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Nobody's Fools: The Rational Audience As First Amendment Ideal, Lyrissa Lidsky
Nobody's Fools: The Rational Audience As First Amendment Ideal, Lyrissa Lidsky
Faculty Publications
Assumptions about audiences shape the outcomes of First Amendment cases. Yet the Supreme Court rarely specifies what its assumptions about audiences are, much less attempts to justify them. Drawing on literary theory, this Article identifies and defends two critical assumptions that emerge from First Amendment cases involving so-called "core" speech. The first is that audiences are capable of rationally assessing the truth, quality, and credibility of core speech. The second is that more speech is generally preferable to less. These assumptions, which I refer to collectively as the rational audience model, lie at the heart of the "marketplace of ideas" …
Protestant Dissent And The Virginia Disestablishment, 1776-1786, Carl H. Esbeck
Protestant Dissent And The Virginia Disestablishment, 1776-1786, Carl H. Esbeck
Faculty Publications
In Everson v. Board of Education (1947), the Supreme Court elevated the events surrounding the disestablishment of the Anglican Church in Virginia during and soon after the American Revolution as a principal guide for the meaning of the Establishment Clause. The rule to come out of the Virginia experience is that support for religion should be voluntary thus, no active support by the government. An in-depth examination of James Madison's Memorial and Remonstrance opposing Patrick Henry's Assessment Bill is undertaken here not only because of its role in the Virginia disestablishment, but because it is the most important document on …