March 20, 2013

POS 282 INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN LAW
In class today, Wednesday 3/20, I distributed one handout, the Maine statute about common law crimes and about mandated reporting of child abuse. We discussed the handout from last time, the Maine statute about hindering apprehension, and saw how it might apply to the Mobbley situation. We then went over the Holland case, and contrasted it with Maine law. We also looked at the Massachusetts reporting statute in the text. We will pick up with the Lawrence case on Friday. The assignment for Friday 3/22 is to review Lawrence v. Texas (previously assigned), looking for the specific issue and holding of the Court in that case.

POS 384 CIVIL LIBERTIES
In class today, Wednesday 3/20, we went over Schenck and Abrams, paying particular attention to how Holmes could find his own views in those cases to be internally consistent. We looked at the particular sections of the federal statute that were violated, and we discussed the actions of the United States that were challenged by the pamphlets in question. We looked at how the big questions in Schenk and Gitlow (prior restraint and incorporation) were dealt with as assumptions by the Court. We began our discussion of Gitlow, and will pick up on Friday with the precise legal question addressed by the majority in Gitlow. The assignment for Friday 3/22 is to read and prepare to discuss through p. 222 of the text.