Law Commons^™

Court Of Appeals Of New York, Watson V. State Commission On Judicial Conduct, Denise Shanley

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

First Amendment Decisions - 2002 Term, Joel Gora

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Supreme Court, Appellate Term, First Department, People V. Bull, Randi Schwartz

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Aba Model Code Revisions And Judicial Campaign Speech: Constitutional And Practical Implications, Howland W. Abramson, Gary Lee

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

2003-2004 Supreme Court Term: Another Losing Season For The First Amendment, Joel M. Gora

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Knockin' On Heaven's Door: Rethinking The Role Of Religion In Death Penalty Cases, Gary J. Simson, Stephen P. Garvey

Stephen P. Garvey

Religion has played a prominent role at various points of capital trials. In jury selection, peremptory challenges have been exercised against prospective jurors on the basis of their religion. At the sentencing phase, defendants have offered as mitigating evidence proof of their religiosity, and the prosecution has introduced evidence of the victim's religiosity. In closing argument, quotations from the Bible and other appeals to religion have long been common. During deliberations, jurors have engaged in group prayer and tried to sway one another with quotes from scripture. Such practices have not gone unquestioned. Rather remarkably, however, the questions have almost …

A Primer On Hobby Lobby: For-Pro T Corporate Entities’ Challenge To The Hhs Mandate, Free Exercise Rights, Rf ’S Scope, And The Nondelegation Doctrine, Danielle Weatherby, Terri R. Day, Leticia M. Diaz

Danielle Weatherby

First Amendment Cases In The October 2004 Term, Joel M. Gora

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

America's Written Constitution: Remembering The Judicial Duty To Say What The Law Is, Joshua J. Schroeder

Joshua J Schroeder

In 2013 the Supreme Court embraced a policy of feigned positivism. In general positivism says there are no future rewards and punishments and thus there is no Natural Law that holds sway over rulers whether it is established by a creator God or not. Thus adopting positivism leaves the Court with an existential problem because the Court’s equitable power flows directly from Natural Law and Nature’s God and is much older than the new country known as the United States. But even in the scope of U.S. history positivism lost significant ground in its struggle with equitable power and the …

Prying, Spying, And Lying: Intrusive Newsgathering And What The Law Should Do About It, Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

The media's use of intrusive newsgathering techniques poses an increasing threat to individual privacy. Courts currently resolve the overwhelming majority of conflicts in favor of the media. This is not because the First Amendment bars the imposition of tort liability on the media for its newsgathering practices. It does not. Rather, tort law has failed to seize the opportunity to create meaninful privacy protection. After surveying the economic, philosophical, and practical obstacles to reform, this Article proposes to rejuvenate the tort of intrusion to tip the balance between privacy and the press back in privacy's direction. Working within the framework …

Incendiary Speech And Social Media, Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

Incidents illustrating the incendiary capacity of social media have rekindled concerns about the "mismatch" between existing doctrinal categories and new types of dangerous speech. This Essay examines two such incidents, one in which an offensive tweet and YouTube video led a hostile audience to riot and murder, and the other in which a blogger urged his nameless, faceless audience to murder federal judges. One incident resulted in liability for the speaker, even though no violence occurred; the other did not lead to liability for the speaker even though at least thirty people died as a result of his words. An …

Brandenburg And The United States' War On Incitement Abroad: Defending A Double Standard, Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

While it is perfectly legitimate for the United States to attempt to persuade foreign citizens and media not to engage in advocacy of violent acts, the administration's rhetoric suggests that the United States expects foreign governments to take action against speech that would be protected by the First Amendment in the United States. What explains this apparent hypocrisy? Is this simply another example of the United States touting democracy at home while supporting despotism abroad? Or is the Brandenburg incitement standard so socially and culturally contingent that it is not appropriate for export, at least to the Arab Middle East? …

The Constitution According To Justices Scalia And Thomas: Alive And Kickin', Eric J. Segall

Eric J. Segall

No abstract provided.

Sharing Stupid $H*T With Friends And Followers: The First Amendment Rights Of College Athletes To Use Social Media, Meg Penrose

Faculty Scholarship

This paper takes a closer look at the First Amendment rights of college athletes to access social media while simultaneously participating in intercollegiate athletics. The question posed is quite simple: can a coach or athletic department at a public university legally restrict a student-athlete's use of social media? If so, does the First Amendment provide any restraints on the type or length of restrictions that can be imposed? Thus far, neither question has been presented to a court for resolution. However, the answers are vital, as college coaches and athletic directors seek to regulate their athletes in a constitutional manner.

Death Or Transformation? Educational Autonomy In The Roberts Court, Elizabeth Dale

Elizabeth Dale

In the aftermath of the Supreme Court's decisions in Grutter and Gratz a number of commentators argued that the Court had begun to embrace a new constitutional doctrine that required deference to the decisions of some institutions. Most notably they asserted that the Court would defer within the field of education. But even as they suggested that the Court was more willing to explore the doctrine, those two opinions left several large questions unanswered: Did the Court's embrace of institutional autonomy extend beyond higher education, into the K-12 realm? If so, what were its bounds? Was the doctrine only relevant …

Employee Speech & Management Rights: A Counterintuitive Reading Of Garcetti V. Ceballos, Elizabeth Dale

Elizabeth Dale

In the two years since the decision came down, courts and commentators generally have agreed that the Supreme Court's decision in Garcetti v. Ceballos sharply limited the First Amendment rights of public employees. In this Article, I argue that this widely shared interpretation overstates the case. The Court in Garcetti did not dramatically change the way it analyzed public employees' First Amendment rights. Instead, it restated the principles on which those claims rest, emphasizing management rights and the unconstitutional conditions doctrine. By making those two theories the centerpiece of the decision, the Court in Garcetti defined public employee speech rights …

