Transcript Document

Are you
A Smartie or a Dum Dum?
Brown v. Board of Education
(1954)
O “In the field of public education, the doctrine
of ‘separate but equal’ has no place.”
Gibbons v. Ogden (1824)
O “Few things were better known than the
immediate causes which led to the adoption
of the present constitution…that the
prevailing motive was to regulate commerce;
to rescue it from the embarrassing and
destructive consequences,…and to place it
under the protection of a uniform law.”
New Jersey v. T.L.O. (1985)
O “The warrant requirement…is unsuited to
the school environment…[and] unduly
interferes with the maintenance of the swift
and informed disciplinary procedures
needed in the schools.”
Near v. Minnesota (1931)
O “The liberty of the press…is safeguarded
from invasion by state action.”
Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857)
O " . . . We think they [people of African
ancestry] are . . . not included, and were not
intended to be included, under the word
"citizens" in the Constitution, and can
therefore claim none of the rights and
privileges which that instrument provides for
and secures to citizens of the United States.
. . ."
Engel v. Vitale (1962)
O “It is no part of the business of government
to compose official prayers.”
Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969)
O “The constitutional guarantees of free
speech and free press do not permit
a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of
the use of force or of law violation except
where such advocacy is directed to inciting
or producing imminent lawless action and is
likely to incite or produce such action.”
West Virginia v. Barnette
(1943)
O Symbols are a “primitive but effective way of
communicating ideas,” and “a person gets
from a symbol the meaning he puts into it,
and what is one man’s comfort and
inspiration is another’s jest and scorn.”
Gideon v. Wainwright (1963)
O "The right to be heard would be, in many cases, of little avail if
it did not comprehend the right to be heard by counsel. Even
the intelligent and educated layman has small and sometimes
no skill in the science of law. If charged with crime, he is
incapable, generally, of determining for himself whether the
indictment is good or bad. He is unfamiliar with the rules of
evidence. Left without the aid of counsel he may be put on trial
without a proper charge, and convicted upon incompetent
evidence, or evidence irrelevant to the issue or otherwise
inadmissible. He lacks both the skill and knowledge
adequately to prepare his defense, even though he has a
perfect one. He requires the guiding hand of counsel at every
step in the proceedings against him. Without it, though he be
not guilty, he faces the danger of conviction because he does
not know how to establish his innocence." . . .
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
O Although, among the enumerated powers of
government, we do not find the word "bank" or
"incorporation," we find the great powers to lay and
collect taxes; to borrow money; to regulate
commerce; to declare and conduct a war; and to
raise and support armies and navies . . . But it may
with great reason be contended, that a government,
entrusted with such ample powers . . . must also be
entrusted with ample means for their execution. The
power being given, it is the interest of the nation to
facilitate its execution. . . . "
Texas v. Johnson (1989)
O “Government may not prohibit the
expression of an idea because society finds
the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.”
Wisconsin v. Yoder (1971)
O “The Amish in this case have convincingly
demonstrated the sincerity of their religious
beliefs, the interrelationship of belief with
their mode of life, . . . , and the hazards
presented by the State's enforcement of a
statute generally valid as to others."
Buckley v. Valeo (1976)
O “A restriction on the amount of money a
person or group can spend on political
communication during a campaign
necessarily reduces the quantity of
expression by restricting the number of
issues discussed, the depth of their
exploration, and the size of the audience
reached.”
Miranda v. Arizona (1966)
O “The prosecution may not use statements,
whether exculpatory or inculpatory,
stemming from custodial interrogation of the
defendant unless it demonstrates the use of
procedural safeguards effective to secure
the privilege against self-incrimination."
Tinker v. Des Moines (1969)
O ". . . In the absence of a specific showing of
constitutionally valid reasons to regulate
their speech, students are entitled to
freedom of expression of their views."
Roe v. Wade (1973)
O …The Constitution does not explicitly mention any
right of privacy. …[T]he Court has recognized that a
right of personal privacy, or a guarantee of certain
areas or zones of privacy, does exist under the
Constitution. … This right of privacy, whether it be
founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of
personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as
we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in
the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the
people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's
decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.
The detriment that the State would impose upon the
pregnant woman by denying this choice altogether is
apparent.”
Roth v. US (1957)
O “All ideas having even the slightest redeeming
social importance—unorthodox ideas,
controversial ideas, even ideas hateful to the
prevailing climate of opinion—have the full
protection of the guaranties, unless excludable
because they encroach upon the limited area of
more important interests. But implicit in the
history of the First Amendment is the rejection of
obscenity as utterly without redeeming social
importance. ”
Marbury v. Madison (1803)
O “It is emphatically the province and duty of
the judicial department to say what the law
is. Those who apply the rule to particular
cases, must of necessity expound and
interpret that rule.”
United States v. Lopez (1995)
O “To uphold the Government's contentions here, we have
to pile inference upon inference in a manner that would
bid fair to convert congressional authority under the
Commerce Clause to a general police power of the sort
retained by the States. Admittedly, some of our prior
cases have taken long steps down that road, giving
great deference to congressional action. The broad
language in these opinions has suggested the possibility
of additional expansion, but we decline here to proceed
any further. To do so would require us to conclude that
the Constitution's enumeration of powers does not
presuppose something not enumerated, and that there
never will be a distinction between what is truly national
and what is truly local. This we are unwilling to do.”
Gregg v. Georgia (1976)
O “The new Georgia sentencing procedures, by
contrast, focus the jury's attention on the
particularized nature of the crime and the
particularized characteristics of the individual
defendant. While the jury is permitted to
consider any aggravating or mitigating
circumstances, it must find and identify at least
one statutory aggravating factor before it may
impose a penalty of death. In this way the jury's
discretion is channeled.”
Schenck v. US (1919)
O “The most stringent protection of free
speech was not to protect a man in falsely
shouting fire in a theatre and causing panic.
The question in every case is whether the
words used are used in such circumstances
that create a clear and present danger.”
New York Times v. US (1971)
O “Any system of prior restraints of expression
comes to this Court bearing a heavy
presumption against its constitutional
validity.”
Baker v. Carr (1962)
O “One person, one vote.”
Regents of California v. Bakke
(1970)
O “Race or ethnic background may be deemed
a ‘plus’ in a particular applicant's file, yet it
does not insulate the individual from
comparison with all other candidates for the
available seats.”
Citizens United v. FEC (2010)
O "When government seeks to use its full
power, including the criminal law, to
command where a person may get his or her
information or what distrusted source he or
she may not hear, it uses censorship to
control thought…The First Amendment
confirms the freedom to think for ourselves."
Gitlow v. New York (1925)
O “Every idea is an incitement. It offers itself for
belief and if believed it is acted on unless some
other belief outweighs it or some failure or
energy stifles the movement at its birth. The
only difference between expression of an
opinion and an incitement in the narrower sense
is the speaker’s enthusiasm for the result.
Eloquence may set fire to reason. But whatever
may be thought of the redundant discourse
before us, it had no chance of starting a present
conflagration.” –dissenting opinion
Mapp v. Ohio (1961)
O “…our holding that the exclusionary rule is
an essential part of both the 4th and 14th
Amendments is not only the logical dictate
of prior cases, but it also makes very good
sense. There is not war between the
Constitution and good sense.”
Plessey v. Ferguson (1896)
O “The 14th Amendment…could not have been
intended to abolish distinction based upon
color, or to enforce social, as distinguished
from political, equality, or a commingling of
the two races.”