First Amendment Commons^™

An Imminent Substantial Disruption: Towards A Uniform Standard For Balancing The Rights Of Students To Speak And The Rights Of Administrators To Discipline., Allison G. Kort

Allison G Kort

ABSTRACT

An Imminent Substantial Disruption: Toward a Uniform Standard for Balancing the Rights of Students to Speak and the Rights of Administrators to Discipline.

By Allison Kort

Twenty-five years before the Supreme Court’s landmark school speech decision in Tinker v. Des Moines, 393 U.S. 503, 504 (1969), the Court cautioned against placing too much discretion in the hands of school boards. In Tinker, when students wore black armbands to protest the Vietnam War, the Supreme Court determined that student speech may not be censored when the record demonstrates no facts which would reasonably have led school authorities to ...

The Limits Of Child Pornography, Carissa Byrne Hessick

Indiana Law Journal

Although the First Amendment ordinarily protects the creation, distribution, and possession of visual images, the Supreme Court has declared that those protections do not apply to child pornography. But the Court has failed to clearly define child pornography as a category of speech. Providing a precise definition of the child pornography exception to the First Amendment has become increasingly important because recent years have seen a dramatic increase in the penalties associated with the creation, distribution, and possession of child pornography.

This Article proposes a clear definition of the child pornography exception. It argues that an image ought to fall ...

"Step Into The Game": Assessing The Interactive Nature Of Virtual Reality Video Games Through The Context Of "Terroristic Speech", Robert Hupf Jr

Robert Hupf Jr

This article will begin the discussion on video gaming’s next interactive jump – total VR immersion – and examine whether the interactivity of VR changes the ordinary First Amendment analysis . . . . Yet, even with the “terroristic speech” component, involving everything from instructions on bomb-making to anti-American “terrorist” recruitment messaging, the Court should affirm the speech-protective logic of Justice Learned Hand and Justice Brandeis and hold that the First Amendment protects the freedom of video game developers in making VR video games with problematic content. The video game medium and its depictions have already been recognized as “speech” in Brown, fall into a ...

“Can I Profit From My Own Name And Likeness As A College Athlete?” The Predictive Legal Analytics Of A College Player’S Publicity Rights Vs. First Amendment Rights Of Others, Roger M. Groves

Roger M. Groves

Two federal court decisions during 2013 have changed the game for college students versus the schools, the NCAA and video game makers. This article explores whether for the first time in history these athletes can profit from their own name and likeness and prevent others from doing so.

But those cases still leave many untested applications to new facts – facts that the courts have not faced. Particularly intriguing is how 21^st Century technology will apply to this area in future litigation. No publicity rights case or article to date has explored the application of predictive analytics, computer programs, algorithms ...

Balancing The Scales: Adhuc Sub Judice Li Est Or Trial By Media, Casey J. Cooper

Casey J Cooper

The right to freedom of expression and free press is recognized under almost all major human rights instruments and domestic legal systems—common and civil—in the world. However, what do you do when a fundamental right conflicts with another equally fundamental right, like the right to a fair trial? In the United States, the freedom of speech, encompassing the freedom of the press, goes nearly unfettered: the case is not the same for other common law countries. In light of cultural and historic facts, institutional factors, modern realities, and case-law, this Article contends that current American jurisprudence does not ...

Removing Disfavored Faces From Facebook: The Freedom Of Speech Implications Of Banning Sex Offenders From Social Media, John Hitz

Indiana Law Journal

This Note scrutinizes the constitutionality of statutes that ban sex offenders who are no longer under any form of probation, parole, or supervised release from using social media. This Note argues that the incarnations of three of the social media ban statutes that have been examined by the federal judiciary were properly found unconstitutional because they violate the free speech rights of the sex offenders that they ban from social media. This Note goes on to argue that states can secure the interests they were seeking to protect in adopting these statutes through other means.

ng what groups of individuals ...

Violent Video Games And The Rights Of Children And Parents: A Critique Of Brown V. Entertainment Merchants Association, Martin Guggenheim

New York University Public Law and Legal Theory Working Papers

This Article closely examines the 2011 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association, 131 S.Ct. 2729 (2011), which held that California’s effort to restrict children’s access to violent video games violated the First Amendment. The Article will show that the Supreme Court widely missed the mark in applying well-established First Amendment law to strike down California’s effort to limit a minor’s access to material reasonably deemed inappropriate by parents. The Court’s principal error was to mischaracterize the statute as a ban on the distribution of material deemed inappropriate by the Legislature. This ...

