Exam II Review (We <3 Nick!)

Chapter 4

 

Writ of Habeas Corpus- a court order demanding that an individual in custody be brought into court and shown the cause for detention. This was in Article 1, Section 9. It prohibited the government from depriving a person of liberty without an open trial before a judge.

 

Bill of Attainder- A law that declares a person guilty of a crime without a trial. This was prohibited in the original Constitution in Article 1, Section 9.

 

Ex Post Facto Laws- Prohibited in the original Constitution. A law that declares an action to be illegal after it has been committed.

 

Due Process- The principle that the government must respect all of a person's legal rights instead of just some or most of those legal rights when the government deprives a person of life, liberty, or property.

 

Equal Protection- A provision in the 14^th Amendment guaranteeing citizens the "equal protection of the laws." This clause has been the basis for the civil rights of African Americans, women, and other groups.

 

Selective Incorporation- the process by which different protections in the Bill of Rights were incorporated into the 14^th Amendment, thus guaranteeing citizens protection from state as well as national governments. Palko established the principle of selective incorporation where the provisions of the Bill of Rights were to be considered one by one and selectively applied as limits on the states through the 14^th Amendment.

 

Necessary and Proper Clause- from Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution, it provides the Congress with the authority to make all laws "necessary and proper" to carry out its expressed powers.

 

All of the Supreme Court Cases on the Handout

 

Amendment 1- SPEECH

• Schenck vs. US (1919)- first time you could define exactly where the freedom boundries for speech are. Court defines where you have these liberties and at what point you no longer do. Was the establishing ground for the Clear and Present Danger rule.
  
  
• Gitlow vs. NY (1925)- "Freedoms of speech and press are among the fundamental personal rights protected by the 14^th Amendment from abridgement by the states." States cannot say what citizens can or cannot say (for the most part).
  
  
• Roth vs. US (1957)- The courts said that basically before things are obscene they are protected. However they never defined obscene. This makes it subjective.
  
  
• Miller vs. California (1973)- The courts said that 'hardcore' is obscene, making it then known that there was also a medium and soft-core porn. an important United States Supreme Court case involving what constitutes unprotected obscenity for First Amendment purposes. The decision reiterated that obscenity was not protected by the First Amendment and established the Miller test for determining what constituted obscene material.
  
  
• New York vs. Ferber (1982)- "Child porn is not a a category of free speech protected by the Constitution."
  
  
• Pope vs. Illinos (1987)- "The social value of a work may be judged from the standpoint of a reasonable person, not only the entire community." This gave the local community a chance to define "obsene".
  
  
• Reno vs. ACLU (1997)- Declared the Communication Decency Act of 1996 to be unconstitutional!!! The D. Act of 96 prohibited the transmission of obscene, indecent, and offensive to people under the age of 18.