Symposium - Civil Rights Law in Transition: The Forty-Fifth Anniversary of the New York City Commission on Human Rights

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Make Your Own Kind of Music: Queer Student Groups and the First Amendment

As openly gay and lesbian students become a more regular presence in public high schools, students in many schools have started lesbian and gay student organizations. In response, some school districts and state legislatures have attempted to prevent the clubs from meeting, either through categorical bans on all extracurricular groups or through legislation specifically designed to prevent the gay clubs from meeting. This Comment examines the First Amendment issues raised by these efforts. It argues that the Supreme Court\u27s current approach to student speech, which focuses on whether the speech is school sponsored and on the application of public forum doctrine, lacks an underlying rationale and leads to inconsistent outcomes. In its place, the author urges the Court to adopt a mission-based test that examines the relationship between the regulation on speech and the educational purpose underlying the activity. Because student clubs generally exist to promote self-exploration and foster the development of individual identity, this new test would extend First Amendment protection to gay and lesbian student groups

Glory Days: Popular Constitutionalism, Nostalgia, and the True Nature of Constitutional Culture

This article uses political science data on participation, knowledge, and popular sentiments about the political process to critique different strands of popular constitutionalism, a recent movement in constitutional theory that highlights the People\u27s role in the development of interpretive norms. It argues that popular constitutionalists have not paid sufficient attention to the increasingly distant relationship between the people and political life, resulting in an interpretive model that is often unable to realize its normative goals and rests on some weak descriptive premises. It also suggests that the existence of high levels of civic engagement during the 1960s - a formative period for many current theorists - has contributed to the increasingly distant relationship between constitutional theory and political practice

Our Founding Feelings: Emotion, Commitment, and Imagination in Constitutional Culture

Traditionally, scholars and judges have treated emotion as a destructive force within constitutional culture. This Article uses recent developments in social psychology, neurobiology, and political psychology to challenge this dominant account and reposition emotion as central to our collective constitutional endeavor. It argues that emotion is critical to commitment and imagination, two features of human behavior that are essential to constitutional legitimacy and innovation. Further, emotions shape our perceptions and preferences about constitutional values through their impact on attitude development and moral decision-making. Finally, our increased understanding of emotion\u27s impact on human behavior has the potential to alter the way we think about a range of ongoing debates in constitutional theory, including the merits of judicial supremacy, the relationship between the Court and public opinion, the standards for constitutional amendment, and the design of democratic institutions

Glory Days: Popular Constitutionalism, Nostalgia, and the True Nature of Constitutional Culture

This article uses political science data on participation, knowledge, and popular sentiments about the political process to critique different strands of popular constitutionalism, a recent movement in constitutional theory that highlights the People\u27s role in the development of interpretive norms. It argues that popular constitutionalists have not paid sufficient attention to the increasingly distant relationship between the people and political life, resulting in an interpretive model that is often unable to realize its normative goals and rests on some weak descriptive premises. It also suggests that the existence of high levels of civic engagement during the 1960s - a formative period for many current theorists - has contributed to the increasingly distant relationship between constitutional theory and political practice

Our Founding Feelings: Emotion, Commitment, and Imagination in Constitutional Culture

Traditionally, scholars and judges have treated emotion as a destructive force within constitutional culture. This Article uses recent developments in social psychology, neurobiology, and political psychology to challenge this dominant account and reposition emotion as central to our collective constitutional endeavor. It argues that emotion is critical to commitment and imagination, two features of human behavior that are essential to constitutional legitimacy and innovation. Further, emotions shape our perceptions and preferences about constitutional values through their impact on attitude development and moral decision-making. Finally, our increased understanding of emotion\u27s impact on human behavior has the potential to alter the way we think about a range of ongoing debates in constitutional theory, including the merits of judicial supremacy, the relationship between the Court and public opinion, the standards for constitutional amendment, and the design of democratic institutions