Supreme+Court+Case+Part+Two

Right to Assemble and Associate v SC (1963) ● 1st amendment: Right to assemble ● Black citizens of South Carolina marched peacefully to protest segregation in their state. They were arrested. ● The court called the marchers’ actions an exercise of First Amendment rights "in their most pristine and classic form" and emphasized that a state cannot "make criminal the peaceful expression of unpopular views" as South Carolina attempted to do here. (1931) ● 1st amendment: Freedom of Press ● Established the prior restraint doctrine. The doctrine protects the press from gov’t attempts to block publication. Except in extraordinary circumstances, the press must be allowed to publish. If what is published turns out to be unprotected by the 1st amendment, the gov’t can take action. However, to act before publication is to engage in censorship that violates the 1st amendment. ● Selective incorporation of the 1st amendment freedom of press. (1971) ● 1st Amendment: Freedom of Press ● Reaffirmed the prior restraint doctrine established in Near v Minnesota, except in cases of threats to national security ● The Court refused the halt publication of the Pentagon Papers (detailed critical account of US involvement in Vietnam) (1988) ● Freedom of Speech (1st Amendment) ● Ruling: Supreme Court sided with the school district curtailing the freedom previously stated in Tinker ● Precedent: schools could censor student speech when schools had a reasonable educational justification for their censorship esp. when the speech was part of an educational activity ● School newspapers are just an educational activity, and schools may censor any school-sponsored publications that may be perceived to bear the approval of the school.

Freedom of Religion Free Exercise Clause: Right to practice your own religion Establishment Clause: separation between Church and State

(1943) ● 1st amendment: establishment clause ● School required flag salute ● The court held that a compulsory flag salute violated the 1st amendment’s exercise of religion clause and was, therefore, unconstitutional. “no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of religion…” (1947) ● 1st amendment: establishment clause ● The Court considered the use of public funds for the operation of school buses in NJ, including buses carrying students to parochial school. The Court permitted New Jersey to continue payments, saying that the aid to children was not gov’t support for religion. The decision stated that the wall separating Church and state must be kept “high and impregnable.” ● This was a clear incorporation of 1st amendment limits on States (1962) ● 1st amendment: establishment clause ● New York state board of regents approved a brief prayer at the start of each day. The prayer read “Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers, and our Country.” ● Precedent – US Supreme Court outlawed the use, even on a voluntary basis, of state sponsored prayer in schools. (1963) ● 1st amendment: establishment clause ● Can religious activity such as reading the bible be given any place in the official activity of public schools? ● The court forbade bible adding during the school day, noting that “In the relationship between man and religioun, the State is firmly committed to a position of neutrality” (1971) ● 1st amendment: establishment clause ● In overturning State laws regarding aid to church-supported schools, the Court created the x limiting “the excessive gov’t entanglement” with religion. The Court noted that any State law about aid to religion must meet 3 criteria ○ Purpose of aid must be secular ○ Its primary effect must neither advance nor inhibit religion ○ It must avoid “excessive entanglements of government with religion” (1972) ● 1st amendment: Free Exercise Clause ● Could a State force members of a religious group to attend public schools? ● The court upheld the religious rights of the Amish to educate their own children, but noted that the State had a “legitimate social concern” when groups wished exemption from “generally applicable educational requirements.” (1985) ● 1st amendment: Establishment Clause ● Could the State of Alabama exempt itself from bans on school prayer and establish “voluntary” prayer for willing participants? ● Precedent – US Supreme Court decided that moments of silence for religious reflection were unconstitutional because the government is promoting religion (1990) ● 1st amendment : Free Exercise Clause ● Must a school principal permit “equal access” for student religious groups? Did the Equal Access Act of 1984 violate the separation of church and state? ● The Court directed schools to permit student religious group activities on the same basis as other student activities when the schools operate broad-based extracurricular programs. (1990) ● 1st amendment: Free Exercise Clause ● Restricted drug use in religious ceremony ● Illegal activities not protected in free exercise v Hialeah (1993) ● 1st amendment: Free Exercise Clause ● Animal Sacrifice ● City of Hialeah, Florida banned animal sacrifice in response to religious practices of Santeria, which involved animal sacrifice. Court ruled this ban unconstitutional in name of the free exercise clause and the fact that other killing of animals was allowed through hunting, etc. (2002) ● 1st amendment: establishment clause ● Ohio program issuing school vouchers to aid in tuition at better public or private schools (even if parochial schools) was not in violation of the establishment clause. (1879) ● 1st amendment: Free Exercise clause ● Polygamy ● “Freedom of Religion means freedom to hold an opinion or belief, but not to take action in violation of social duties or subversive to good order” and to rule otherwise would be to make the professed doctrines of religious belief superior to the law of the land, and in effect permit every citizen to become a law unto himself.”

Obscenity – Not Protected by the First Amendment

(1957) ● 1st amendment: Free speech and obsccenity ● A NY man named x operated a business that used the mail to invite people to buy materials, considered obscene by postal inspectors. The Court, in its first consideration of obscenity, created the “prevailing community standards” rule, which required a consideration of the work as a whole. In its decision, the Court defined obscene that which offended “the average person, applying contemporary community standards.” (1973) ● 1st amendment: free speech and obscenity ● The Court upheld a stringent application of California obscenity law by Newport Beach, CA, and attempted to define what is obscene. The “x” included three criteria: ○ That the average person would, applying contemporary community standards find that the work appealed to the prurient interest. ○ That the work depicts or describes, in an offensive way, sexual conduct defined by State law ○ That “the work” taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value. ● The funny thing about this case was it required the Supreme Court Justices to watch porn to evaluate what was obscene

Second Amendment – Right to Bear Arms

(1939) ● 2nd amendment deals with state militia & has nothing to do with individual rights & gives states’ the right to regulate guns (dealt with sawed off shotguns) (2008) ● 2nd amendment: right to bear arms ● DC had banned handgun ownership, and required that all firearms including rifles and shotguns be kept "unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock. This was challenged as a violation of the 2nd amendment. ● Court ruled with gun owners, and overturned this law as an unconstitutional violation of the right to bear arms.

the states, for it had not been incorporated up to this time. Our book states that it does incorporate the 2nd amendment to the states, while others argue it doesn’t because DC is not a state. Time will tell us more.
 * There is much debate as to weather the case finally incorporated the right to bear arms (2nd amendment) to

Supreme Court Case Part Three