Constitutional Law Commons^™

Religious Minorities And Secular Rights, Joshua C. Mcdaniel

Washington and Lee Law Review

When religious claimants sue to protect their ability to practice their faith, they often invoke legal guarantees that specifically protect religious exercise. Yet historically—and still today—they also rely on secular guarantees like freedom of speech or equal protection. And their victories on these grounds set precedents not just for believers but for everyone. As a result, many rights we now take for granted stem from religious minorities pressing for the ability to preach, proselytize, and publish their religious views. No account of free speech law would be complete, for instance, without considering the pathbreaking decisions won by Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Although …

Constructive Falsity, Legal Truth, And The Public Interest In Not Reporting On Expunged Records, Itay Ravid

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Judicial Underreach: Tiktok Inc. V. Garland'S Implications For National Security And Free Speech, Olivia Sharp

Colorado Law Student Scholars

No abstract provided.

The Domestic Mirror: Tiktok V. Garland, Data Privacy, And Meaningful Free Expression, Olivia Sharp

Colorado Law Student Scholars

No abstract provided.

Press Freedom As A First Amendment Paradigm, Gregory P. Magarian

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

The Press, Privacy, Expungement, And Second Chances: Shifting The Paradigm, Brian M. Murray

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Using State Sentencing Enhancements To Protect Journalists From Physical Assault, Anthony L. Fargo

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

The View From The Bar: How Media Lawyers Perceive Their Work, Jonathan Peters, Skylar Bandoly

Villanova Law Review (1956 - )

No abstract provided.

Lost And Found, Katherine M. Houlden

Nebraska Journal on Advancing Justice

No abstract provided.

Home Of The Brave, Land Of The Free: The Star-Spangled Banner's Contested History, Michael H. Hoffheimer

Nebraska Journal on Advancing Justice

No abstract provided.

Pearl's Perfect Last Will - Crushed By Infantilism Bias, Edward F. Fogarty Mr

Nebraska Journal on Advancing Justice

No abstract provided.

Dangerous Or Neglected, Amanda Landaverde

Nebraska Journal on Advancing Justice

No abstract provided.

The Call To Action, And My Reluctant Answer, Audrey R. Svane

Nebraska Journal on Advancing Justice

No abstract provided.

Legacy: Introduction To Issue 2, Nicholas L. Marti

Nebraska Journal on Advancing Justice

No abstract provided.

Volume 2, Issue 2 Masthead, Njaj Editorial Board

Nebraska Journal on Advancing Justice

No abstract provided.

The Ministerial Exception And Defamation: Navigating Churches’ Autonomy And Their Communications, Zachary Runge

Pepperdine Law Review

In two recent cases, the Supreme Court has adopted what scholars and lower courts have called the “ministerial exception.” The Court only addressed the ministerial exception’s application to employment discrimination claims. But the Court did not foreclose the possibility of its application to other claims. This Comment argues that the ministerial exception applies to defamation claims arising out of a minister’s termination. After providing the background for the ministerial exception, this Comment explains the current state of the law. Then, this Comment argues that the ministerial exception, as a form of the church autonomy doctrine, applies to the defamation claims …

Ayahuasca And Religious Freedom, Andrew C. Michaels

Pepperdine Law Review

Ayahuasca is an ancient and powerful psychedelic brew that has been used for many centuries in the Amazon rainforest, and over past decades has been gaining popularity in western countries such as the United States. The ayahuasca brew contains dimethyltryptamine (DMT) and accordingly is banned by the Controlled Substances Act (CSA). But some groups working with ayahuasca have applied for exemptions under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), and so far, at least five such groups have received exemptions, either via court decision or via agreement with the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). However, the factors that courts and the DEA …

Broadcasting Bigotry: A Proposal To Revive Group Defamation And Hold Modern Media Accountable For The Disparagement Of Asian Americans, Dominic Roschival

University of Cincinnati Law Review

No abstract provided.

True Threats And Protected Speech In Counterman V. Colorado, David Crump

University of Cincinnati Law Review

No abstract provided.

Press Protection As Anticorruption, Zachary Reger

Texas A&M Law Review

As the partisan press of the Founding Era gave way to the commercial press of the nineteenth century, then to the professional press of the twentieth century, American journalism assumed an increasingly skeptical attitude toward governmental power. Today, the investigatory and information-spreading functions of the “fourth branch” are more important than ever to checking public corruption in a vast administrative state. At the same time, the press faces financial crisis, threatening the anticorruption interest.

This Essay evaluates three mechanisms for shoring up the corruption-fighting role of American journalism: (1) constitutional speech protections for the corporate form taken by most modern …

Brief Of First Amendment Scholars As Amici Curiae Supporting Petitioner, Joseph M. Terry, Stephen J. Fuzesi, James N. Sasso, Langston E. Ward, Richard W. Garnett

Court Briefs

No. 25-927
Richard Lowery v. Lillian Mills

On Petition for Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit

From the Summary of Argument

The suppression of constitutionally protected speech violates the First Amendment. A speaker need not be punished to be able to state a cause of action if the government has suppressed or threatens to suppress his or her speech through other means. This Court, across decades, and in a range of contexts, repeatedly has reaffirmed that principle. It has done so in cases affirming that a party may challenge a criminal statute …

Free Speech Trapped In Amber: The Rise Of The 'History And Tradition' Test, From Unregulated Guns To Highly Regulated Speech, Matthew D. Bunker, Emily Erickson

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

An insidious virus appears poised to invade First Amendment free speech doctrine. “History and tradition,” a deeply flawed variant of originalism, threatens to transform speech law from a rational enterprise, employing tiers of scrutiny to evaluate potential infringements on speech, to a random scavenger hunt through the distant past that could upend numerous vital First Amendment principles.

