First Amendment Commons^™

Introduction, Brett G. Scharffs

BYU Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Establishment Clause Gag Reflex, Frederick Mark Gedicks

BYU Law Review

Some outcomes of Establishment Clause cases are better defended on realist rather than doctrinal grounds - that is, not on the basis of supposedly neutral principles, but by reference to some assessment of the kinds of church-state interactions that most Americans would tolerate. I call this the Establishment Clause gag reflex.

A constitutional gag reflex refers to the instinctive intellectual revulsion one might feel in response to the doctrine or holding of a case. For example, a contemporary judicial decision countenancing permanent denial of citizenship to racial minorities, or that denied to such minorities liberty or equality rights enjoyed by …

Unity Of The Graveyard And The Attack On Constitutional Secularism, Steven G. Gey

BYU Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Supreme Court's Rhetorical Hostility: What Is "Hostile" To Religion Under The Establishment Clause?, Frank S. Ravitch

BYU Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Moderate Defense Of Hate Speech Regulations On University Campuses, W. Bradley Wendel

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

The regulation of hate speech on public and private university campuses is a fiercely contested and divisive issue. Professor Bradley Wendel defends the middle ground in this debate. This Essay argues that concerns about abuses of power by those in positions of authority are unfounded when an institution possesses greater expertise in a domain than the citizens who are affected by the institution’s decision, provided that the institution is acting on the basis of reasons that are shared by the affected individual.

Not For Attribution: Government's Interest In Protecting The Integrity Of Its Own Expression, Helen L. Norton

Faculty Scholarship

Public entities increasingly maintain that the First Amendment permits them to ensure that private speakers’ views are not mistakenly attributed to the government. Consider, for example, Virginia’s efforts to ban the Sons of Confederate Veterans’ display of the Confederate flag logo on state-sponsored specialty license plates. Seeking to remain neutral in the ongoing debate over whether the Confederate flag is a symbol of “hate” or “heritage,” Virginia argued that the state would be wrongly perceived as endorsing the flag if the logo appeared on a state-issued plate adorned by the identifier “VIRGINIA.” The Fourth Circuit was unpersuaded, holding that the …

Filtering Software In Public Libraries: Traditional Collection Decision Or Congressionally Induced First Amendment Violation?, Christopher Harne

Mercer Law Review

In United States v. American Library Ass'n, the United States Supreme Court held that filtering provisions of the Children's Internet Protection Act ("CIPA" or "Act") are constitutional and are a valid exercise of Congress's spending power because they do not induce public libraries to violate their patrons' First Amendment rights. The Court also held that CIPA does not place unconstitutional conditions upon public libraries' receipt of federal funding.

American Conversations With(In) Catholicism, Richard W. Garnett

Michigan Law Review

The jacket photo for John T. McGreevy's Catholicism and American Freedom is striking. In the foreground, a young and vigorous Pope John Paul II, censer in hand, strides across an altar platform on the Mall in Washington, D.C. His attention is fixed off-camera, presumably at the altar he is about to reverence with incense. At the bottom of the picture, gathered around and below the platform, sits a grainy group of mitre-wearing bishops. Looming directly over the scene, in the background yet dominating the photograph, is the towering dome of the U.S. Capitol Building. This picture is worth many thousand …

Forfeiting Liberty: A Collective Sense Of Vulnerability And The Need For Proactive Protection After 9/11, Ally Hack

Cardozo Public Law, Policy & Ethics Journal

The note argues that the post-9/11 era has seen a significant erosion of civil liberties, particularly for Arab-Americans and Muslims, drawing parallels to historical episodes of national fear and paranoia, such as Japanese internment during World War II and McCarthyism. It contends that the U.S. response to the attacks, including the expansion of surveillance and detention powers under the USA PATRIOT Act, threatens First Amendment rights and democratic values. The analysis emphasizes the importance of protecting civil liberties and maintaining open debate, even during times of crisis, to ensure a stable and just society.

