Law Commons^™

Free Speech And Justified True Belief, Joseph Blocher

Faculty Scholarship

Law often prioritizes justified true beliefs. Evidence, even if probative and correct, must have a proper foundation. Expert witness testimony must be the product of reliable principles and methods. Prosecutors are not permitted to trick juries into convicting a defendant, even if that defendant is truly guilty. Judges’ reasons, and not just the correctness of their holdings, are the engines of precedent. Lawyers are, in short, familiar with the notion that one must be right for the right reasons.

And yet the standard epistemic theory of the First Amendment—that the marketplace of ideas is the “best test of truth”—has generally …

Who Tells Your Story: The Legality Of And Shift In Racial Preferences Within Casting Practices, Nicole Ligon

Faculty Scholarship

Expressing racial preferences in casting calls and hiring practices is nothing new. Producers of television shows, movies, and Broadway musicals have regularly and explicitly sought to hire actors and actresses with certain physical characteristics, including race, in casting their productions. And, given that the industry seemingly accepted this standard when it favored white talent, the public heard little about it. To the extent controversy arose, courts quelled concerns in a swift and easy fashion, without consideration of the societal harms or impacts that stereotyped or limited portrayals of minorities in entertainment could have on the public’s perception of people of …