Casebriefs » Intro. to Constitutional Law

Exam Question for Constitutional Law Section

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 17:53:44 +0000

In 1990 Congress enacts the Wetlands Protection Act (WPA). The only findings Congress included in the statute were that (1) “wetlands and wetland-adjacent areas are important breeding and stop-off points for various types of migratory birds,” and (2) that “wetlands and wetland-adjacent areas are being lost to residential and business park development at alarming rates.” The WPA prohibits large-scale development (e.g., the building of a residential subdivision or office park) of any parcel of land if the United States Army Corps of Engineers determines that the parcel “is, or has the potential to be, a wetland or wetland-adjacent area.” There is no requirement that the Corps of Engineers determine that a given parcel of land actually house migratory birds; if it is a wetland or wetland-adjacent area, then the statute’s development prohibition automatically applies.

Rapacious and Thoughtless, a major land developer in Southern California, plans to develop “Ranchoview,” a mixed use office park and condominium complex, on land in Orange County. A marshy stretch of the Orange River runs through the parcel, and will have to be filled in in order for the project to be built. The Corps of Engineers orders R&T to stop development, based on its determination that the parcel is a wetland.

Tom Thompson is a birdwatcher who lives a few miles from the proposed Ranchoview project. He keeps a bird feeder in his backyard in order to attract some of the migrating waterfowl that use the Orange River as a stop on their winter migration south. Tom is concerned that Ranchoview will make the River area loud and polluted, thus driving away the birds. Could he sue to block the project?

Assume that Tom is a member of the National Audubon Society, an organization that is organized to protect the interests of birdwatchers. Could the Society sue on Tom’s behalf? On what conditions?

Can R&T successfully argue that the WPA goes beyond Congress’ authority under the Commerce Clause?

The First Amendment

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 17:52:38 +0000

The First Amendment to the Constitution guarantees freedom of speech and press, religious freedom and freedom from government establishing a state religion. Despite the Speech Clause’s prohibition on government imposing speech restrictions, it’s clear that government must be able to restrict speech in some ways. As legal doctrine has evolved, a key part of the Speech Clause has become the rule that government ordinarily cannot restrict speech because it disagrees with the content of that speech.

UNITED STATES v. PLAYBOY ENTERTAINMENT GROUP, INC.

120 S.Ct.1878 (2000)

Justice KENNEDY delivered the opinion of the Court.

This case presents a challenge to § 505 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Section 505 requires cable television operators who provide channels “primarily dedicated to sexually-oriented programming” either to “fully scramble or otherwise fully block” those channels or to limit their transmission to hours when children are unlikely to be viewing, set by administrative regulation as the time between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. Even before enactment of the statute, signal scrambling was already in use. Cable operators used scrambling in the regular course of business, so that only paying customers had access to certain programs. Scrambling could be imprecise, however; and either or both audio and visual portions of the scrambled programs might be heard or seen, a phenomenon known as “signal bleed.” The purpose of § 505 is to shield children from hearing or seeing images resulting from signal bleed.

“Substantive Due Process”

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 17:49:09 +0000

Another important Fourteenth Amendment guarantee is the provision that no state shall “deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law.” While you might think that the Due Process Clause requires only a fair procedure – i.e., “due process” – it has been interpreted to provide substantive protection for a set of basic rights, protecting those rights from impairment regardless of the process the government was willing to provide.

Washington v. Glucksberg

521 U.S. 702 (1997)

CHIEF JUSTICE REHNQUIST delivered the opinion of the Court.

The question presented in this case is whether Washington’s prohibition against “causing” or “aiding” a suicide offends the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. We hold that it does not. . . .

The Equal Protection Clause

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 16:36:08 +0000

The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution is the source for many of our most important constitutional freedoms. One of the Fourteenth Amendment’s crucial provisions is its guarantee that no state shall deprive any person of the “equal protection of the laws.” The Equal Protection Clause has become a foundation for the Constitution’s commitment to equality. However, determining what constitutes “equal protection” has been difficult.

Frontiero v. Richardson

411 U.S. 677 (1973)

MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN announced the judgment of the Court in an opinion in which MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS,MR. JUSTICE WHITE, and MR. JUSTICE MARSHALL join.

