Generated Deck

Jehovah’s Witness students expelled for refusing to salute the flag; Court upheld the expulsion. Established that free-exercise protections were limited at the time.

Overturned Gobitis; ruled that compulsory flag salutes violate the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause. Marked major expansion of religious liberty.

Prohibited states from using tax funds to support religious instruction. First case applying Establishment Clause to the states (via 14th Amendment).

Religious instruction inside public schools held unconstitutional; reinforced separation of church and state.

Upheld release-time program letting students leave school early for religious observance. Showed some accommodation of religion is permissible.

Created the Lemon Test: (1) secular purpose, (2) primary effect not advancing/inhibiting religion, (3) no excessive entanglement. Defines modern Establishment Clause analysis.

University denied funding to religious student magazine; Court ruled this violated free-speech neutrality. Required equal treatment of religious expression.

Family-owned business objected to ACA contraception mandate; Court allowed religious exemption for closely held corporations under RFRA.

Banned state-sponsored nondenominational prayer in public schools. Landmark Establishment Clause case.

Posting Ten Commandments in classrooms violated Establishment Clause.

Clergy-led prayer at public-school graduations unconstitutional; reaffirmed school-prayer ban.

Student-led prayer at football games unconstitutional; schools may not endorse religion even indirectly.

Anti-draft leaflets; Court upheld conviction, establishing “clear and present danger” test limiting free speech.

Socialist convicted for Left Wing Manifesto; Court applied (incorporated) free-speech protection to states via 14th Amendment but upheld conviction.

Flag burning protected as symbolic speech under the First Amendment.

Prior restraint (blocking publication) unconstitutional; established core of press freedom.

Pentagon Papers case; government cannot block publication absent immediate national-security threat. Reinforced ban on prior restraint.

Defined obscenity with three-part test: appeals to prurient interest, patently offensive, lacks serious value. Obscenity not protected speech.

Struck down Communications Decency Act restrictions on “indecent” online content; protected Internet speech.

Recognized individual right to possess firearms for lawful purposes unrelated to militia service.

Incorporated the Second Amendment to the states through the 14th Amendment’s Due Process Clause.

Established the exclusionary rule—illegally obtained evidence cannot be used in court.

Allowed use of evidence discovered independently of an illegal search (“independent-source” exception).

Officers could look through blinds and observe drug activity without violating 4th Amendment; limited privacy rights of short-term guests.

Police with probable cause to search a car may also search passengers’ belongings.

Thermal-imaging search of a home without warrant violated 4th Amendment; tech surveillance counts as a search.

Police must inform suspects of right to remain silent and to counsel before questioning; created Miranda warnings.

“Scottsboro Boys” case; Court required counsel for indigent defendants in capital crimes.

Extended right to counsel to all felony defendants in state courts; states must provide attorneys for the poor.

Death penalty as applied was arbitrary and discriminatory; violated 8th Amendment—temporary halt to executions.

Reinstated death penalty with procedural safeguards; not inherently cruel or unusual.

Statistical racial disparities insufficient to prove unconstitutional discrimination in capital sentencing.

Executing mentally disabled offenders violates 8th Amendment; banned such executions.

Only juries, not judges, can impose death sentences in capital cases.

Struck down ban on contraception; recognized implied constitutional “right to privacy.”

Legalized abortion nationwide in first two trimesters based on privacy right (9th & 14th Amendments); later overturned by Dobbs 2022.

Struck down anti-sodomy laws; legalized same-sex intimacy; extended privacy rights.

States may ban physician-assisted suicide; no constitutional right to die.

Declared enslaved and free Blacks not citizens; invalidated Congress’s power to ban slavery in territories. Fueled Civil War.

Limited 14th Amendment’s Privileges and Immunities Clause to federal, not state, rights—greatly weakened civil-rights protections.

Held that citizenship did not confer women’s right to vote; delayed women’s suffrage until 19th Amendment.

Outlawed white-only primaries; affirmed African-American right to participate in party elections.

Overturned Plessy v. Ferguson; ruled “separate but equal” unconstitutional in public education.

Struck down racial quotas in university admissions but allowed race as one of several factors; shaped affirmative-action policy.

Upheld limited use of race for diversity; diversity a compelling interest but point-system quotas invalid.

Ended affirmative action in college admissions; race can no longer be used as a factor.

Created intermediate scrutiny standard for gender classifications; struck down different drinking ages for men and women.

(See above) — Landmark abortion rights case later overturned by Dobbs 2022.

Overturned Roe v. Wade; returned abortion regulation to the states.

Defined sexual-harassment standard; plaintiffs need show hostile environment, not psychological harm.

Struck down Colorado amendment denying civil-rights protections to gays/lesbians; violated Equal Protection Clause.

(Re-listed) — Decriminalized same-sex intimacy nationwide.

Legalized same-sex marriage nationwide; 14th Amendment requires states to recognize such marriages.