The absolutist approach to the First Amendment of the United States Constitution--argued for many years by Supreme Court Justices Hugo L. Black and William O. Douglas--is regarded as the most libertarian interpretation by most mass communication law students. However, the two justices found agreement difficult in some First Amendment cases,…

The books, newspaper columns, articles, and speeches of Walter Lippmann were analyzed to determine the journalist's First Amendment viewpoints in four periods when national security was an issue in the United States. These periods were (1) after World War I, (2) after the Korean War, (3) during World War II, and (4) during the war in Vietnam. The…

This paper analyzes how absolutist arguments against campus harassment codes violate the spirit of the first amendment, examining in particular the United States Supreme Court ruling in "RAV v. St. Paul." The paper begins by tracing the current development of first amendment doctrine, analyzing its inadequacy in the campus hate speech…

Noting that United States Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas has often been characterized as an "absolutist" in terms of First Amendment policy, this paper argues that, in fact, Douglas's policy positions provided for less than absolute freedom to communicate. The paper then reveals, through an anlaysis of 18 of Douglas's opinions,…