Monthly Archives: January 2015

As It Stands: E01 - The First Amendment
This video will go into the quotes used by Jefferson, Paine, and Franklin to show that America is not a Christian country. For my personal channel click the link: https://www.youtube.com/channel/U...

By: SecularTv

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As It Stands: E01 - The First Amendment - Video

Lindsay France

Adam Liptak, Supreme Court correspondent for The New York Times, delivers a 2015 Frank Irvine Endowed Lecture (FIELS), "A New Deal for the First Amendment?"

The terrorist attack on the office of Charlie Hebdo, a satirical magazine in Paris, sparked a heated debate on the freedom of speech around the world. In America, this new dialogue was a continuation of a much longer, equally passionate debate on the First Amendment rights, one that has been taking place in the Supreme Court.

Adam Liptak, the Supreme Court correspondent for The New York Times, discussed the First Amendment in A New Deal for the First Amendment? at Cornell Law School Jan. 22.

Liptak began his talk with a 2011 Supreme Court case, Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc., which determined the legality of selling a doctors prescription information. The case was decided using the First Amendment, causing Justice Stephen Breyer to accuse the court of Lochnerism, a reference to the contentious 1905 Lochner v. New York decision based on the amendment. The Lochner case, Liptak explained, is often placed in the anti-canon of Supreme Court cases, along with other notorious decisions such as Dred Scott and Plessy v. Ferguson.

What made the Sorrell and Lochner cases so controversial, Liptak continued, is how the law was interpreted and applied. In Sorrell, prescription information was a form of speech, which could be protected, but it was also an economic activity, which could be regulated. A similar duality existed in Lochner. Reconciling this duality led to the controversy: The state legislatures tried to impose economic regulations and the contradicting court decision was dismissed as judicial activism.

Liptak mentioned another possible consideration in applying the law: If judging is, as he phrased it, weighing competing interests and putting a thumb on the scale in favor of marginalized speech, then should a deciding factor in applying the First Amendment be the relative power of the speaker? Though Liptak did not have an answer to this question, an audience member raised the possibility that a power-based consideration could lead to influential organizations, like major newspapers, being censored.

This brought Liptak to the dangers of applying the First Amendment liberally. I practiced First Amendment law for 14 years, and I drank the Kool-Aid, he said, describing his previous faith in the amendment. Over the years, many important decisions have been made using it, including allowing protestors near funerals and decriminalizing flag burning. However, he added, There is something troubling we should think about: economic regulations being struck down on the basis of free speech.

The Lochner era, which was characterized by such decisions, ended in the 1930s with the New Deal. To end our modern era of First Amendment law, Liptak suggested, a new New Deal is needed.

The lecture was presented by the Law Schools Frank Irvine Endowed Lecture Series.

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Does the First Amendment need a New Deal?

By Brian J. Kurtz, FordHarrison LLP

Does the First Amendment protect the head of an adjunct faculty union who writes a letter critical of the community college that fired her? Read on to find out.

Robin Meade was an adjunct faculty member at Moraine Valley Community College, a public institution in Palos Hills. She became upset in August 2013 when the college sent her a one-page document that set out her course schedule for the coming term.

The document got Meades attention because the words EMPLOYMENT AGREEMENT were emblazoned across the top, followed by two paragraphs of text stating that it was not a contract for full-time employment and stating further that the college might not employ her at all if there was no need for her services. Ever been so mad you could write a letter? Meade wrote a letter.

Specifically, Meade composed a letter to the League for Innovation in the Community College (LICC), an organization the college was reapplying to for membership. LICC includes 800 member institutions and over 150 corporate partners. The college had asked adjuncts to write to LICC supporting its application. Meades letter declined to do so and instead pulled no punches regarding the reasons she couldnt support the reapplication.

Meade accused the college of treating its adjunct faculty like a disposable resource and a separate, lower class of people. She accused the college of underpaying its adjunct faculty, denying them access to health care, and denying them access to certain courses. Meade said that adjunct faculty taught 60 percent of the colleges course load, but the college devoted most of its teaching resources to full-time faculty.

Meade also accused the college of prohibiting adjuncts from working on an hourly basisas opposed to a per-course basisthus deterring them from spending time tutoring students. On this point, Meade implied that the practice was contributing to the colleges high failure rate in developmental classes.

She dramatically concluded that all of those factors had created a chilling effect which affects adjunct performance and erodes the confidence the idyllic atmosphere and beautiful buildings and grounds strive to project. Meade sent the letter on the letterhead of the colleges adjunct faculty union, the Moraine Valley Adjunct Faculty Organization, of which she was president.

Meade sent her letter to LICC on August 20. Two days later, she received a notice from the college that her services were terminated. The notice referred specifically to her LICC letter and accused her of spouting misrepresentations and falsehoods.

The notice went on to complain that her letter wasnt responsible advocacy on behalf of her union but instead was a personal attack designed to undermine the colleges relationship with LICC. The college followed up the termination notice with a warning that if she was seen on campus, she could be arrested for trespassing. Meade sued the college in federal court, alleging that she was terminated in retaliation for expressing views protected by the First Amendment.

See the rest here:
Retaliation: Did college unlawfully terminate faculty member for complaining?