Globally Speaking - Honoring The Victims' Stories: Matsuda's Human Rights Praxis, Berta E. Hernández-Truyol

Berta E. Hernández-Truyol

Globally speaking, international law and the vast majority of domestic legal systems strive to protect the right to freedom of expression. The United States’ First Amendment provides an early historical protection of speech—a safeguard now embraced around the world. The extent of this protection, however, varies among states. The United States stands alone in excluding countervailing considerations of equality, dignitary, or privacy interests that would favor restrictions on speech. The gravamen of the argument supporting such American exceptionalism is that free expression is necessary in a democracy. Totalitarianism, the libertarian narrative goes, thrives on government control of information to the …

Ties That Bind? The Questionable Consent Justification For Hosanna-Tabor, Jessie Hill

NULR Online

No abstract provided.

Religious Freedom, Church-State Separation, & The Ministerial Exception, Carl H. Esbeck, Thomas C. Berg, Kimberlee Wood Colby, Richard W. Garnett

Richard W Garnett

The Hosanna-Tabor case concerns the separation of church and state, an arrangement that is often misunderstood but is nevertheless a critical dimension of the freedom of religion protected by the First Amendment to our Constitution. For nearly a thousand years, the tradition of Western constitutionalism - the project of protecting political freedom by marking boundaries to the power of government - has been assisted by the principled commitment to religious liberty and to church-state separation, correctly understood. A community that respects - as ours does - both the importance of, and the distinction between, the spheres of political and religious …

Accommodation, Establishment, And Freedom Of Religion, Richard W. Garnett

Richard W Garnett

This short essay engages the argument that it would violate the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause to exempt an ordinary, nonreligious, profit-seeking business – such as Hobby Lobby – from the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive-coverage rules. In response to this argument, it is emphasized that the First Amendment not only permits but invites generous, religion-specific accommodations and exemptions and that the Court’s Smith decision does not teach otherwise. In addition, this essay proposes that laws and policies that promote and protect religious freedom should be seen as having a “secular purpose” and that because religious freedom, like clean air, is an …

The Cost To Carry: New York State’S Regulation On Firearm Registration, David D. Pelaez

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Defining The Line Between Constitutionally Protected Speech And True Threats: Can I Be Arrested For Being Annoying?, Allison E. Dolzani

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Neutral Discrimination – Selective Enforcement Of Religiously Neutral Laws And The First Amendment, Jeffrey Gautsche

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Religious Freedom & Closely Held Corporations: The Hobby Lobby Case & Its Ethical Implications, Corey A. Ciocchetti

Corey A Ciocchetti

Hobby Lobby and its quest for religious freedom captured the attention of a nation for a few moments in late June 2014. The country homed in on the Supreme Court as the justices weighed the rights of an incorporated, profit-making entity run by devout individuals that objected to particular entitlements granted to women under the Affordable Care Act. The case raised important legal issues such as whether the law allows for-profit corporations to exercise religion (yes!) and whether protection for religious freedom trumps the rights of third parties to cost free preventive care (sort of!). The Supreme Court’s decision also …

Two Tests Unite To Resolve The Tension Between The First Amendment And The Right Of Publicity, Dora Georgescu

Fordham Law Review

The right of publicity is an established legal doctrine that grants individuals the exclusive right to control the commercial use of their image. Though it has many important and laudable uses, one unfortunate consequence of the right of publicity is that it restricts artists’ abilities to portray real persons in their works. In so doing, the right of publicity directly conflicts with the First Amendment protections of an individual’s freedom of expression.

While the U.S. Supreme Court addressed this tension in Zacchini v. Scripps-Howard Broadcasting Co., the Court did not create a clear standard for balancing the interests of …

U.S. Supreme Court Review 2013-2014 Term, Miller W. Shealy Jr.

Miller W. Shealy Jr.

No abstract provided.

Financing Elections And "Appearance Of Corruption": Citizen Attitudes And Behavior In 2012, Molly J. Walker Wilson

Catholic University Law Review

As political spending reaches new highs in the 2012 election cycle, and as the controversy surrounding wealthy donors and interest groups grows, polls demonstrate a surge of cynicism among Americans who profess a belief that the American political system is corrupt. The Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United made possible the most recent expansion of political spending. In this case, the question was whether allowing corporations and unions to spend unlimited amounts of money on political advertising would result in corruption or the appearance of corruption. The majority on the Court determined that it would not. Many observers have …

"God Hates Fags" Isn't The Same As "Fuck The Draft": Introducing The Non-Sexual Obscenity Doctrine, Adam Lamparello

Adam Lamparello

No abstract provided.

Toward A Federal Constitutional Right To Employment, R. George Wright

Seattle University Law Review

This Article outlines an argument for a federal constitutional right to employment. The Article begins by examining the harms and costs of involuntary long-term unemployment. It then discusses the historical contributions to our understanding of the value of work, before drawing on several well-established jurisprudential distinctions to explain why, and to justify initial optimism regarding a constitutional employment right.

Sacred Cows, Holy Wars: Exploring The Limits Of Law In The Regulation Of Raw Milk And Kosher Meat, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

In a free society law and religion seldom coincide comfortably, tending instead to reflect the inherent tension that often resides between the two. This is nowhere more apparent than in America, where the underlying principle upon which the first freedom enunciated by the Constitution's Bill of Rights is based ‒ the separation of church and state – is conceptually at odds with the pragmatic compromises that may be reached. But our adherence to the primacy of individual rights and civil liberties ‒ that any activity must be permitted if it is not imposed upon others without their consent, and if …