HIS 454 Special Topics: Freedom of Speech & Expression in American Law and History

[Undergraduate Law BA]

If you need an additional elective, the Department of History is offering a course that may be of interest to some of your law undergraduates:
HIS 454 Special Topics: Freedom of Speech & Expression in American Law and History
Instructor: D. Gerber

The First Amendment to the American Constitution states that Congress cannot pass laws, “… abridging the freedom of speech, of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” These words, the foundation of core American freedoms, have become known as guarantees of “freedom of expression.” But it is by no means clear precisely what they mean. How broad are those freedoms? What do they include or exclude? How and why have they developed to go beyond limiting Congress to limiting state and local government activities? Americans have spent many decades seeking to answer those questions, mostly without resolutions that please everyone. In this seminar we will read and analyze key Supreme Court decisions of the last century that have attempted to answer just those questions. A feature of this seminar is that in simulated court hearings students will plead and decide upon the lawsuits that are the bases for the Court’s decisions.