Constitutional Law II: Civil and Political Rights (333-0-1)
Instructors
Joanna Lynn Grisinger
847 491 3987
620 Lincoln St #201
I am an American legal historian who works on the modern administrative state. At Northwestern, I teach courses on law and society, U.S. legal history, gender and the law, and constitutional law. My first book, The Unwieldy American State: Administrative Politics since the New Deal (Cambridge, 2012), examines the politics of administrative law reform; I am currently working on a project about the relationship between administrative agencies and social movements.
Meeting Info
555 Clark B03: Tues, Thurs 2:00PM - 3:20PM
Overview of class
Legal St 333-0-20 Constitutional Law II, Prof. Joanna Grisinger
"A court is a body of judges whose decisions are either: (1) right, (2) caused by the fault of someone else (usually the legislature), or (3) unfortunate but unavoidable accidents due to the circumstance that no human system can be perfect." - Thurman Arnold
"No matter whether th' Constitution follows th' flag or not, th' Supreme Court follows the election returns." - "Mr. Dooley" (Finley Peter Dunne)
"The Supreme Court should never be affected by the weather of the day, but inevitably, it is affected by the climate of the era." - Paul Freund
This course investigates the civil rights and civil liberties protected by the Constitution and defined by the U.S. Supreme Court. It will also examine the many controversies over what, exactly, the Constitution means, who gets to decide, and how.
Registration Requirements
Attendance at first class required. Taught with POLI SCI 333; may not receive credit for both courses.
Please note: Constitutional Law I is not a prerequisite for this class. They can be taken in any order.
Learning Objectives
. By the end of the quarter, students should be able to:
• recognize and articulate the relationship between the Supreme Court's constitutional decisionmaking; broader social, political, and economic factors; and the behaviors of individuals and groups (especially lawyers and Supreme Court justices);
• be able to evaluate and analyze Supreme Court decisions through careful evaluation of their major assertions, assumptions, evidential basis, and explanatory utility;
• understand and explain the evolution of constitutional doctrine in Supreme Court decisionmaking over time, in order to observe, describe, understand, and (maybe) predict the Supreme Court's behavior;
• reflect on how theories about judicial decisionmaking can help us understand (and obscure) the Supreme Court's approach to contemporary social issues like privacy, equality, voting rights, freedom of expression, and freedom of religion;
• be able to explain the Supreme Court's important role in constructing and enforcing formal categories of (and protections regarding) ability, age, education, ethnicity, gender, nationality, race, religion, politics, sexuality, and social status, often in overlapping and intersecting ways; and
• understand the Supreme Court's role in defining the formal legal parameters of racism and anti-racism, power and resistance, justice and injustice, equality and inequality, agency and subjection, and belonging and subjection in ways that shape both its own decisionmaking and broader political and social understandings of these concepts.
Teaching Method
Lecture/discussion; weekly discussion section
Evaluation Method
take-home midterm exam - 40% (400 points)
take-home final exam - 45% (450 points)
Class Materials (Required)
Casebook (available for free on the Canvas site)
Class Attributes
Social & Behavioral Sciences Distro Area
Associated Classes
DIS - University Hall 121: Thurs 4:00PM - 4:50PM
DIS - University Hall 101: Fri 1:00PM - 1:50PM