Civil Liberties

On Citizens United v. FEC Supreme Court Decision: Reflections from April 30, 2005 on Correcting the Bizarre Incentives Created by Campaign Finance Reform Laws

By Donald B. Hawthorne | January 23, 2010 |

A nearly five year old blog post, reposted here in response to this week’s Supreme Court decision about free speech: Andrew has a terrific, focused posting entitled First They Came for the Radio Talk Show Hosts… that gets to the heart of the latest fallout from campaign finance reform here in Rhode Island. Once again,…

Dr. King

By Marc Comtois | January 18, 2010 |

Aside, from his obvious importance in the civil rights movement, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was one of this nation’s great, effective orators and writers. His “I Have a Dream” speech and “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” are, respectively, great examples of his talent and ability to call upon central tenets of our nation’s founding–upon…

The Federal Church of the United States of America

By Justin Katz | January 17, 2010 |

By now, you’re likely to have heard Martha Coakley’s interpretation of the First Amendment’s application to the matter of abortion. In conversation with radio talk host Ken Pittman, the Democrats’ candidate for U.S. Senate spoke as follows: Ken Pittman: Right, if you are a Catholic, and believe what the Pope teaches that any form of…

Making America Just Another (Subordinate) Country

By Justin Katz | January 12, 2010 |

Amid political battles locally and race scandals nationally, let’s not lose sight of the newly immune global-government police force operating within the United States. A recent column by Andrew McCarthy is must-reading on the topic, as he explains why the Obama administration is disinclined to explain why the president would quietly remove protections of the…

Jim Taricani on the TSA Subpoenaing Bloggers About Their Sources

By Carroll Andrew Morse | December 31, 2009 |

The Associated Press is reporting that the Transportation Security Agency is trying to force a pair of bloggers who reported on changes to TSA security procedures following Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s attempted bombing of a Christmas Day flight to Detroit to reveal their sources…As the government reviews how an alleged terrorist was able to bring a…

The British Judiciary Defines the Jews

By Justin Katz | December 31, 2009 |

In the continuing series of stories that show Western (especially European) governments to believe it to be their right to define the boundaries of religious practice, David Goldman describes a case in which a British court found that an Orthodox Jewish school could not follow the practice of matrilineal descent in its admissions policies: JFS…

A Federalist Christmas

By Justin Katz | December 19, 2009 |

My monthly column in the current Rhode Island Catholic reviews the Commerce Clause, government spending, and the Fourteenth Amendment as contributors to trends that are transforming Christmas into a private affair: The underlying assumption that an atheist should feel as at home as an orthodox Roman Catholic in any corner of the nation is at…

Arlene Violet: “Brown University over-reacts to Young”

By Monique Chartier | December 12, 2009 |

Rhode Island political junkies will recall that Chris Young was literally dragged away by police from a microphone at the Brown University health care forum starring Congressman Patrick Kennedy ten days ago and then criminally charged. Ahlene has an excellent analysis of the incident and its First Amendment implications in Thursday’s Valley Breeze. Excerpt: ……

Rhode Island’s Attorney General Endorses a Broad and Constitutionally Sensible View of the Second Amendment

By Carroll Andrew Morse | December 3, 2009 |

At the time of Sondra Sotomayor’s Supreme Court nomination hearings, Anchor Rising noted that Rhode Island Attorney General Patrick Lynch had not joined an amicus brief offered by other state Attorney Generals in the case of McDonald v. Chicago in support of the position that the Second Amendment is protected from state-government abridgement via the…

“Smart” Like a Fox

By Justin Katz | November 20, 2009 |

At least I’m not alone in my concern that the “smart grid” craze opens up new horizons of privacy infringement: Smart grid technology — including new “smart meters” being attached to businesses and homes — is designed in part to provide consumers with real-time feedback on power consumption patterns and levels. But as these systems…