The First Amendment to the United States Constitution prevents the government from making laws which regulate an establishment of religion, or that would prohibit the free exercise of religion, or abridge the freedom of speech, the freedom of the press, the freedom of assembly, or the right to petition the government for redress of grievances. It was adopted on December 15, 1791, as one of the ten amendments that constitute the Bill of Rights.
Clear and present danger was a doctrine adopted by the Supreme Court of the United States to determine under what circumstances limits can be placed on First Amendment freedoms of speech, press, or assembly. The test was replaced in 1969 with Brandenburg v. Ohio's "imminent lawless action" test.
Huey Pierce Long Jr., nicknamed "the Kingfish", was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 40th governor of Louisiana from 1928 to 1932 and as a member of the United States Senate from 1932 until his assassination in 1935. He was a populist member of the Democratic Party and rose to national prominence during the Great Depression for his vocal criticism of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his New Deal, which Long deemed insufficiently radical. As the political leader of Louisiana, he commanded wide networks of supporters and often took forceful action. A controversial figure, Long is celebrated as a populist champion of the poor or, conversely, denounced as a fascistic demagogue.
New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964), was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that the freedom of speech protections in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution restrict the ability of American public officials to sue for defamation. Specifically, it held that if a plaintiff in a defamation lawsuit is a public official or person running for public office, not only must he or she prove the normal elements of defamation—publication of a false defamatory statement to a third party—he or she must also prove that the statement was made with "actual malice", meaning that the defendant either knew the statement was false or recklessly disregarded whether or not it was true.
Gitlow v. New York, 268 U.S. 652 (1925), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court holding that the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution had extended the First Amendment's provisions protecting freedom of speech and freedom of the press to apply to the governments of U.S. states. Along with Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad Co. v. City of Chicago (1897), it was one of the first major cases involving the incorporation of the Bill of Rights. It was also one of a series of Supreme Court cases that defined the scope of the First Amendment's protection of free speech and established the standard to which a state or the federal government would be held when it criminalized speech or writing.
Near v. Minnesota, 283 U.S. 697 (1931), was a landmark decision of the US Supreme Court under which prior restraint on publication was found to violate freedom of the press as protected under the First Amendment. This principle was applied to free speech generally in subsequent jurisprudence. The Court ruled that a Minnesota law that targeted publishers of "malicious" or "scandalous" newspapers violated the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Legal scholar and columnist Anthony Lewis called Near the Court's "first great press case".
Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 393 U.S. 503 (1969), was a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court that defined First Amendment rights of students in U.S. public schools. The Tinker test, also known as the "substantial disruption" test, is still used by courts today to determine whether a school's interest to prevent disruption infringes upon students' First Amendment rights.
Prior restraint is censorship imposed, usually by a government or institution, on expression, that prohibits particular instances of expression. It is in contrast to censorship which establishes general subject matter restrictions and reviews a particular instance of expression only after the expression has taken place.
Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1 (1947), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court which applied the Establishment Clause in the country's Bill of Rights to state law. Prior to this decision, the First Amendment's words, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" imposed limits only on the federal government, and many states continued to grant certain religious denominations legislative or effective privileges.
In United States law, the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, together with that Amendment's Free Exercise Clause, form the constitutional right of freedom of religion. The relevant constitutional text is:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...
Freedom of the press in the United States is legally protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Texas Monthly v. Bullock, 489 U.S. 1 (1989), was a case brought before the US Supreme Court in November 1988. The case was to test the legality of a Texas statute that exempted religious publications from paying state sales tax.
Minneapolis Star Tribune Company v. Commissioner, 460 U.S. 575 (1983), was an opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States overturning a use tax on paper and ink in excess of $100,000 consumed in any calendar year. The Minneapolis Star Tribune initially paid the tax and sued for a refund.
United States v. Stevens, 559 U.S. 460 (2010), was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States, which ruled that 18 U.S.C. § 48, a federal statute criminalizing the commercial production, sale, or possession of depictions of cruelty to animals, was an unconstitutional abridgment of the First Amendment right to freedom of speech.
Zacchini v. Scripps-Howard Broadcasting Co., 433 U.S. 562 (1977), was an important U.S. Supreme Court case concerning rights of publicity. The Court held that the First and Fourteenth Amendments do not immunize the news media from civil liability when they broadcast a performer's entire act without his consent, and the Constitution does not prevent a state from requiring broadcasters to compensate performers. It was the first time the Supreme Court heard a case on rights of publicity.
Smith v. California, 361 U.S. 147 (1959), was a U.S. Supreme Court case upholding the freedom of the press. The decision deemed unconstitutional a city ordinance that made one in possession of obscene books criminally liable because it did not require proof that one had knowledge of the book's content, and thus violated the freedom of the press guaranteed in the First Amendment. Smith v. California continued the Supreme Court precedent of ruling that questions of freedom of expression were protected by the Due Process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment from invasion by state action. It also established that in order for one to be criminally liable for possession of obscene material, there must be proof of one's knowledge of the material.
Hazelwood School District et al. v. Kuhlmeier et al., 484 U.S. 260 (1988), was a landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States that held that public school curricular student newspapers that have not been established as forums for student expression are subject to a lower level of First Amendment protection than independent student expression or newspapers established as forums for student expression.
Times Film Corporation v. City of Chicago, or Times v. City of Chicago is the name of two cases decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1957 and 1961. Both involved the issue of limits on freedom of expression in connection with motion pictures. In both cases the court affirmed the right of local governments to engage in some form of censorship.
Richmond Newspapers Inc. v. Virginia, 448 U.S. 555 (1980), is a United States Supreme Court case involving issues of privacy in correspondence with the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, the freedom of the press, the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. After a murder case ended in three mistrials, the judge closed the fourth trial to the public and the press. On appeal, the Supreme Court ruled the closing to be in violation of the First Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment asserting that the First Amendment implicitly guarantees the press access to public trials.
