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Constitutional Law

First Amendment Center

News related to the first amendment of the US Constitution and freedom of speech issues.
By First Amendment Center

Post Frequency: 38.7/day

Last Entry: March 29, 2011 at 21:00:00

N.J. lawmakers send new anti-bullying measure to governor

Posted on November 22, 2010
TRENTON, N.J. — Legislation aimed at combating bullying in schools, which advocates call the nation's toughest because it requires schools to develop anti-harassment programs, was approved yesterday in the New Jersey Legislature. The state General Assembly and Senate both passed the bill overwhelmingly and sent it to the desk of Republican Gov...

Federal judge orders Gawker to pull Palin book pages

Posted on November 21, 2010
NEW YORK ? A federal judge on Nov. 20 ordered Gawker Media to pull leaked pages of Sarah Palin's forthcoming book America by Heart: Reflections on Family, Faith and Flag from its blog. The injunction prohibits Gawker from "continuing to distribute, publish or otherwise transmit pages from the book" pending a hearing on Nov...

Ruling: Valedictorian wrongly barred from speaking at graduation

Posted on November 21, 2010
HELENA, Mont. ? A Butte High School valedictorian was unconstitutionally banned from speaking at her graduation because she refused to remove the words ?God? and ?Christ? from her speech, the Montana Supreme Court ruled late last week. The court on Nov...

S.D. high court refuses to decide leadership of Hutterite colony

Posted on November 21, 2010
PIERRE, S.D. ? The state court system cannot determine which of two factions controls a Hutterite colony in northeast South Dakota because the dispute involves constitutionally protected issues of religious freedom, the South Dakota Supreme Court has ruled...

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Scalia loves his gadgets, but not cameras in court

Posted on November 21, 2010
WASHINGTON — Justice Antonin Scalia seems solidly old-fashioned. He?s devoted to the Constitution?s original meaning, prefers the Roman Catholic Mass in Latin and opposes TV cameras in the Supreme Court. But the 74-year-old Scalia wants it known that he owns an iPod and an iPad and does so much work on his computer that he ?can hardly write in longhand anymore...

Court strikes down city council's public-comment rule

Posted on November 20, 2010
HARRISBURG, Pa. ? The Philadelphia City Council must allow direct public comment on matters under its consideration and may not simply divert those comments to committee meetings, a divided Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled. The council's current practice of not allowing comment at its full-body meetings violates the state's Sunshine Act, the justices ruled 4-3 on Nov...

Hall of Justice helps out Hollywood superheroes

Posted on November 19, 2010
LOS ANGELES ? Batman, Superman and other superheroes are getting some help from the feds for their caped crusades along Hollywood Boulevard. On Nov. 17, U.S. District Judge Dean Pregerson blocked police from cracking down on the costumed characters who perform and pose for pictures for tips along the fabled street...

6th Circuit backs school's ban on Confederate flag garb

Posted on November 18, 2010
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. ? A federal appeals court has upheld a district court's ruling that a school's ban on Confederate flag clothing was a reasonable attempt to prevent disruptions. Tommy Defoe sued Anderson County school officials after he was sent home and then suspended for insubordination in 2006 for wearing a T-shirt and a belt buckle bearing the image of the Confederate battle flag...

Philly, Boy Scouts end gay-rights battle over HQ

Posted on November 18, 2010
PHILADELPHIA ? A Boy Scouts chapter that won the right to ban gays from its city-owned headquarters at a federal trial in Philadelphia said it had negotiated a deal to end the decade-long dispute with city officials. The city had threatened to evict the scouts for violating its anti-discrimination laws, and urged the group to reject national Boy Scouts of America policies that ban gays...

Obama makes changes to faith-based partnerships

Posted on November 18, 2010
WASHINGTON ? President Barack Obama has signed off on what the White House says are significant improvements to federally funded partnerships between the government and religious-based and neighborhood organizations. A religious watchdog group said it disapproved of some changes and said more should be done...

Congress passes bill to stop 'crush videos'

Posted on November 18, 2010
WASHINGTON ? Videos appealing to a sexual fetish by showing women killing small animals will be banned under legislation that cleared the Senate today and is heading to President Barack Obama for his signature. The voice vote in the Senate followed a vote in the House on Nov...

U.S. opposes religious-defamation bans

Posted on November 17, 2010
WASHINGTON ? Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said yesterday that Islamic nations and others were restricting free speech by attempting to ban statements defaming religion. She declared the Obama administration's opposition. Presenting the State Department's annual international survey of religious freedom, Clinton said the U...

Christian group's latest effort for campus recognition rebuffed

Posted on November 17, 2010
SAN FRANCISCO ? A federal appeals court has shot down another attempt by a Christian student group, which refuses to allow gay members, to force a California law school to formally recognize it. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June that the University of California Hastings College of the Law could legally deny funding and other benefits to the Christian Legal Society...

Judge refuses to stop Tenn. mosque construction

Posted on November 17, 2010
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — A judge denied a request yesterday for a temporary restraining order to stop construction at the site of a proposed mosque in Murfreesboro. Rutherford County Chancellor Robert Corlew said after closing arguments that he didn?t find that the ?county acted illegally, arbitrarily or capriciously? when county planners approved the site plan for an Islamic center...

