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My favorite Supreme Court decisions:
- Santa Fe Independent School District v. Doe, 530 U.S. 290 (2000). My childhood school district's journey to the Supreme Court will always have a special place in my heart.
- Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965). A right to privacy derived from substantive due process is necessary for the livelihood of the individual.
- District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008). The right to bear arms in the Second Amendment is a judicially-created constitutional right, but it is a form of liberty worthy of respect because its exercise is not intrinsically dangerous in and of itself. Also see McDonald v. City of Chicago, 561 U.S. 742 (2010).
- Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003). No person's sexual acts can be a prohibited in a state that recognizes privacy and liberty as fundamental values of its society.
- Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. ___ (2015). Same-sex couples are worthy of the same respect attributed to opposite-sex couples when it comes to one of America's central family units - marriage. I have substantially contributed to the majority opinion section and the dissenting opinions sections in Obergefell's respective article, being the first editor to summarize this ruling in full.
- Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727 (1972). A case in which William Douglas (see left) argued that trees should be granted legal personhood.
- Van Orden v. Perry, 545 U.S. 677 (2005). Justice Stephen Breyer saves a monument of the Ten Commandments at the Texas State Capitol in one of the most interesting concurring opinions I have ever read.
- Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421 (1962). The beginning of what was a desperately needed transition to separation of church and state.
- West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943). Contains one of my favorite lines from a Supreme Court decision. "The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials, and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One's right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections."
- Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 (1992). Judicial compromise saves the legality of abortion in the United States established by Roe v. Wade 410 U.S. 113 (1973).