October 29, 2015

POS 282 INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN LAW
In class today, Thursday 10/29, I distributed one handout, the Maine statutes that set the rules for, among other things, hindering apprehension. We first finished our discussion of Gregg, including the two dissenting opinions. We talked a little bit about the MLK Letter from the Birmingham Jail and the concept of uplifting or degrading human personality. We then went through the Mobbley case regarding duty to one's spouse v. duty to society. We began our look at the Maine statute by noting that Maine has no immunity for protecting one's spouse. The assignment for Tuesday 11/3 is to a)read today's statutory handout; b)read Holland (p.65), also with an eye to how Maine statutes deal with these questions; and c)read Lawrence v. Texas (through p. 72 of the text).


POS 384 CIVIL LIBERTIES
In class today, Thursday 10/29, I distributed one handout, the Maine statute regarding disturbing the peace. We reviewed Chaplinsky, and compared the Maine statute with the N.H. statute at issue in Chaplinsky. We also talked about the difference between a facial challenge to a law, versus an as-applied challenge. I then talked about a Maine Supreme Court case, State v. John W., 418 A.2d 1097, which discussed free speech, yelling at police, and the Maine disturbing the peace statute. We moved on to Cohen, and went over both the majority opinion and Blackmun's dissent. In Hill, we got only as far as going over the concept of content-neutrality, and acting out exactly what was allowed or not within the 100 ft. radius. The assignment for Tuesday 11/3 is to review Hill (previously assigned), including how the various opinions disagreed with each other. I also told the class that my tentative plan is to give an assignment on Tuesday 11/3 that would be due Thursday 11/12.