Law Commons^™

The Supreme Court’S Two Constitutions: A First Look At The “Reverse Polarity” Cases, Arthur D. Hellman

Articles

In the traditional approach to ideological classification, “liberal” judicial decisions are those that support civil liberties claims; “conservative” decisions are those that reject them. That view – particularly associated with the Warren Court era – is reflected in numerous academic writings and even an article by a prominent liberal judge. Today, however, there is mounting evidence that the traditional assumptions about the liberal-conservative divide are incorrect or at best incomplete. In at least some areas of constitutional law, the traditional characterizations have been reversed. Across a wide variety of constitutional issues, support for claims under the Bill of Rights or …

Quiet-Revolution Rulings In Constitutional Law, Dan T. Coenen

Scholarly Works

The Supreme Court ordinarily supports its establishment of major constitutional principles with detailed justifications in its opinions. On occasion, however, the Court proceeds in a very different way, issuing landmark pronouncements without giving any supportive reasons at all. This Article documents the recurring character and deep importance of these “quietrevolution rulings” in constitutional law. It shows that—however surprising it might seem—rulings of this sort have played key roles in shaping incorporation; reverse incorporation; congressional power; federal courts; and freedom-ofspeech, freedom-of-religion, and equal-protection law. According to the synthesis offered here, these rulings fall into two categories. One set of cases involves …

Hate Speech And Double Standards, Thomas M. Keck

Political Science - All Scholarship

Many European states ban the public expression of hateful speech directed at racial and religious minorities, and an increasing number do so for anti-gay speech as well. These laws have been subjected to a wide range of legal, philosophical, and empirical investigation, but this paper explores one potential cost that has not received much attention in the literature. Statutory bans on hate speech leave democratic societies with a Hobson’s choice. If those societies ban incitements of hatred against some vulnerable groups, they will inevitably face parallel demands for protection of other such groups. If they accede to those demands, they …

Hobby Lobby And The Pathology Of Citizens United, Ellen D. Katz

Articles

Four years ago, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission held that for-profit corporations possess a First Amendment right to make independent campaign expenditures. In so doing, the United States Supreme Court invited speculation that such corporations might possess other First Amendment rights as well. The petitioners in Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp. v. Sebelius are now arguing that for-profit corporations are among the intended beneficiaries of the Free Exercise Clause and, along with the respondents in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores, that they also qualify as “persons” under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). Neither suggestion follows inexorably from Citizens United, …

Nonsense And The Freedom Of Speech: What Meaning Means For The First Amendment, Joseph Blocher

Faculty Scholarship

A great deal of everyday expression is, strictly speaking, nonsense. But courts and scholars have done little to consider whether or why such meaningless speech, like nonrepresentational art, falls within “the freedom of speech.” If, as many suggest, meaning is what separates speech from sound and expression from conduct, then the constitutional case for nonsense is complicated. And because nonsense is so common, the case is also important — artists like Lewis Carroll and Jackson Pollock are not the only putative “speakers” who should be concerned about the outcome.

This Article is the first to explore thoroughly the relationship between …

The Thirteenth Amendment And Pro-Equality Speech, William M. Carter Jr.

Articles

The Thirteenth Amendment’s Framers envisioned the Amendment as providing federal authority to eliminate the “badges and incidents of slavery.” The freemen and their descendants are the most likely to be burdened with the effects of stigma, stereotypes, and structural discrimination arising from the slave system. Because African Americans are therefore the most obvious beneficiaries of the Amendment’s promise to eliminate the legacy of slavery, it is often mistakenly assumed that federal power to eradicate the badges and incidents of slavery only permits remedies aimed at redressing the subordination of African Americans. While African Americans were the primary victims of slavery …

The Roberts Court Vs. Free Speech, David Cole

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

The Questioning Attitude: Questions About Derrida, Martin J. Stone

Articles

No abstract provided.

Weak-Form Judicial Review And "Core" Civil Liberties, Mark V. Tushnet

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In this Essay, I want to unearth some subordinated strands in the Rehnquist Court's free speech jurisprudence. For example, the Rehnquist Court allowed Congress to regulate campaign finance in ways subject to credible First Amendment objections, and to impose obligations on cable television systems that would almost certainly be unconstitutional were they imposed on newspapers. These decisions, I suggest, do not rest simply on the kind of deference to legislative judgment that fits comfortably into a system of strong-form review. Rather, they represent what I call a managerial model of the First Amendment, which accords legislatures a large role in …

Six Opinions By Mr. Justice Stevens: A New Methodology For Constitutional Cases?, Robert F. Nagel

Publications

No abstract provided.

Five Modern Notions In Search Of An Author: The Ideology Of The Intimate Society In Constitutional Speech Law, Marie Failinger

Faculty Scholarship

In this article, drawing heavily on the work of sociologist Richard Sennett, the author argues that the Court’s jurisprudence lends credence to, and exacerbates, five damaging “common sense” notions about American public social life: that public space and time are naked or empty, and can be imagined as no more than transportation tunnels or even the binoculars of a voyeur, as illustrated by the public forum doctrine; that massed acts of public communication, or “speech crowds” are dangerous and must be controlled by force, as the public forum and “clear and present danger” doctrines suggest; that “shadow” space for deviant …

Democratic Credentials, Donald J. Herzog

Articles

We've made a mistake, urges Bruce Ackerman. We've failed to notice, or have forgotten, that ours is a dualist democracy: ordinary representatives passing their statutes are in fact the democratic inferiors of We the People, who at rare junctures appear on the scene and affirm new constitutional principles. (Actually, he claims in passing that we have a three-track democracy.)' Dwelling lovingly on dualism, Ackerman doesn't quite forget to discuss democracy, but he comes close. I want to raise some questions about the democratic credentials of Ackerman's view. Not, perhaps, the ones he anticipates. So I don't mean to argue that …

Silence And The Word, Paul Campos

Publications

No abstract provided.

How To Do Things With The First Amendment, Pierre Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

Teaching Tolerance, Robert F. Nagel

Publications

No abstract provided.

Freedom Of Speech As Therapy, Pierre Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

Book Review, Pierre Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

Rules And Standards, Pierre Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

On Complaining About The Burger Court, Robert F. Nagel

Publications

No abstract provided.

An Attack On Categorical Approaches To Freedom Of Speech, Pierre J. Schlag

Publications

No abstract provided.

Unconstitutional Conditions Upon Public Employment: New Departures In The Protection Of First Amendment Rights, Harold H. Bruff

Publications

No abstract provided.