This ambitious and accessible history of the nation's highest court contains information important for every American to know.

In this gracefully written, accessible and entertaining volume, John Semonche surveys censorship for reasons of sex from the nineteenth century up to the present. He covers the various forms of American media-books and periodicals, pictorial art, motion pictures, music and dance, and radio, television, and the Internet. The tale is varied and interesting, replete with a stock of colorful characters such as Anthony Comstock, Mae West, Theodore Dreiser, Marcel Duchamp, Opie and Anthony, Judy...

Journalists face constant intimidation. Whether it takes the extreme form of beheadings, death threats, government censorship or simply political correctness—it casts a shadow over their ability to tell a story.When the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published the cartoons of the prophet Muhammad nine years ago, Denmark found itself at the center of a global battle about the freedom of speech. The paper's culture editor, Flemming Rose, defended the decision to print the ...

'I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it' This slogan, attributed to Voltaire, is frequently quoted by defenders of free speech. Yet it is rare to find anyone prepared to defend all expression in every circumstance, especially if the views expressed incite violence. So where do the limits lie? What is the real value of free speech? Here, Nigel Warburton offers a concise guide to important questions facing modern society about the value and limits o...

Letters from prison, songs, poems, and courtroom statements, plus tributes to the Russian punk band that shook the world.On February 21, 2012, five members of a Russian feminist punk collective Pussy Riot staged a performance in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow. Dressed in brightly colored tights and balaclavas, they performed their "Punk Prayer" asking the Virgin Mary to drive out Russian president Vladimir Putin from the church. After just forty second...

American public schools often censor controversial student speech that the Constitution protects. Lessons in Censorship brings clarity to a bewildering array of court rulings that define the speech rights of young citizens in the school setting. Catherine J. Ross examines disputes that have erupted in our schools and courts over the civil rights movement, war and peace, rights for LGBTs, abortion, immigration, evangelical proselytizing, and the Confederate flag. She argues that th...

In Dirt for Art's Sake, Elisabeth Ladenson recounts the most visible of modern obscenity trials involving scandalous books and their authors. What, she asks, do these often-colorful legal histories have to tell us about the works themselves and about a changing cultural climate that first treated them as filth and later celebrated them as masterpieces? Ladenson's narrative starts with Madame Bovary (Flaubert was tried in France in 1857) and finishes with Fanny Hill (written in the eighteen...

No other nation's creation, both politically and socially, owes such a debt to lawyers as the United States of America. This book traces the story of that creation through the human lives of those who played important parts in it: amongst others, of English lawyers who established the form of the original colonies; of the Founding Fathers, who declared independence and created a Constitution; of Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson, Justices of the Supreme Court and finally Barack Obama. Even R...

For some, he was “America’s leading smut king,” hauled into court repeatedly over thirty years for peddling obscene publications through the mail. But when Samuel Roth appealed a 1956 conviction, he forced the Supreme Court to finally come to grips with a problem that had plagued both American society and constitutional law for longer than he had been in business. For while the facts of Roth v. United States were unexceptional, its constitutional issues would define the relationsh...

This richly detailed biography illustrates how a determined Canadian seeking justice created an enduring legacy. Through vigorous battles, Jim McRuer’s passion for justice was translated into laws that daily touch and protect the lives of millions today.James Chalmers McRuer was not easy to get along with or even much liked by many lawyers who dubbed him ’Vinegar Jim.’ Yet countless others saw him as heroic, inspirational, a man above and apart from his times.His resolute f...

Lincoln scholars explore the president's law career in this informative volume, examining his legal writings on matters from ethics to the Constitution.As our nation's most beloved and recognizable president, Abraham Lincoln is best known for the Emancipation Proclamation and for guiding our country through the Civil War. But before he took the oath of office, Lincoln practiced law for nearly twenty-five years in the Illinois courts. In Abraham Lincoln, Esq.

Jefferson's Freeholders and the Politics of Ownership in the Old Dominion explores the historical processes by which Virginia was transformed from a British colony into a Southern slave state. It focuses on changing conceptualizations of ownership and emphasizes the persistent influence of the English common law on Virginia's postcolonial political culture. The book explains how the traditional characteristics of land tenure became subverted by the dynamic contractual relations of a commer...