I thought it would be both interesting and useful in this fourth installment in the continuing Three Ring Circus saga to explore in some depth four subjects that have never been totally clear to me. I do so in the hope that, in addition to improving my understanding, this effort will be helpful to others who also find these subjects somewhat of a puzzle. Therefore, this Article will evaluate the origins of the balancing of interests test, revisit the Commerce Clause in its dormant state and the balancing of competing interests, reexamine the intermediate scrutiny of gender-based classifications, and return to the idea of similiarity of situation.

It is a thrill to celebrate with you as you complete your law school career and begin what I believe is the most rewarding professional career available. In the short span of three years, you have gone from being students to graduates, and shortly, when you have passed the bar examination, as I am sure you will, to being lawyers. I like lawyers. They are my heroes and heroines. There is not a day that goes by that I am not deeply proud to be a lawyer.

My name is John Loftus. It is probably kind of silly to have an Irish-Catholic as president of the Holocaust Museum. A lot of us wonder why we even have a Holocaust Museum for Jews. Every ethnic group has genocide. What was the largest number of people killed? During the middle passage of slavery, tens of millions of Africans died during the slave trade. What ethnic group had the highest percentage of their people killed? It was not the Jews; it was the Armenians. One out of every three Armenians in the world died in Turkish deportations in World War I.

The goals recited above are certainly laudable, but when these goals clash, who is the proper party to decide which goal carries more weight with respect to our Nation’s public policy? The first quote comes from the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and provides the rationale behind Congress’s enactment of a broad sweeping statutory scheme meant to eradicate discrimination against the disabled and ensure that disabled individuals have equal opportunities and access to public accommodations. The second quote is from the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA). Congress recognized that tribal gaming provides a much needed source of income to Native American tribes and sought, through the IGRA, to enact a statutory scheme that would provide for economic self-sufficiency and protect tribal gaming from corruption so that the tribes could reap the economic benefits of such gaming enterprises.

“A year after the restoration of Louis XVIII, a visit was made by the inspector-general of prisons.” In 1998 a Florida appellate court considered the post-conviction relief request of a prisoner named Wilton Dedge in Dedge v. State. “‘I do not know what reason government can assign for these useless visits; when you see one prisoner you see all—always the same thing—ill-fed and innocent.’” Two of three appellate judges on the Dedge court affirmed the trial court’s denial of Dedge’s request. The court did not issue a majority opinion. Dedge contends he is innocent of the crimes for which he was convicted in 1984. “‘I must conscientiously perform my duty.’ . . . ‘Let us visit this one first.’” The lone dissenter in Dedge, Judge Winifred J. Sharp, wrote a three-page opinion that revisited the trial, explored a new scientific test, Polymerase Chain Reaction Deoxyribonucleic Acid (PCR DNA) analysis, considered the applicability of the new test to Dedge’s case, and criticized the majority’s application of a ticking two-year- time-bomb lurking within Florida’s post-conviction relief statute. “[T]urning to the prisoner, ‘What do you demand? ’. . . . ‘[I]f innocent, I may be set at liberty.’” Since no DNA tests were available at the time of his 1984 trial, Dedge asks for DNA tests, now available, which could exonerate him.