In February 2017, Ryan Duke was arrested and charged with the murder of Tara Grinstead, who went missing almost 12 years earlier. Tara was a south Georgia high school teacher and beauty queen, and her disappearance and Duke’s subsequent trial attracted substantial media attention. (Indeed, her murder has its own Wikipedia page.) Five days after… Read More Gag Order in Georgia Murder Trial Stuck Down
Much has been written about parents that refuse to vaccinate their children. But as far as we know, this is the first time that the First Amendment has come up. Michigan requires that children be vaccinated. But like almost every other state, Michigan provides waivers from the vaccination requirement if parents have religious objections. A… Read More Michigan Anti-Vaxxer Told that Her Catholic Faith Does Not Oppose Vaccination
This is the second recent case to deal with a First Amendment challenge from the 2012 election. This one involved the Libertarian Party of Illinois. Illinois law has what’s called a “full-slate” requirement for non-major (minor) political parties that wish to field candidates on election ballots. It requires them to field candidates for all offices… Read More Illinois’s Full-Slate Requirement for Elections Held Unconstitutional
You may remember when the Supreme Court in 2015 declared that bans on same-sex marriage were unconstitutional. Well that decision was not particularly well-received in Mississippi. Shortly after the Supreme Court’s same-sex marriage decision, Mississippi enacted a law that enumerates three “sincerely held religious beliefs” entitled to legal protection. They are: (1) that marriage should… Read More Churches and LGBT Individuals Not Allowed to Challenge Pro-Religious Mississippi Law
So this case is just a procedural decision (standing), but it has the makings of a very interesting church-and-state case. A student at a Colorado high school organized a spring-break mission trip to Guatemala through a Christian organization that arranges such mission trips. Two teachers at the high school agreed to chaperone the trip. The student… Read More Colorado Student’s Parent Allowed to Challenge School Fundraising for Religious Mission Trip
