The Law Dictionary for Everyone
Following is the case brief for Shelby County v. Holder, 133 S. Ct. 2612 (2013) Case Summary of Shelby County v. Holder: Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act has a formula to identify any State or political subdivision that maintained tests or devices to suppress the minority vote as a “covered jurisdiction,” which under Section 5 of the Act […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for Sweatt v. Painter, 339 U.S. 629 (1950) Case Summary of Sweatt v. Painter: An African-American law school applicant was denied admission into the University of Texas Law School solely because of his race. Upon suit filed by the applicant, the university tried to set up a separate facility for African-American law students. The Texas […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967) Case Summary of Loving v. Virginia: The State of Virginia had a law forbidding interracial marriages. An interracial couple from Virginia, the Lovings, married in Washington D.C. to avoid the Virginia law, but later settled in Virginia. When caught living together in Virginia, the couple was convicted […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972) Case Summary of Wisconsin v. Yoder: Members of the Amish religion, including Jonas Yoder, refused to send their children to school beyond the 8th grade for religious reasons. Because Wisconsin law compels school attendance for all children until age 16, Yoder and the other respondents were tried […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U.S. 742 (2010) Case Summary of McDonald v. Chicago: Chicago residents, concerned about their own safety, challenged the City of Chicago’s handgun ban. Building on the Court’s recent decision in Heller, the petitioners sought to have the Second Amendment apply to the States, either under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Privileges or […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for Regents of Univ. of California v. Bakke, 438 U.S. 265 (1978) Case Summary of Regents of Univ. of California v. Bakke: A white medical school applicant was twice rejected from the Univ. of California Medical School, though he had better scores than minority candidates who were accepted. Following a lawsuit, the state court found […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for New Jersey v. T.L.O., 469 U.S. 325 (1985) Case Summary of New Jersey v. T.L.O.: A 14-year-old high school student, T.L.O., was found smoking in the girls’ restroom at school. The Assistant Vice Principal subsequently searched her purse and found evidence of both cigarette smoking and marijuana dealing at the school. At the juvenile […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. 515 (1832) Case Summary of Worcester v. Georgia: Worcester, and a group of missionaries, did missionary work on Cherokee land in violation of Georgia law. The Georgia law required that “white persons” only enter Cherokee land with a license and after having sworn a loyalty oath to Georgia. Worcester […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944) Case Summary of Korematsu v. United States: President Roosevelt’s Executive Order, in response to Pearl Harbor, called for the detention of American citizens of Japanese ancestry on the West Coast of the U.S. Mr. Korematsu, an American citizen of Japanese ancestry, violated one particular order pursuant […]
Read moreFollowing is the case brief for Obergefell v. Hodges, 135 S. Ct. 2534 (2015) Case Summary of Obergefell v. Hodges: Petitioners, a number of same-sex couples, sued four states that denied marriage licenses to those couples because those states defined marriage as being a union between one man and one woman. Petitioners won in all of the federal district courts […]
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