Articles

The Washington Department of Ecology allows public employee union representatives to communicate with workers in the building’s public lobby but enacted a new policy that bans the Freedom Foundation, right-to-work advocates who also want to communicate with workers in the lobby about their First Amendment rights related to union membe ...

Elections end, but T-shirts can live forever. Until last week, Texas law prohibited voters from wearing an Obama or Reagan T-shirt in polling places, even when neither past president was on a present ballot. In fact, the law prohibited voters from wearing anything that an election worker deemed “electioneering” for or against any candid ...

The federal Civil Rights Act of 1871 authorizes Americans to sue in federal court to vindicate the government’s violation of their civil rights. Congress guaranteed the federal forum out of concern that state courts could not entirely be trusted to protect constitutional rights. For this reason, civil rights plaintiffs generally may sue direc ...

According to recent surveys, free speech is losing favor among college students. While supporting free expression in general terms, students prefer to carve out exceptions to censor speech that offends or is controversial or leaves some listeners feeling pained or troubled. Where did these young adults develop such discomfort with free speech, a tr ...

On Monday, the United States Supreme Court announced that courts must hear our case Pakdel v. City and County of San Francisco, which challenges a San Francisco ordinance that forces land owners to provide lifetime leases to tenants. In the Court’s opinion, they removed barriers to bringing property rights cases in federal court. In 2009, ...

As a high-school sophomore, B. L. was upset when she failed to make the varsity cheerleading team. At the mall with a friend that weekend, she vented her frustrations by posting a picture to Snapchat in which she raised her middle finger accompanied by the caption, “F*** school f*** softball f*** cheer f*** everything.” One … ...

Editor’s note: In March 2021, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs in Uzuegbunam to allow nominal damages for past completed constitutional injuries. This decision will ensure access to the court (regardless of someone’s wealth) to more people who’ve had their rights violated by the government. *** If the government ...

Mandatory bars associations, also called integrated or unified bars, combine government agency regulations with trade association-style politicking. Assuming that mandatory bar associations were best suited to handling admission, education, and regulation of attorneys, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Lathrop v. Donohue (1961) that states did not i ...

Which of these things is not like the others? The bullhorn-wielding Black Lives Matter (BLM) activist at Starbucks. Students staging a sit-in at a private college to protest administration salaries and student debt. Animal welfare activists trespassing on agricultural production properties to gather evidence of animal mistreatment. Environmentalist ...