The Menace Of Neutrality In Religion, Gabriel A. Moens

BYU Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Media At The Tip Of The Spear, Kevin A. Smith

Michigan Law Review

Due largely to the first widespread availability of the telegraph, through which breaking stories could be transmitted to the presses in moments, the debut of the American war correspondent occurred during the Civil War. From their beginning, American war correspondents have frequently "embedded" with the troops on whom they reported. General Grant, for example, allowed his favorite New York Herald reporter to travel with his entourage, and even used him as a personal messenger. Reporters proved an important component of the war effort for both the North and the South. Papers on both sides proved willing providers of propaganda to …

The Banality Of Evil And The First Amendment, W. Bradley Wendel

Michigan Law Review

In the late spring and early summer of 1994, hundreds of thousands of people in Rwanda - an estimated ten percent of the population - were brutally murdered by their fellow citizens, generally for the "crime" of belonging to the socially and economically dominant, but numerically minority Tutsi ethnic group. The slaughter followed a systematic propaganda campaign coordinated by the Rwandan government, dominated by members of the Hutu ethnic group, who had long harbored grievances against Tutsis. The campaign demonized Tutsis as "devils," stirred up fear among the largely rural and poor Hutu population by propagating false information about a …

The United States Constitution's First Amendment Vs. The Canadian Charter Of Rights And Freedoms: A Comparative Analysis Of Obscenity And Pornography As Forms Of Expression, Justin A. Giordano

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Need For A Two (Or More) Tiered First Amendment To Provide For The Protection Of Children, Kevin W. Saunders

Chicago-Kent Law Review

This Article addresses the two sorts of problems raised by Professor Etzioni, while also responding to the earlier articles in this Symposium. With regard to the spillover effect, the author argues that there are ways to limit the effect on adults of restrictions designed to protect children, even on the Internet. Furthermore, some spillover effect is allowed and may leave open the possibility of protecting children from tobacco or alcohol advertisements. The Article also addresses areas in which material has been seen as protected even for children. While agreeing that depictions of violence pose an important problem, the Article also …

The Liberal Theory Of Freedom Of Expression For Children, Colin M. Macleod

Chicago-Kent Law Review

This Article develops a liberal theory of freedom of expression which is sensitive to the interests of children as distinct, vulnerable but developing members of society. I argue that children have, in addition to welfare interests, interests in the development and exercise of basic moral powers. In virtue of such interests, children acquire, well before they become adults, nontrivial rights of free expression. Respecting children's rights to free expression entails limits on the prerogatives of parents and others to determine the sorts of cultural materials children should be permitted access. Nonetheless children's rights are importantly different from those of adults. …

Free Speech And Children's Interests, David Archard

Chicago-Kent Law Review

This Article endorses the conclusion of Etzioni's article that the First Amendment right of free speech should not trump the interests of children. However the picture is more complicated once we recognize that parents have a "basic" right to bring up their children as they see fit that may conflict with the state's duty to protect children in its jurisdiction.

Moreover there is an important difference between protecting children now from harms and safeguarding the interests of the adults they will grow into. Society has an interest in protecting children based upon its fundamental interest in ensuring the conditions of …

Toward A Constitutional Regulation Of Minors' Access To Harmful Internet Speech, Dawn C. Nunziato

Chicago-Kent Law Review

In this Article, Prof. Nunziato scrutinizes Congress's recent efforts to regulate access to sexually-themed Internet speech. The first such effort, embodied in the Communications Decency Act, failed to take into account the Supreme Court's carefully-honed obscenity and obscenity-for-minors jurisprudence. The second, embodied in the Child Online Protection Act, attended carefully to Supreme Court precedent, but failed to account for the geographic variability in definitions of obscene speech. Finally, the recently-enacted Children's Internet Protection Act apparently remedies the constitutional deficiencies identified in these two prior legislative efforts, but runs the risk of being implemented in a manner that fails to protect …

Shielding Children: The European Way, Michael D. Birnhack, Jacob H. Rowbottom

Chicago-Kent Law Review

The Internet crosses physical borders, and carries with it both its promises and its harms to many different countries and societies. These countries thus share the same technology, but they do not necessarily share the same set of values or legal system. This Article compares the legal response in the United States and in Europe to one important issue: the exposure of children to certain materials, which are deemed harmful to them but not harmful to adults.