The question before us concerns the right of a female member of the uniformed services to claim her spouse as a “dependent” for the purposes of obtaining increased quarters allowances and medical and dental benefits under 37 U.S.C. § 401, 403, and 10 U.S.C. § 1072, 1076, on an equal footing with male members. Under these statutes, a serviceman may claim his wife as a “dependent” without regard to whether she is in fact dependent upon him for any part of her support. A servicewoman, on the other hand, may not claim her husband as a “dependent” under these programs unless he is in fact dependent upon her for over one-half of his support. Thus, the question for decision is whether this difference in treatment constitutes an unconstitutional discrimination against servicewomen in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. A three-judge District Court for the Middle District of Alabama, one judge dissenting, rejected this contention and sustained the constitutionality of the provisions of the statutes making this distinction. . . . We reverse.

Congressional Power to Regulate

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 16:32:57 +0000

The other great structural issue in Constitutional Law is federalism – the relationship between the federal government and the states. Many of the battles over federalism center on the amount of regulatory power that is invested in Congress. The most important congressional regulatory power is the power “to regulate commerce among the several states.” The following case recounts the history of “the Commerce Power” and reveals modern limits on that power.

UNITED STATES v. LOPEZ

514 U.S. 549 (1995)

Chief Justice REHNQUIST delivered the opinion of the Court.

In the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990, Congress made it a federal offense “for any individual knowingly to possess a firearm at a place that the individual knows, or has reasonable cause to believe, is a school zone.” 18 U.S.C. § 922(q)(1)(A) (1988 ed., Supp. V). The Act neither regulates a commercial activity nor contains a requirement that the possession be connected in any way to interstate commerce. We hold that the Act exceeds the authority of Congress “[t]o regulate Commerce . . . among the several States. . . .” U.S. Const., Art. I, § 8, cl. 3.

On March 10, 1992, respondent, who was then a 12th-grade student, arrived at Edison High School in San Antonio, Texas, carrying a concealed .38 caliber handgun and five bullets. Acting upon an anonymous tip, school authorities confronted respondent, who admitted that he was carrying the weapon. He was arrested and charged under Texas law with firearm possession on school premises. The next day, the state charges were dismissed after federal agents charged respondent by complaint with violating the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990. . . .

The Executive Power

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 16:24:44 +0000

Another important separation of powers issue involves the power of the President. Article II of the Constitution, which deals with the President, is vague about the scope of presidential powers. This has led to attempts by Presidents to assert power that others argue does not rightly belong to them, as in the following case.

YOUNGSTOWN SHEET & TUBE CO. v. SAWYER

343 U.S. 579 (1952)
Mr. Justice BLACK delivered the opinion of the Court.

We are asked to decide whether the President was acting within his constitutional power when he issued an order directing the Secretary of Commerce to take possession of and operate most of the Nation’s steel mills. The mill owners argue that the President’s order amounts to lawmaking, a legislative function which the Constitution has expressly confided to the Congress and not to the President. The Government’s position is that the order was made on findings of the President that his action was necessary to avert a national catastrophe which would inevitably result from a stoppage of steel production, and that in meeting this grave emergency the President was acting within the aggregate of his constitutional powers as the Nation’s Chief Executive and the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the United States. The issue emerges here from the following series of events:

The Judicial Power

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 16:09:27 +0000

One of the fundamental issues in Constitutional Law relates to the power of the three branches of the federal government – an issue known as the “separation of powers.” One of the main limits on the power of the federal courts is that they can only exert their power at the behest of a plaintiff who is properly before the court. The crucial inquiry here, explored in the following case, is whether the plaintiff has “standing” to sue.

WARTH v. SELDIN

422 U.S. 490 (1975)
Mr. Justice POWELL delivered the opinion of the Court.
Petitioners, various organizations and individuals resident in the Rochester, N.Y., metropolitan area, brought this action in the District Court for the Western District of New York against the town of Penfield, an incorporated municipality adjacent to Rochester, and against members of Penfield’s Zoning, Planning and Town Boards. Petitioners claimed that the town’s zoning ordinance. . .effectively excluded persons of low and moderate income from living in the town, in contravention of petitioners’ First, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights. . . . The District Court dismissed the complaint. . . The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed, holding that none of the plaintiffs, and neither Housing Council nor Home Builders Association, had standing to prosecute the action. . . . [W]e affirm.