Throughout our nation’s history, the legal system has consistently favored people with power and wealth over those without. In turn, those in power have used the law to regulate, harass, and incarcerate people seen as inferior or undesirable— whether they be “vagrants,” “tramps,” or “vagabonds.” While the U.S. Supreme Court has held anti-vagrancy and anti-loitering laws unconstitutional, the recent explosion of homelessness across the United States has prompted municipalities to come up with new ways to criminalize people who are homeless. This short course will explore the “criminalization of homelessness”—that is, local government’s use of police power and the criminal legal system to marginalize, exclude from public space, and lock up people because they lack permanent housing, even when that is due to mental health or substance abuse issues. The course will examine how this phenomenon plays out in Hawaiʻi and several other jurisdictions in the United States. The course will also examine the strengths and limitations of civil rights litigation as a way to address this phenomenon.