When government officials hold prayer services, quote scripture and engage in religious proselytizing at the workplace, is it religious freedom – or an old-fashioned First Amendment violation?
Articles on First Amendment
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The court decided Colorado’s ban on conversion therapy violated the free speech of a talk therapist.
For Madison, religious freedom was not a tool for political domination. Rather, he saw it as a constitutional safeguard for liberty and democracy.
The phrase ‘separation of church and state’ dates back to a letter from Thomas Jefferson to a Baptist congregation.
It’s difficult to measure what is lost when an opinion is never voiced and impossible to catalogue the arguments that never form because a speaker calculates the risk and decides silence is safer.
In 1970, National Guard troops killed four protesters at Kent State University. In 2026, federal agents killed two Minneapolis protesters. Public reaction to the deaths was significantly different.
The law is on Trump’s side, in most cases, when his administration names things after him. But citizens still have the right to protest.
In Minnesota, can constitutional protections withstand the actions of a federal government seemingly intent on aggressively violating the rule of law?
When protesters experience repression and violence, whether or not they have legal education can help determine continued involvement in a protest movement.
Renee Good’s death was the consequence, writes a First Amendment scholar, of a kind of politics in which the state survives by making dissenters illegitimate as citizens.
Federal agents have pepper-sprayed, tackled and detained people recording their actions. If you post your recordings of agents, you also risk the feds tracking you and those around you.
Powerful men connected to Jeffrey Epstein are named, dissected and speculated about. The survivors, unless they work hard to step forward, remain a blurred mass in the background.
There are some 2,500 of these centers across the United States. Many are located within a mile of an abortion provider.
Powerful men connected to Jeffrey Epstein are named, dissected and speculated about. The survivors, unless they work hard to step forward, remain a blurred mass in the background.
New laws mandating the Ten Commandments’ display in schools have faced lawsuits in Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas.
A new Trump administration policy threatens free speech and association by targeting individuals and groups as potential domestic terrorists based on their beliefs rather than their actions.
The congressional anti-communist hearings of the 1940s are a reminder that freedom of speech today is even more fragile than it may seem.
Is former FBI Director James Comey’s attempt to get his prosecution thrown out a legal slam-dunk? It may look like that to the public, but it’s not.
Free press advocates warn that limiting how journalists cover the Defense Department hampers the stability and freedom that democracies enjoy.
Pressuring broadcasters by leveraging the powers of the Federal Communications Commission occurs no matter which party controls the White House.
Top contributors
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Joseph Panzer Chair in Education and Research Professor of Law, University of Dayton
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Professor Emeritus of Communication and Rhetorical Studies, Syracuse University
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Associate Professor of Philosophy and Law, Wayne State University; Institute for Humane Studies
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Brechner Eminent Scholar in Mass Communication, University of Florida
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Stephanie A. (Sam) Martin is a Friend of The Conversation.
Frank and Bethine Church Endowed Chair of Public Affairs, Boise State University
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Professor of American Civics, University of Tennessee
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Director of the Center for Religion, Law & Democracy, Willamette University
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Associate Professor of Law, Quinnipiac University
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Professor of Communication and Journalism, University of Maine
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University Research Professor of Education, University of Kentucky
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Professor of Law, University of Dayton
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Programmes Manager and Research Fellow, the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Oxford
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Associate Professor of Hip-Hop, University of Virginia
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Thomas and Karole Green Professor of Law, Washington University in St. Louis
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Susan S. Engeleiter Professor of Education Law, Policy and Practice, University of Wisconsin-Madison