Law Commons^™

Speech Inequality After Janus V. Afscme, Charlotte Garden

Faculty Articles

This Article explores the growing divide between the Roberts Court’s treatment of the free speech rights of wealthy individuals and corporations in campaign finance cases as compared to its treatment of the rights of public-sector labor unions and their members. First, it highlights some internal contradictions in the Janus Court’s analysis. Then, it discusses the growing—yet mostly ignored—divergence in the Court’s treatment of corporate and labor speakers with respect to the use of market influence to achieve political influence.The Article has two Parts. In Part I, I explain how the Court reached its decision in Janus before critiquing the decision’s …

Avoidance Creep, Charlotte Garden

Faculty Articles

At first glance, constitutional avoidance—the principle that courts construe statutes so as to avoid conflict with the Constitution whenever possible—appears both unremarkable and benign. But when courts engage in constitutional avoidance, they frequently construe statutory language in a manner contrary to both its plain meaning and to the underlying congressional intent. Then, successive decisions often magnify the problems of avoidance—a phenomenon I call “avoidance creep.” When a court distorts a statute in service of constitutional avoidance, a later court may amplify the distortion, incrementally changing both statutory and constitutional doctrine in ways that are unsupported by any existing rationale for …

Meta Rights, Charlotte Garden

Faculty Articles

Are individuals entitled to notice of their constitutional rights or assistance in exercising those rights? In most contexts, the answer is no. Yet, there are some important exceptions, in which the Court has held that special circumstances call for notice and procedural protections designed to facilitate rights invocations. This article refers to these entitlements as “meta rights” — rights that protect rights. The most famous of these is the Miranda warning, which notifies suspects of their Fifth Amendment rights to silence and an attorney. There are others as well — among them, the First Amendment right of individuals represented by …

Citizens, United And Citizens United: The Future Of Labor Speech Rights?, Charlotte Garden

Faculty Articles

Within hours of its announcement, the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United v. FEC came under attack from progressive groups. Among these groups were some of America's largest labor unions-even though the decision applies equally to unions and for-profit corporations. The reason is clear: there exist both practical and structural impediments that will prevent unions from benefitting from Citizens United to the same extent as corporations. Therefore, Citizens United stands to unleash a torrent of corporate electioneering that could drown out the countervailing voice of organized labor.

This article, however, takes a broader view of Citizens United to explore a …

The Guardians Of Knowledge In The Modern State: Post’S Republic And The First Amendment, David M. Skover, Ronald K. L. Collins

Faculty Articles

Collins and Skover’s essay examines Yale Law School Dean Robert Post’s recent book, Democracy, Expertise, and Academic Freedom: A First Amendment Jurisprudence for the Modern State (Yale, 2012). Collins and Skover describe and examine Dean Post’s dichotomy between the realm of “democratic legitimation,” where the First Amendment should offer its strongest protections, and the realm of “democratic competence,” where the First Amendment should yield to the findings of knowledgeable experts. Questioning the theoretical premises of Dean Post’s book, they argue that a “harm principle” may better explain much of the First Amendment doctrine that Post attempts to reconcile with his …

Labor Values Are First Amendment Values: Why Union Comprehensive Campaigns Are Protected Speech, Charlotte Garden

Faculty Articles

Corporate targets of union “comprehensive campaigns” increasingly have responded by filing civil Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) lawsuits alleging that unions’ speech and petitioning activities are extortionate. These lawsuits are the descendants of the Supreme Court’s unexplained treatment of much labor speech as less worthy of protection than other types of speech. Starting from the position that speech that promotes democratic discourse deserves top-tier First Amendment protection, this article argues that labor speech--which plays a unique role in civil society--should be on an equal footing with civil rights speech. Thus, even if union advocacy qualifies as legal extortion, …

What Is War? Reflections On Free Speech In 'Wartime, David Skover, Ronald Collins

Faculty Articles

Written as the lead article for a Symposium issue commemorating the Free Speech in Wartime Conference held in January of 2005 at Rutgers Law School - Camden, this piece analyzes the following questions: What qualifies as war in the 21st Century? Who determines when the country is at war? And what effect, if any, should the existence of a war have on judicial review of First Amendment challenges?

