Justice Harlan’s Imperishable Dissent in Plessy v. Ferguson
Justice John Marshall Harlan was the only dissenter from the U.S. Supreme Court’s infamous ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson, in 1896, in...
top of page
HumanitiesND
Mar 17, 20223 min read
Plessy v. Ferguson: An Infamous Landmark Ruling
Not all landmark Supreme Court decisions are admirable. Some are frankly infamous, including Plessy v. Ferguson. In 1896, in Plessy, the...
12 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Mar 10, 20223 min read
Without Freedom of the Press: Life Behind an Iron Curtain
Vladimir Putin’s infliction on the Russian people of a second Iron Curtain has demonstrated more effectively than any number of seminars...
4 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Mar 8, 20223 min read
Supreme Court Rules on Secrecy v. Public's Right to Know
The Pentagon Papers Case, which proceeded through the federal courts at record pace, presented the U.S. Supreme Court with a sharply...
7 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Feb 25, 20224 min read
The Pentagon Papers Case and the Right to Know
Thomas Jefferson once observed that fearless, independent newspapers were indispensable to the American experiment, and to “the...
5 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Feb 23, 20224 min read
“The Sullivan Decision: Affirming the Right to Criticize Government”
For a nation grounded on the republican values of self government and freedom of expression, both of which are served and ...
10 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Feb 16, 20224 min read
NY Times v. Sullivan Saves Freedom of the Press
The Supreme Court’s decision in The New York Times v. Sullivan (1964), checks all the definitional boxes of a landmark ruling. It...
3 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Feb 2, 20224 min read
The Abrams Dissent: New Life for Freedom of Speech
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes’s iconic dissenting opinion in Abrams v. United States (1919) transformed the Clear and Present Danger Test...
6 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Jan 27, 20224 min read
Justice Holmes’s Changing Conceptions of Free Speech
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes’s opinion for the Supreme Court in Schenck v. United States (1919) shocked his libertarian friends and...
6 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Jan 20, 20224 min read
“Free Speech Origins: Clear and Present Danger Test”
America’s free speech story, as written in Supreme Court decisions, did not begin until World War I when the Court declared in 1919, in...
15 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Jan 13, 20225 min read
Clinton v. Jones, Presidential Immunity and Donald Trump
Great questions of constitutional law—how can the president be held accountable, whether the president is amenable to the judicial...
5 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Jan 13, 20224 min read
Cooper v. Aaron: Striking Down Nullification, Again
In 1958, in Cooper v. Aaron, the Supreme Court, ensnared in the white-hot cauldron of southern resistance to federal authority, the...
15 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Jan 6, 20224 min read
McCulloch v. Maryland: Why We Have Implied Powers
By virtually every measurement, McCulloch v. Maryland (1819) ranks as Chief Justice John Marshall’s greatest opinion, and, in the view of...
14 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Dec 28, 20216 min read
Landmark Decisions: Why Federal Courts Possess Authority Over States
The Supreme Court’s assertion in Marbury v. Madison (1803) of the power of judicial review, the authority to declare federal governmental...
2 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Dec 20, 20214 min read
“Federalist 78: Foundation for Marbury v. Madison”
The Federalist Papers, it has been said, constitute one of the most important works in the world of political science ever written in the...
53 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Dec 9, 20214 min read
“Origins of Judicial Review and Marbury v. Madison”
Skeptics of the federal judiciary’s authority to declare laws unconstitutional have expressed doubts and concerns ever since the Supreme...
15 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Dec 2, 20215 min read
Marbury v. Madison: The Greatest of Landmark Decisions
The first landmark ruling delivered by the U.S. Supreme Court was Marbury v. Madison (1803), in which Chief Justice John Marshall...
5 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Nov 29, 20213 min read
“Why We Study Landmark Judicial Decisions”
The yearlong commitment of this column to the exploration of the Constitution has focused, primarily, on historical explanations of the...
7 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Nov 17, 20214 min read
Court’s Creation of Executive Privilege Without Foundation
The Supreme Court’s historic rejection in U.S. v. Nixon (1974) –“The Watergate Tapes Case”--of President Richard Nixon’s assertion of an...
27 views0 comments
HumanitiesND
Nov 15, 20214 min read
Executive Privilege: Flimsy Historical Defenses
Delegates to the Constitutional Convention, as we have seen, did not fail to address the issue of presidential authority to invoke...
12 views0 comments
bottom of page