Photographer: New Orleans cop ordered no photos of body

Posted on November 17, 2010
NEW ORLEANS ? A news photographer who witnessed some of the aftermath of a deadly shooting in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina testified yesterday that he was ordered by a police officer not to photograph the victim's body. Alex Brandon was working for the Times-Picayune newspaper when he said he walked up to a makeshift police headquarters at a school and saw the body of 31-year-old Henry Glover, who had been shot...

Breyer says high court must adapt to Facebook world

Posted on November 16, 2010
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Don?t expect a Facebook friend request from Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer any time soon. The 72-year-old justice said in a speech at Vanderbilt Law School yesterday that he was perplexed when he recently saw the film ?The Social Network? about the origins of Facebook...

Girls sue Pa. school over 'boobies'-bracelet ban

Posted on November 16, 2010
PHILADELPHIA ? Two middle schoolers have filed a free-speech lawsuit against a Pennsylvania school district that suspended them for wearing the popular "I (heart) boobies!" bracelets. The American Civil Liberties Union says it believes the lawsuit filed Nov...

TSA chief: No religious exemptions to airport screening

Posted on November 16, 2010
WASHINGTON — The Transportation Security Administration says airline passengers won?t get out of body imaging screening or pat-downs based on their religious beliefs. TSA chief John Pistole told the Senate Homeland Security Committee yesterday that passengers who refuse to go through a full-body scanner machine and reject a pat-down won?t be allowed to board, even if they turned down the in-depth screening for religious reasons...

'God' in Pledge doesn't violate students' rights, 1st Circuit rules

Posted on November 15, 2010
BOSTON ? A federal appeals court has upheld a New Hampshire law requiring schools to authorize a time each day for students to voluntarily recite the Pledge of Allegiance, finding the oath's reference to God doesn't violate the students' constitutional rights...

Calif. middle schooler gets apology in U.S. flag flap

Posted on November 15, 2010
DENAIR, Calif. ? A Stanislaus County school official has apologized to a student who was told to remove an American flag from the back of his bicycle. Last week, a supervisor at Denair Middle School told 13-year-old Cody Alicea to remove the flag over concerns for the teen's safety...

House votes for bill to stop animal 'crush videos'

Posted on November 15, 2010
WASHINGTON ? The House voted yesterday to ban so-called crush videos that depict the abuse and killing of animals. The measure would revive, with some modifications, a 1999 law that was struck down by the Supreme Court last April in United States v. Stevens on the grounds it was too broadly written and violated First Amendment free-speech protections...

High court won't hear free-speech challenge to grand jury subpoenas

Posted on November 15, 2010
WICHITA, Kan. — The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday rebuffed a subpoena challenge mounted by an outspoken advocate for chronic pain patients who is under a grand jury investigation for possible conspiracy to obstruct justice. The high court didn?t comment on its refusal to take up the appeal by Siobhan Reynolds...

Kan. town to pay $8K to settle dispute over yard sign

Posted on November 14, 2010
WICHITA, Kan. ? A Valley Center homeowner can again display a yard sign criticizing the city and its administrator without fear. News emerged this weekend of the court settlement in a First Amendment case that arose after homeowner Jarrod West put a sign in his yard protesting inaction on a water-drainage problem...

N.Y. judge keeps 911 calls secret in shooting of student

Posted on November 14, 2010
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. ? A state judge has refused to release 911 calls and other evidence to the parents of a college football player who was shot and killed by police, saying they failed to include any firsthand account of what happened. Danroy and Angella Henry of Easton, Mass...

N.C. medical examiners drop SIDS checklist

Posted on November 14, 2010
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The North Carolina medical examiner?s office says it is dropping a standardized checklist for suspicious infant deaths after learning the information in those reports must be made public. The Charlotte Observer reported Nov. 13 that the change in policy came after the attorney general issued an opinion that the information in those reports would be public...

Judge: N.Y. must release records on monkey research

Posted on November 14, 2010
ALBANY, N.Y. ? A state trial judge has ruled that New York must release records on substance-abuse experiments on monkeys and other animals. The state's Office of Mental Health tried to block the Freedom of Information Act request from the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, saying research scientists may be targeted by animal-rights terrorists...

Christian group to sponsor 'Day of Dialogue' about homosexuality

Posted on November 12, 2010
DENVER ? A conservative Christian group has announced that it will sponsor a school-outreach program to talk about sexual orientation. Focus on the Family of Colorado Springs says it will take over sponsorship of the former "Day of Truth," which has been co-sponsored since 2005 by Exodus International, a Christian group in Orlando, Fla...

N.J. district punishes teacher for comments on secret recording

Posted on November 11, 2010
PASSAIC, N.J. ? A New Jersey special education teacher was suspended for nine days and docked a pay raise for comments that were caught on a secretly recorded video. Alissa Ploshnick was due to return to work today after being punished over comments that appeared in an online video dubbed "Teachers Unions Gone Wild...

Mosque foes use Tenn. trial as forum to question Islam

Posted on November 11, 2010
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. ? Islam is suddenly on trial in a booming Nashville suburb, where opponents of a new mosque have spent six days in court trying to link it to what they claim is a conspiracy to take over America by imposing restrictive religious rule...

Colo. police investigate, protect pedophilia author

Posted on November 11, 2010
PUEBLO, Colo. ? Police in Colorado are both investigating and protecting the author of a guide for pedophiles. Phillip Ray Greaves II of Pueblo has drawn national attention because his self-published book was for sale on Amazon. The book offers advice to pedophiles on how to make a sexual encounter with a child as safe as possible...

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