Civil Liberties

  • Bad Tendency Test: Legal test allowing speech restriction if it might lead to illegal activity.

  • Civil Liberties: Constitutional protections from government overreach on individual rights (e.g., speech, privacy).

  • Clear and Present Danger: Test determining whether speech poses an immediate, serious threat to public safety.

  • Clear and Probable Danger Test: Allows speech restriction if there's a strong likelihood of significant harm.

  • Commercial Speech: Speech related to business advertising, which can be regulated more strictly than political speech.

  • Creationism: Religious belief that life and the universe originated from divine acts, contrasting with evolution.

  • Criminal Due Process Rights: Constitutional guarantees for fair treatment in legal procedures (e.g., right to a fair trial).

  • Double Jeopardy: Fifth Amendment protection preventing a person from being tried twice for the same crime.

  • Due Process: Legal principle ensuring fair treatment through the normal judicial system, especially in legal proceedings.

  • Establishment Clause: Prohibits the government from establishing an official religion or favoring one religion over another.

  • Exclusionary Rule: Legal rule that excludes evidence obtained through violations of a defendant's constitutional rights.

  • Fighting Words: Speech that incites immediate violence or disruption, not protected by the First Amendment.

  • Free Exercise Clause: Protects individuals' rights to practice their religion without government interference.

  • Habeas Corpus: Legal action that requires a person under arrest to be brought before a judge, protecting against unlawful detention.

  • Imminent Lawless Action Test: Legal test allowing speech to be restricted if it is likely to incite immediate illegal acts.

  • Intelligent Design: Theory that life's complexity is evidence of deliberate creation, not random evolution.

  • Lemon Test: Three-part test used to assess whether a law violates the Establishment Clause by entangling government with religion.

  • Libel: Publishing false, harmful written statements about someone, subject to legal action for defamation.

  • Marketplace of Ideas: Concept that free expression of competing ideas leads to the discovery of truth.

  • Miranda Rights: Rights read to an arrested individual, including the right to remain silent and have an attorney.

  • Obscenity: Speech or material that violates standards of decency and is not protected under the First Amendment.

  • Prior Restraint: Government action preventing material from being published or disseminated, generally unconstitutional.

  • Rendition: Secretly transferring detainees to other countries for interrogation, sometimes associated with human rights violations.

  • Right to Privacy: Implied constitutional right protecting individuals from unwarranted government intrusion into personal matters.

  • Selective Incorporation: Judicial doctrine that applies certain protections in the Bill of Rights to the states through the 14th Amendment.

  • Slander: Making false, damaging spoken statements about someone, actionable as defamation.

  • Symbolic Speech: Actions or symbols used to express ideas (e.g., flag burning), protected under the First Amendment.

  • Time, Place, and Manner Restrictions: Limits on when, where, and how speech can occur, as long as they are content-neutral.

  • Total Incorporation: Theory that all Bill of Rights protections apply to states through the 14th Amendment.