Traditionalism’s ascendence to the forefront of history-centric constitutional interpretation was heralded in three dramatic cases decided at the end of the U.S. Supreme Court’s October 2021 term. New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n v. Bruen elicited particular concern among First Amendment scholars, …

All The King’S Lawyers, Rebecca Aviel

Fordham Law Review

No abstract provided.

Complicit Nullification: The Illegitimate (Abrogation) Of School Religious Liberty Precedent, Amanda Harmon Cooley

Cardozo Law Review

Louisiana has enacted legislation that mandates the display of the Ten Commandments in every public school classroom. This statutory mandate directly contradicts the Supreme Court’s extant precedent in Stone v. Graham. Legislators in Texas, North Dakota, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Kentucky have also indicated plans to introduce similar unconstitutional legislation, defying the Supreme Court’s interpretations of the First Amendment’s Religion Clauses. Similarly, Texas and Florida now permit public school chaplains or Bible-based public school curricula, which violates the Court’s longstanding prohibitions on such actions, as established in its 1948 ruling in Illinois ex rel. McCollum v. Board of Education …

An Alternative Sacrifice: Religious Arbitration Agreements In Ministerial Employment Contracts, Grace E. Brandt

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

After decades of development in lower courts, the Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the ministerial exception in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. E.E.O.C. (2012) and provided additional guidance in Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrissey-Berru (2020). The precise contours of the exception remain uncertain, but the doctrine—grounded in the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses of the First Amendment—effectively bars civil courts from reviewing claims against religious institutions that implicate ministerial employment decisions. Thus, ministers are unable to pursue redress for legitimate harms that occur within the scope of their religious employment, even if unrelated to religious doctrine. This …

What’S History Without Tradition?, Richard C. Osborne Iii

Catholic University Law Review

For many decades, the Establishment Clause had been a thorn in the Supreme Court’s side. Indeed, no other constitutional provision in recent memory has provided the Court with more trouble than the Establishment Clause. In its efforts to decide whether government conduct violated the Establishment Clause, the Court had applied no less than six tests. And as if that were not bad enough, many of these tests co-existed with one another, leaving government actors left to guess at their own peril which one controlled their fate.

But that officially changed when the Supreme Court decided Kennedy v. Bremerton School District …

Standing In The Shadows: Member Anonymity In Associational Standing Cases, Mitchell Brost

Pepperdine Law Review

Associational standing serves several benefits for plaintiff members: associations often have expertise in a certain field that guides the representation of their members, they have greater resources that allow them to bring lawsuits in the first place, and they can serve as the public face of the lawsuit to shield the plaintiff member from serious retaliation that may result from bringing the claim. But due to some imprecise language in Justice Scalia’s majority opinion in Summers v. Earth Island Institute, circuit courts are divided over whether associational members can remain anonymous at all. Thus, individuals who have legitimate legal claims, …

Outbound Investment Restrictions And International Law’S Challenge, Harlan Grant Cohen

Seattle University Law Review

The Outbound Investment Rule, restricting U.S. investment in certain Chinese advanced technology sectors, has largely been portrayed as an incremental measure, a modest extension to fill loopholes in the existing investment screening regime. But while perhaps the logical next step in the securitization of the economy, the Outbound Investment Rule actually reflects a momentous shift in the relationship between governments and business, one playing out in the United States and around the world and worth attention. Unlike traditional investment screening, the Outbound Investment Rule operates like a sanctions regime, designed not to protect the U.S. economy, but to hamper the …

Resilient Dispute Resolution Systems For International Energy Conflicts, Guillermo J. Garcia Sanchez

Seattle University Law Review

Energy-related conflicts are on the rise, spanning diverse issues such as the impacts of rare mineral mining on local communities, the impacts of sanctions on energy investments due to the Russia-Ukraine war, and the impacts of expanded subsidies on the electric vehicle and solar panel industries. Increasingly, companies, communities, and governments are clashing over the challenges of pursuing disparate and sometimes competing energy policies. This Article argues that dispute resolution mechanisms in the energy investment sector must be fundamentally rethought. Traditional semi-adjudicatory models, which focus on winners and losers, fail to accommodate the complex and multifaceted nature of contemporary energy …

Restricting Data Flows Is A Sign Of Weakness, Nikolas Guggenberger

Seattle University Law Review

There has been a seismic shift in American attitudes toward the free flow of data across borders.  In less than a decade, the United States has transitioned from condemning barriers to digital trade to constructing a digital fortress of its own. It passed legislation requiring TikTok’s parent company to divest its U.S. operations or face a nationwide ban affecting 170 million U.S. users, citing national security concerns about its ties to China and the potential for data surveillance and content manipulation. Upon legal challenge by TikTok on First Amendment grounds, the Supreme Court affirmed the ban’s constitutionality. Recent federal legislation …