel Immerwahr, How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States (2019)

• Neil Weare, Why the Insular Cases Must Become the Next Plessy, Harv. L. Rev. Blog (2018)

• Juan R. Torruella, The Insular Cases: The Establishment of a Regime of Political Apartheid, 29 U. Pa. J. Int’l L. 283 (2007)

Selected Briefs to U.S. Supreme Court Calling to Overrule Insular Cases

Fitisemanu v. United States

• Petition for Certiorari, April 27, 2022
• Brief amici curiae of ACLU, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, and Other Civil Rights Organizations, May 27, 2022
• Brief amici curiae of Current and Former Elected Officials of Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, May 31, 2022
• Brief amicus curiae of Virgin Islands Bar Association, May 27, 2022
• Brief amici curiae of Former Federal and Local Judges, May 31, 2022
• Brief amici curiae of Scholars of Constitutional Law and Legal History, May 26, 2022
• Brief amici curiae of Descendants of Dred Scott and Isabel Gonzalez, May 27, 2022, Neal Kumar Katyal, Counsel-of-Record

United States v. Vaello Madero

• Brief amicus curiae of Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, September 2, 2021
• Brief amicus curiae of Government of the U.S. Virgin Islands, September 7, 2021
• Brief amici curiae of The District of Columbia, Guam, and 16 other states and territories, September 7, 2021
• Brief amici curiae of LatinoJustice PRLDEF and other Hispanic Groups, September 7, 2021
• Brief amicus curiae of Virgin Islands Bar Association, September 7, 2021

FOMB v. Aurelius Investment LLC

• Brief amici curiae of American Civil Liberties Union Foundation and the ACLU of Puerto Rico, August 29, 2019
• Brief amicus curiae of Equally American Legal Defense and Education Fund, August 29, 2019
• Brief amici curiae of Scholars of Constitutional Law and Legal History, August 29, 2019
• Brief amici curiae of Former Federal and Local Judges, August 29, 2019
• Brief amici curiae of Scholars of Constitutional Law and Legal History, August 29, 2019
• Brief amicus curiae of Virgin Islands Bar Association, August 29, 2019

Tuaua v. United States

• Petition for Certiorari, February 1, 2016, Theodore B. Olson, Counsel-of-Record
• Brief amici curiae of Members of Congress and Former Governmental Officials, March 2, 2016, Paul D. Clement, Counsel-of-Record
• Brief amici curiae of Former Federal and Local Judges, March 2, 2016
• Brief of League of United Latin American Citizens, Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC, and the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association, March 2, 2016
• Brief amicus curiae of Puerto Rican Bar Association, March 2, 2016
• Brief amici curiae of Scholars of Constitutional Law, March 2, 2016
• Brief amici curiae of Scholars of International Law, March 2, 2016

Media Coverage

• Adam Liptak, Gorsuch Calls for Overruling ‘Shameful’ Cases on U.S. Territories, NY Times (May 2, 2022)
• Marcia Coyle, The U.S. Supreme Court Cases Built on a “Rotten Foundation,” Constitution Daily Blog at the National Constitution Center, (May 2, 2022)
• Alejandro Agustin Ortiz & Adriel I. Cepeda Derieux, The Most Racist Supreme Court Cases You’ve Probably Never Heard Of (February 10, 22, updated August 22, 2023)
• Peter Shamshiri, The Insular Cases Survive Because the American Legal System Keeps Them Safe, Balls and Strikes (November 14, 2022)
• Rafael Bernal, Supreme Court faces new pressure to reconsider racist ‘Insular Cases’, The Hill (Oct 10, 2022)
• Anthony Romero, Lourdes Rosado, Janai Nelson, Insular Cases are a relic of our colonial past (August 23, 2022)
• Paul Blumenthal, Civil Rights Groups to Biden DOJ: Stop Using 100-Year-Old Racist Precedents In Court, HuffPost (February 15, 2022)
• Lía Fiol-Matta, The Insular Cases: It’s Time to Turn the Page, Bloomberg Law (March 14, 2022)