A Curious Concurrence: Justice Brandeis' Vote In Whitney V. California, David Skover, Ronald Collins

Faculty Articles

A piece of jurisprudential sleuthing, this article uncovers the back story for a puzzle unanswered by legal historians for some eighty years: Why would the free-speech libertarian Louis Brandeis write the most famous paean to First Amendment normative values in his opinion in Whitney v. United States, and yet join (by way of a concurring opinion) the judgment of the majority of the Court that would have sent the "patrician radical" Anita Whitney to prison for a 14-year term solely for participating in the formation of the California Communist Labor Party? Part of the puzzle is provided by the unpublished …

The Landmark Free-Speech Case That Wasn't: The Nike V. Kasky Story, David Skover, Ronald Collins

Faculty Articles

Written as the Foreword to a Symposium entitled Nike v. Kasky and the Modern Commercial Speech Doctrine, this piece tells the background stories that brought the Nike v. Kasky players to the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court and beyond. Subsequently, it explores the principles and perspectives at tension in the Nike controversy, and charts the lessons of the Nike story - legal, political, and cultural.

The Marketplace Of Ideas In Cyberspace, Margaret Chon

Faculty Articles

In the Panel Discussion on The Marketplace Of Ideas In Cyberspace at the 1999-2000 Oliver Wendell Holmes Symposium And Lectureship At Mercer University, Professor Margaret Chon discusses censorship and hate speech on the internet. Professor Chon questions the exporting of our First Amendment jurisprudence in this particular area, since we are the only democratic country to speak of, that protects what we've been referring to as hate speech.

Afterword: New "Truths" And The Old First Amendment, David Skover, Ronald Collins

Faculty Articles

Written as an afterword to a Symposium on The Death of Discourse, this piece replies to commentaries on the relationship between "Noble Lies" and the First Amendment authored by Professors Shadia Drury (political science), Robert Hariman (rhetoric & communication studies), David Nyberg (philosophy), Loyal Rue (religion & philosophy), and Richard Stivers (sociology).

The Pornographic State, David Skover, Ronald Collins

Faculty Articles

Written as a contribution to the Harvard Symposium on Changing Images of the State, this article explores the realm of Pornotopia, a republic of images, the state that liberal America aspires to be. Imagine a nation in which there is little or no discord about pornography because there is little or no meaningful discourse about it. Imagine a nation in which people gladly trade the reality of human beings for images of that reality, a "virtual reality." Imagine a nation in which there is erotic self­expression but little or no communal expression. Imagine a nation in which sexual war and …

The Psychology Of First Amendment Scholarship: A Reply, David Skover, Ronald Collins

Faculty Articles

This essay was written as an afterword to the Colloquy entitled The First Amendment in a Commercial Culture, as a reply to commentaries on "Commerce & Communication" authored by Leo Bogart (advertising expert), Sut Jhally (professor of communications), Alex Kozinski (federal appellate judge) & Stuart Banner (attorney), and Rodney Smolla (law professor). The authors, Professors Skover and Collins, had hoped that Commerce & Communication would prompt new debate and discussion about certain First Amendment issues. However, judging from thier colleagues' reactions, there may well be more of the former than the latter. But in the scheme of things, who's to …

The First Amendment In An Age Of Paratroopers, David Skover, Ronald Collins

Faculty Articles

As the lead piece in a Colloquy entitled The First Amendment and the Paratroopers' Paradox, this article argues that today's free speech theory is largely grounded in 18th Century fears of government's tyrannical censorship. This theory is ill-equipped to deal with a distinct tyranny in 21st Century America, a tyranny playing upon the public's insatiable appetite for amusement. Those who venture to develop free speech principles to suit a new cultural environment are the First Amendment paratroopers of our time, the ones who realize that we cannot retain our old constitutional prerogatives in a transformed world. The Paratroopers' Paradox: To …

The National Labor Relations Act And The Forgotten First Amendment, James E. Bond

Faculty Articles

In this article Professor Bond discusses several points. First, the freedom of association principle, whatever its constitutional paternity, is now treated by the Court as one among first amendment equals. It is thus a fundamental right which the government may limit only for the most compelling reasons and then only in that way which least intrudes upon its exercise. Second, the relationship of an employee both to his employer and to his fellow employees involves associational rights of the kind guaranteed and protected by the first amendment. Third, the exclusive representation rule' of the National Labor Relations Act seriously interferes …