LEAD 11
Our First Amendment
Last Offered n/a

This course is not offered in the current catalog

Class Details

“Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.” Those words are clear, and yet our interpretation of these essential rights has changed over the decades. In this seminar, we will study how free speech and freedom of the press have clashed with other rights as well as with governmental responsibilities. How should we balance the free flow of information with national security? How should we balance free speech with speech we hate — the neo-Nazi demonstration in Skokie, Illinois in 1977, flag burning, trigger words? Among the cases we will examine are the Pentagon Papers, the decision of the New York Times in 1971 to publish classified information about the war in Vietnam; Supreme Court decisions in the 1964 libel case, the New York Times v. Sullivan, that set a high bar for libeling public officials and other public figures, and in the Citizens United case in 2010 that equated money and speech. We will look at more recent cases that raise issues of privacy, intellectual property rights, and national security, such as Apple’s refusal to unlock a cell phone. And we will discuss uncomfortable learning at Williams College. Along with current journalism and key texts written by Madison and Jefferson, we will discuss a chapter by Williams political scientist James MacGregor Burns, Anthony Lewis’s short history of the First Amendment in the 20th century, anecdotes by James Goodale, the Times’ lawyer in the Pentagon Papers case, and an account of that case by law professor David Rudenstine.
The Class: Format: mwr 1-2:50pm
Limit: 12
Grading:
Requirements/Evaluation: participation in class discussions, one 3-page paper, and one 7-page paper
Prerequisites: none
Enrollment Preferences: preference to Political Science and History majors
Materials/Lab Fee: cost to student $25

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Updated 10:29 pm

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