This US-European comparison, in which the experience in the United Kingdom serves as a leading example, illustrates the traits of various kinds of …

On Protecting Children—From Censorship: A Reply To Amitai Etzioni, Marjorie Heins

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Etzioni's argument for censorship of minors ignores the fundamental problem with Internet filters, misstates the results of media-effects research, and uses emotional terms like "protection" and "harm" to mask moral judgments about what is appropriate for youth.

Given the size and constantly changing character of the Internet, filters necessarily rely on key words and phrases. As a result, thousands of valuable Web pages are mistakenly blocked by filters, even at their narrowest settings. The problem is inherent in the system.

Most media-effects studies do not show a causal link between violent content and violent (or "aggressive") behavior. The studies that …

On Protecting Children From Speech, Amitai Etzioni

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Are children entitled to the same First Amendment rights as adults? This Article explores the constitutionality of limiting children's access to objectionable materials assuming that both free speech rights and the protection of children are two core values that, like all other social values, must be balanced. When used to assess specific court cases and public policies, the balancing principle is a helpful guide in determining whether voluntary or incentives-based programs are sufficient to remedy the problems at hand or whether government regulation of free speech is necessary. The Article analyzes five court cases involving Internet filters in libraries, the …

The Speech-Enhancing Effect Of Internet Regulation, Emily Buss

Chicago-Kent Law Review

In this Article, the author suggests that certain speech-reducing regulations will, in fact, be speech-enhancing for children. This is because children are vulnerable to far greater censorship at the hands of their parents than at the hands of Internet regulators. Regulations that inspire parents to relax their grip on their children's access to information are likely to produce significant net speech gains for children. Viewed this way, regulations designed to protect children can be conceived as pitting the speech interests of adults against the speech interests of children. The Article suggests a number of reasons we might value the children's …

When Well-Being Trumps Liberty: Political Theory, Jurisprudence, And Children's Rights, William Galston

Chicago-Kent Law Review

Compared to most adults, children are dependent and vulnerable and therefore require special protection. Efforts to safeguard their well-being often collide with one or more of the liberty guarantees of the First Amendment. Professor Etzioni fears that current jurisprudence has tipped the balance too far towards individual liberty, making it difficult to extend children the legal protection they need. Drawing on a theoretical account of constitutionalism as well as existing case law, the author argues that mainstream jurisprudence is up to the task of balancing the well-being of children against the liberty of adults. The Supreme Court's recent decision in …

Mocking George: Political Satire As "True Threat" In The Age Of Global Terrorism, Lauren Gilbert

University of Miami Law Review

No abstract provided.

Response, Amitai Etzioni

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.

Supreme Court Watch, Reginald Oh

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

Professor Oh briefly describes Locke v. Davey in which the U.S. Supreme Court, in its 2003-04 term, attempted to clarify its First Amendment jurisprudence on the religion clauses. In a 7-2 decision, the Court held that the State of Washington did not violate the First Amendment Free Exercise Clause by denying government financial aid to college students seeking to pursue a course of study in religious devotional studies.

Law, Literature, And Libel: Victorian Censorship Of "Dirty Filthy" Books On Birth Control, Kristin Brandser Kalsem

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Cross Burning, Cockfighting, And Symbolic Meaning: Toward A First Amendment Ethnography, Timothy Zick

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Another Of Roger William's Gifts: Women's Right To Liberty Of Conscience: Joshua Verin V. Providence Plantations, Edward J. Eberle

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Access To Public School Facilities For Religious Expression By Students, Student Groups And Community Organizations: Extending The Reach Of The Free Speech Clause, Ralph D. Mawdsley

Brigham Young University Education and Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Contents, First Amendment Law Review

First Amendment Law Review

No abstract provided.