The Written Assignments  for this course are composed of a number of brief writing efforts. Students must complete and hand these in at various class meetings only on the dates noted here.  Each assignment should be the student's own work, even if there are sources that provide such information.  (N.B. the Plagiarism link on this website.) The purpose of these assignments is to insure student preparation for class each day and these will greatly help students develop efficient and better writing skills.  Students should develop the ability to write clearly, concisely, and quickly, as well as regularly. Students will prepare these written assignments as announced in class and/or on this website.  These assignments will be very brief documents.   Please note that EARLY and LATE submissions WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED. Please do not submit electronic assignments eithers.  It is essential  that students develop the abilities to write clearly, concisely, directly, and analytically, throughout the semester and make precise deadlines. Each case assignment should be submitted in typed, single-spaced form on a separate sheet of paper, with your name on each page, along with the name of the case and the case citation at the top of the page.

The sequence of reading assignments in O’Brien and the supplementary materials are listed below.  The first written assignment is to prepare a BRIEF for each of the cases listed in the Chapter 4 readings.  The nature of a brief is indicated in the Reading and Briefing Cases page of this website.  You should plan to submit a brief for the first case – Barron v. City of Baltimore – and the second case – the Slaughter House Cases – on Thursday, January 10, 2007.  The first of these cases is pretty straightforward, the second of them is much more challenging.  You should plant to stay three (3) cases ahead of where class discussion ends each class period.  While the discussion of these first two cases will probably not finish on the 10th, you should devote enough energy to briefing these that you have some method for sorting through legal issues and the reasoning of the Court.  The actual progress through the cases listed in Chapter 4 will be relatively slow, and you should have little difficulty keeping ahead of the class discussion.  Writing, means submitting a written copy of your brief for evaluation by the instructor, as they are due.  Students should also bring a copy of their briefs to class for notation and for reference during class discussion.  (Never leave home without your case briefs for this course!)

If a case listed below contains the legal citation and is bolded, then it is NOT in O'Brien and student should read the case in full either in the HSSE Library or on line through Lexis-Nexis.)

The Nationalization of the Bill of Rights – O'Brien Ch. 4

The writing assignment for the following cases involve preparing a BRIEF for each of the cases listed below.  Pay particular attention to the document on this web-site about what and how to "brief" in connection with a case.

Section A. The Selective Nationalization of Guarantees of the Bill of Rights Plus Other Fundamental Rights.

N.B.  A case name that is in BOLD and includes a citation afterward indicates that this cases should be read in its entirety, by reading the U.S. Reports.  You might find O'Brien's discussion of these cases useful, if they exist, but you should develop your own assessment of these cases by reading the entire opinion.

Barron v. The Mayor and City of Baltimore
The Slaughter House Cases	83 U.S. 36 (1873)
Hurtado v. California
Missouri Pacific Railway Co. v. Nebraska	164 U.S. 403 (1896)
Gitlow v. New York	268 U.S. 652 (1925)
Palko v. Connecticut
Adamson v. California
Rochin v. California
Breithaupt v. Abrahm	352 U.S. 432 (1957)
Griswold v. Connecticut
Duncan v. Louisiana

Section B. The Rise and (Partial) Retreat of the "Due Process Revolution"

Economic Rights and American Capitalism – O'Brien Ch. 3

The writing assignment for the following cases involve preparing a HOLDING for each of the cases listed below.  This was explained in class on 1 February.  Students should consult the webpage for a discussion of the development of a holding.   Students are encouraged to continue preparing briefs for each case since this will aid them in understanding and remember each of the cases that are assigned and discussed in class. (In the preparation of briefs, pay particular attention to the logic of the arguments the Court uses to support its holding in each case.)

Section A. The Contract Clause and Vested Interests in Property.

Section B. The Development and Demise of a "Liberty of Contract."

Section C. The "Takings Clause" and Just Compensation.

The Right to Free Speech – O'Brien Ch. 5

The writing assignment for the following cases involves the following:

Prepare a paragraph for each case, after the first two, that focuses on (1) the case under scrutiny, and (2) the previous two cases in the section.  That means the paragraph should contain, first the holding in the case at hand.  Then a brief and clear outline (a sentence of two) explaining why the court held as it did in the case.  Indicate the court's reasoning.  Lastly, this case must be linked to the previous two cases.  That means the case must be analytically "compared and contrasted with" the two previous cases.

N.B. The cases with bolded names and bolded citations attached to them below are NOT excerpted in the Casebook.  They need to be read in the original.

 

Section A. Judicial Approaches to the First Amendment.

Abrams v. U.S.	250 U.S. 616 (1919)
Whitney v. California	274 U.S. 357 (1927)
Yates v. U.S.	354 U.S. 298 (1957)
Scales v. U.S.	367 U.S. 203 (1961)
Communist Party of the United States v. Subversive Activities Control Bd	367 U.S. 1 (1961)
Schenk v. U.S.
Gitlow v. New York
Dennis v. U.S.
Brandenberg v. Ohio
Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire	315 U.S. 568 (1942)
Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights	547 U.S. 47 (2006)

Section B. Obscenity, Pornography, and Offensive Speech

Roth v. U.S.
Stanley v. Georgia
Miller v. California
Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton
New York v. Ferber
City of Erie v. Pap
Reno v. A.C.L.U.
Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition
Cohen v. California
Federal Communications Commission v. Pacifica Fnd
Bethel School Dist. No. 403 v. Fraser
R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul Minnesota
Wisconsin v. Mitchell
Virginia v. Black
Rust v. Sullivan

            Section C. Libel

New York Times v. Sullivan
Gertz v. Robt, Wekch, Inc.
Masson v. The New Yorker Magazine
Cox Broadcasting Corp. v. Cohn

              Section D. Commercial Speech

Bigelow v. Virginia
44 Liquormat, Inc. v. Rhode Island.
Lorillard Tobacco Co. v. Reilly
Johanns v. Livestock Marketing Ass'n	544 U.S. 550 (2005)

            Section E. Freedom of the Press

Near v. Minnesota
New York, Times v. United States
Branzburg v. Hayes
Houchins v. KQED