Syllabus

Course Description

This course introduces students to the work of the Supreme Court and to the main outlines of American constitutional law, with an emphasis on the development of American ideas about civil rights. The goal of the course is to provide students with a framework for understanding the major constitutional controversies of the present day through a reading of landmark Supreme Court cases and the public debates they have generated. The principal topics are civil liberties in wartime, race relations, privacy rights, and the law of criminal procedure.

Assignments

As a CI-H subject, the course also aims to introduce students to some of the more practical aspects of the art of constitutional lawyering and adjudication: delivering oral arguments, writing briefs, and deciding cases. To satisfy the CI-H writing requirement, there will be four short writing assignments - two analytical papers, a brief, and a judicial opinion -- on the following topics:

1. The debate over racial profiling in wartime (analytical paper, 4 pages)
2. The constitutionality of teaching intelligent design in public schools (analytical paper, 4 pages)
3. Affirmative action (brief, 5 pages)
4. The constitutionality of a state law prohibiting gay marriage (judicial opinion, 8 pages, first draft to be revised and resubmitted)

As the semester progresses, further guidelines will be provided about each writing assignment, which students should consult at least each week. To satisfy the CI-H oral expression requirement, students will be asked to pair up in teams of two and provide an oral presentation of both sides of one particular case. In addition, I will make liberal use of the so-called "Socratic method" employed in law schools, which means that students should come prepared for each class session regardless of whether or not they have been asked to prepare oral argument for that particular class.

Grading

Grades will be determined roughly as follows:

Calendar