Nothing is more central to a free society than the right to criticize one’s government. Nothing.

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Looking forward to attending this symposium in February! prawfsblawg.blogs.com/prawfsblawg/...

Here's to hoping for a Gobitis —> Barnette mood shift. Too bad it'll likely require extraordinary suffering.

Sincerely wondering: what remedies does Justice Kavanaugh believe are and should be available in federal court these days for excessive force violations by federal immigration officials?

This strike is outright murder even if you accept all the legal arguments the Obama admin made in support of its drone strikes, which you shouldn’t. www.justsecurity.org/119982/legal...

‘’The Supreme Court’s Two Bodies’’

Wow!

Great post!

My dad is retiring today after over 30 years as a USPS letter carrier (with other jobs before that). For years, he also worked nights and weekends as a baseball umpire when our family needed more money. His good cheer amidst endless sacrifices will always inspire me.

The honesty is refreshing

"The Future of Press Freedom," a book co-edited by @sonjawest.bsky.social & @randersenjones.bsky.social & produced in conjunction with @knightcolumbia.org, with chapters by a stellar line-up of 1st Amendment scholars (& also me), is available via open access here: www.cambridge.org/core/books/f...

New paper! Along with my co-authors, Prof. Susan Appleton and Hannah Keidan, I have posted a short symposium foreword, "The Curiously Minor Role of Minor v. Happersett," on SSRN. Anyone interested in legal history, election law, or women's rights should check it out: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Interesting to see a Justice acknowledge that the Court might "narrow" one of its precedents. Usually, a majority just "declines to extend" an earlier decision, which is code for narrowing. Didn't realize they felt free to call this spade a spade!

Last fall, the editors of the Harvard Law Review invited me to write the Foreword for this year's Supreme Court issue. My working draft is below, and comments are most welcome. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

"drink higher": finish your OJ so I can go play "tiny tunnels": Cheerios "goobelies": blueberries "dobbelies": strawberries "hold you": hold me "f**k": fork "pooky pooky": I just heard thunder (which is spooky) "not this kind": switch songs! "I wanna stretch a legs": I'm done with this bath/car ride

Thank you, anonymous Con Law course evaluator.

Little known fact about Dick Fallon: he fulfilled the fantasy of many law professors and published a mystery novel (available on Amazon for $1900--even more expensive than Hart & Wechsler!): www.amazon.com/Stubborn-Mul...

Very glad he's leaving us one more book: www.cambridge.org/core/books/c...

This interview is so fascinating. Con Law folks – consider teaching these cases when you cover equal protection! www.buzzsprout.com/1227113/epis...

But this is absurd and inconsistent with, e.g., Congress having the constitutional power to regulate foreign commerce!

Apache Stronghold would like a word!

Am I doing this right?

W&M Bill of Rights Journal's Symposium Issue on Memory and Authority is available at HeinOnline, Lexis, EBSCO, Westlaw, and the W&M Repository. Check it out today! scholarship.law.wm.edu/wmborj/vol33...

Today’s unsigned, unexplained #SCOTUS ruling clearing the way for removals of migrants to third countries without any additional process is a disaster—not just on the merits, but because of the government misbehavior that it not only refuses to punish, but effectively rewards. Me, via “One First”:

To find a new protected class, Justice Barrett would require a "legacy" or "longstanding history" of de jure "discrimination." But whether a lengthy history of legal classifications amounts to "discrimination" is a normative judgment made in the present. (1/)

Very much agree with this prediction. Not saying it's inevitable, but it's hard to think of a modern case better situated to be viewed retrospectively as another Plessy, Buck v. Bell, etc. Wish the dissenters had gone there! wustllawreview.org/2023/09/25/j...

Striving to canonize Geduldig is... a choice. My impression is that today's law students—even those who support Dobbs—overwhelmingly find Geduldig's reasoning to be indefensible (whether logically, morally, or both).

Sometimes you feel like you need to decide a case a certain way because the law requires it even if it harms people. Fine. But writing separately to say how much more you would harm people if you had the votes seems to me something one can and should avoid.

Excited to share a draft of my most recent work, “The Moral Complacency of Federal Indian law” (forthcoming in the Minnesota Law Review): papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Unpacking is more fun when you spent your early 20s collecting autographs.

Really love being back in North Carolina. The classic Arkansas → North Carolina → DC → North Carolina → Arkansas → North Carolina path!

/1 Just realized that my latest article with @yalelawjournal.bsky.social just dropped! This is obviously a huge honor. I really appreciate the editors taking a chance on a young, no-name scholar with an idiosyncratic story to tell. www.yalelawjournal.org/article/resu...

government speech

Here is my paper on "Tradition and Feminism in Constitutional Rights Adjudication": papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

🧵 Exciting to have my new Penn Law Review piece on Ancillary Rights published! Many thanks to lots of people for feedback & criticism, esp. @danielrice.bsky.social for helping organize my thoughts. The piece unpacks how & when rights extend to related conduct-- papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

This song absolutely rocks!!

for my AdLaw people

for my Trademark people

“The Fed is different” is right up there with “only sec. 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment requires implementing legislation” in statements that really strain the notion that legal plausibility is any sort of constraint on the justices.

The sheer joy of watching decades-old home movies for the first time. Get your VHS tapes digitized!

I lol'ed.

The craziest thing that's happened to me in a long time. Nearly fell through the ceiling while trying to move a heavy rowing machine in the attic. Only a well-placed 2x4 stopped that from happening. (Let's just say I couldn't sit for a couple days.) Grateful not to have been seriously injured!

New paper from me and @leahlitman.bsky.social, entitled "Legalistic Noncompliance," taking stock of the second Trump administration's emerging practice with respect to judicial orders. It's on the "draft-y" side -- comments welcomed! papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

Separation of persons

Realizing that I'll have some colorful titles on my home shelves when we take Zillow pics. "Slave Patrols," "Hitler's American Model," "How to Become a Federal Criminal," "Lust on Trial," "From Slave Abuse to Hate Crime," "Civilizing Torture," "The Chinese Must Go," etc. Should I censor or no?

Absolutely sickening