Join First Amendment Watch and Foundation for Individual Rights (FIRE) for a virtual taping of the So to Speak Podcast with Jacob Mchangama, author of “Free Speech: A History from Socrates to Social Media” in conversation with Greg Lukianoff, Professor Stephen D. Solomon, Sarah McLaughlin, and host Nico Perrino.
Teacher Guide: Disinformation and the First Amendment
Disinformation is more pernicious and widespread today than at any other point in history, largely because of social media and the Internet. For instance, it is now widely known—and verified by the U.S. intelligence community—that Russians interfered with the 2016 presidential election.
In 2018, Christie’s auction house in New York sold a painting, Portrait of Edmond Bellamy, for $432,500. This sales price was significant. Not because it was exceptionally high—Christie’s has had many sales that would dwarf this price—but because the painting was not made by a human being. It was created by a computer using artificial intelligence (AI).
Texas Community College Sued for Violating Former Professor’s First Amendment Rights
Collin College, a community college in McKinney, Texas is being sued by a former professor for violating her free speech and assembly rights. In a lawsuit filed on September 22nd in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Texas Sherman Division, Suzanne Jones alleges that Collin College administrators pushed her out for criticizing the school’s COVID-19 response, and in retaliation for two previous incidents in 2017 and 2020.
Teacher Guide: Does the First Amendment Allow the Government to Censor Art?
For much of our nation’s history, the First Amendment’s guarantee of freedom of speech did not clearly protect art from government censorship. Over the course of the 20th century, however, courts gradually extended speech protections to a broader range of artistic expression, including film, dance, theater, and fine arts. Today, public officials can censor art only in limited circumstances. What are those circumstances, and what protection does the First Amendment provide?
Supreme Court Strikes Down Debt Exception Provision, Upholds General Ban on Robocalls
The case was brought by an association of political consultants who argued that a 2015 exception for calls to collect government debt violated the First Amendment. While the majority of justices agreed with the consultants that the 2015 exception was unconstitutional (6-3), an even greater majority disagreed with their argument for striking down the law in its entirety (7-2).
Supreme Court Hears Oral Arguments In Case Involving Government Ban on Robocalls
The U.S. Supreme Court considers a challenge to the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, a law passed in 1991 that prohibits the use of automated calls to cell phones. The plaintiffs, a group of political consultants, argue that the law and its exceptions discriminate based on the content of the caller's message.
On May 5th, the Knight Foundation and Gallup released the 2020 First Amendment on Campus report, an online survey of more than 3,000 full-time undergraduate students, and a large cohort of students from historically black colleges and universities. The First Amendment survey began in the spring of 2016, and the respondents for the 2020 report were queried in the fall of 2019, well before the COVID-19 pandemic.