Good Enough For Government Work: Two Cheers For Content Neutrality, Seth F. Kreimer

Faculty Scholarship

When then-Professor Elena Kagan emerged on the public stage in the mid-1990s, she declared “the distinction between content-based and content-neutral regulations of speech serves as the keystone of First Amendment law.” In the last decade and a half, commentators and Supreme Court opinions regularly echoed that declaration. Yet the First Amendment does not mention “content neutrality.” It is an artifact of modern constitutional doctrine–a doctrine subject to a sustained barrage of judicial and academic criticism.

Most scholarly critiques of content neutrality focus on First Amendment theory and Supreme Court opinions. After surveying these critiques, along with the incomplete defenses ...

College Student Speech - What You Can't Say Can't Say Off-Campus On Your Computer And Why, Brett J. Geschke

Brett J Geschke

Student Speech – What you Can’t Say Off-Campus on Your Computer and Why

Brett J. Geschke | Spring 2014

Organization of the Article

Introductory Argument and Thesis ● 1

Overview of the First Amendment – School Speech ● 6

First Amendment School Speech Analysis in the Digital Age ● 16

Recent Federal Cases Applying Tinker and Finding Punishment Constitutional ● 20

Recent Federal Cases Applying Tinker and Finding Punishment Unconstitutional ● 29

An Alternative Framework: A Recent State Supreme Court Case On This Issue ● 37

The Difference Between High School and College Student Speech ● 41

Analyzing On-Point Law Review Articles ● 46

Conclusory Remarks – Apply Tinker ● 50

Introductory ...

United States Of America V. Manning, Bradley E., Pfc: When Fear Meets Reality: How An Aggressive Prosecution Did Not Equate To An Assault On First Amendment Freedoms, Jordan A. Wilson

Jordan A Wilson

Abstract:

Although debate concerning the First Amendment rights of government whistleblowers certainly exists, a much more heated debate arises concerning the rights of not the original leakers, but those who choose to publish the leaked material. This debate is only intensified when the government attempts to use military law and apply its jurisdiction to civilian actors.

The court martial of PFC Bradley Manning raised the specific question of whether charges under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) may be brought against civilian news publications who choose to publish the classified information. This question led to the emergence of a ...

United States V. Martignon, Maureen A. Fitzgerald

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

How Much Spam Can Can-Spam Can?: Evaluating The Effectiveness Of The Can-Spam Act In The Wake Of White Buffalo Ventures V. University Of Texas, Fay Katayama

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Freedom Of Speech & Election Day At The Polls: Thou Doth Protest Too Much, James J. Woodruff Ii

James J. Woodruff II

This Article seeks to answer the following question: What are the actual limits the government can place on political speech at and around the polling place? In examining this question, this Article argues that some of the current limitations placed on polling-place activities are unconstitutional. Specifically, this Article focuses on the wearing of political slogans and images within the polling room and campaign-free zone and the placement of campaign signs within the campaign-free zone.

Section 1983 Civil Rights Litigation In The October 2005 Term, Martin Schwartz

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Campaign Finance And Political Gerrymandering Decisions In The October 2005 Term, Burt Neuborne

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

First Amendment Decisions In The October 2005 Term, Joel Gora

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Lausti And Salazar: Are Religious Symbols Legitimate In The Public Square?, Katie A. Croghan

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Press Exceptionalism, Sonja R. West

Scholarly Works

Thanks to advances in mass communication technology, it is now easier and cheaper for all of us to share information with each other. This new ability allows us to act in ways that often seem “press-like.” We might, for example, tweet a warning to our friends about a traffic jam or blog about an upcoming election. Armed with nothing more than a smart phone or a laptop, each of us can share information about matters of public interest to a potentially broad audience in a timely manner — thus engaging in the very activities that were once considered the exclusive province ...

Nineteenth Century Corporate Law: A New Lens For Religious Freedom Scholars, Nathan B. Oman

Popular Media

No abstract provided.

Summary Of Jacobs V. Adelson, 130 Nev. Adv. Op. 44, Kylee Gloeckner

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court determined whether the absolute privilege rule applies to statements made to the media.