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Full-Text Articles in Law
Do Immigrants Have Freedom Of Speech?, Michael Kagan
Do Immigrants Have Freedom Of Speech?, Michael Kagan
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The Department of Justice recently argued that immigrants who have not been legally admitted to the United States have no right to claim protections under the First Amendment. If the DOJ argument is right, then most of the 11 million unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. could be censored or punished for speaking their minds – as many of them have in support of comprehensive immigration reform and the Dream Act. This Essay explores the complicated and conflicted case law governing immigrants’ free speech rights, and argues that, contrary to the DOJ position, all people in the United States are protected …
Speaker Discrimination: The Next Frontier Of Free Speech, Michael Kagan
Speaker Discrimination: The Next Frontier Of Free Speech, Michael Kagan
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Citizens United v. FEC articulated a new pillar of free speech doctrine that is independent from the well-known controversies about corporate personhood and the role of money in elections. For the first time, the Supreme Court clearly said that discrimination on the basis of the identity of the speaker offends the First Amendment. Previously, the focus of free speech doctrine had been on the content and forum of speech, not on the identity of the speaker. This new doctrine has the potential to reshape free speech law far beyond the corporate speech and campaign finance contexts. This article explores the …
Student Press Exceptionalism, Sonja R. West
Student Press Exceptionalism, Sonja R. West
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Constitutional protection for student speakers is an issue that has been hotly contested for almost 50 years. Several commentators have made powerful arguments that theCourt has failed to sufficiently protect the First Amendment rights of all students. But this debate has overlooked an even more troubling reality about the current state ofexpressive protection for student — the especially harmful effect of the Court’s precedents on student journalists. Under the Court’s jurisprudence, schools may regulate with far greater breadth and ease the speech of student journalists than of their non-press classmates. Schools are essentially free to censor the student press even …
A Word Of Warning From A Woman: Arbitrary, Categorical, And Hidden Religious Exemptions Threaten Lgbt Rights, Leslie C. Griffin
A Word Of Warning From A Woman: Arbitrary, Categorical, And Hidden Religious Exemptions Threaten Lgbt Rights, Leslie C. Griffin
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Religious exemptions have already undermined women’s rights. Now exemptions threaten gays and lesbians. The Constitution protected women’s equality and liberty until religious exemptions eroded them. Today, as gays and lesbians stand on the threshold of marriage equality, religious exemptions threaten to diminish their hard-earned constitutional right. For this reason, I argue it is past time to reject the religious exemption theory of religious liberty, which privileges religion over civil and constitutional rights, in favor of neutral laws that govern all. Religious exemptions pervade American law in numerous ways that are harmful to civil rights.
In this essay, I identify three …
Land Use Law Update: Reed V. Town Of Gilbert Redux, Sarah Adams-Schoen
Land Use Law Update: Reed V. Town Of Gilbert Redux, Sarah Adams-Schoen
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The Winter 2015 Land Use Law Update asked whether the Supreme Court’s decision in Reed v. Town of Gilbert would require municipalities throughout the country to rewrite their sign codes. The short answer is “yes.”
At a minimum, following the Supreme Court’s decision that the Town of Gilbert’s temporary directional sign regulations violated petitioners Good News Community Church’s and Pastor Clyde Reed’s First Amendment rights, municipalities will want to act quickly to amend their sign codes if they regulate different categories of signs differently. A code that places fewer restrictions on political or ideological signs than on directional signs likely …