In an article published in The New York Times on an ongoing rape trial in New Hampshire, the reporter argues that the rape provisions in the 1962 Model Penal Code require revision. In the article, ALI member Deborah Tuerkheimer of Northwestern University School of Law is quoted from her forthcoming article in The Emory Law Journal on her belief that a majority of states still erect a far higher barrier to prosecution and conviction by relying “on the concept of force in defining rape.”
The piece explains, “Tuerkheimer and others are pushing to reform state rape laws and the Model Penal Code. As the American Law Institute re-examines the code’s sexual-assault provision for the first time since 1962, a heated debate is taking place over how to replace the old language. Should the code follow states like New Hampshire, or go further and adopt the standard of affirmative consent?”