UVA Law is home to outstanding scholars of civil rights and civil liberties. Their expertise spans the equal protection clause in the 14th Amendment, civil rights statutes, the religion clauses and the speech and press clauses of the First Amendment, and more. Disputes over equality and discrimination continue to reverberate in legislatures and courts nationwide. The freedom of speech has become an ever more important and contested right within our society, and the religion clauses have become an active and controversial area in Supreme Court jurisprudence. Scholars at the Law School are at the forefront of all of these debates, in law reviews and philosophical journals, as well as in courthouses and the public square.
The Supreme Court took on New York Times Co. v. Sullivan in 1964, in part, to protect the civil rights movement. But did justices go too far in making libel hard to prove? UVA Law professor Frederick Schauer explains new concerns.
Fifty years ago, federal and state lawmakers called for the regulation of a criminal justice “databank” connecting federal, state, and local agencies...
In New York Times v. Sullivan (1964), the Supreme Court began adopting First Amendment restrictions on liability for defamation and other speech torts...
Fifty years ago, federal and state lawmakers called for the regulation of a criminal justice “databank” connecting federal, state, and local agencies...
In New York Times v. Sullivan (1964), the Supreme Court began adopting First Amendment restrictions on liability for defamation and other speech torts...
Religion today offers plaintiffs a ready path to disobey laws without consequence. Examples of such disobedience abound. In the past few years alone...
In Matter of Giuliani, the New York Appellate Division held that Rudy Giuliani’s knowingly false statements of fact during the period after the 2020...
A robust public debate is currently underway about the responsibility of online platforms. We have long called for this discussion, but only recently...
This essay, written for a forthcoming Oxford University Press volume edited by Geoffrey Stone and Lee Bollinger, probes Oliver Wendell Holmes’s almost...
Catholic integralism has reemerged as a radical critique of liberalism and as a potential source of justification for illiberal regimes. Integralists...
At the dawn of the Internet’s emergence, the Supreme Court rhapsodized about its potential as a tool for free expression and political liberation. In...
Numbers in parentheses indicate the academic year(s) courses were offered: 2022-23 is coded (23), 2023-24 is coded (24) and 2024-25 is coded (25). (SC) stands for short course and (YR) stands for yearlong.
Advanced Topics in the First Amendment (Religion Clauses) (25) Business and Governmental Tort Liability (23) Civil Rights and Antidiscrimination Law (23,25) Civil Rights Litigation (23,24,25) Comparative Constitutional Law (23,24,25) Comparative Freedom of Speech Law Seminar (24,25) Constitutional Law II: Freedom of Speech and Press (23,24,25) Constitutional Law II: Freedom of Religion (23,24,25) Constitutionalism: Nature, Culture and Constitutions (23,24) Designing Democracy: Participation (23) Designing Democracy: Representation (24) Government Secrecy (24) Law of Corruption (23) Law and Inequality Colloquium (23,24,25) Law and Riots (23,24,25) Law, Inequality and Education Reform (25) Law of the Police I: Rules, Rights and Regulation (23,25) Monetary Constitution Seminar (23,24,25) Pretrial Litigation Skills: Civil Rights (23,24,25) Privacy (23,24,25) Privacy Law and Theory Seminar (23,24,25) Privacy Torts (24,25) Property, Police Power and Emergencies (23,24,25) Race, Class and Democratic Legitimacy (SC) (24) Race, Education and Opportunity (23) Racial Justice and Law (23,24,25) Religious Freedom and Reproductive Rights (24) Religious Freedom: Current Challenges (24) Regulation of Political Advocacy Seminar (24,25) Regulation of the Political Process (23,25) Rule of Law and Its Threats (23,25) School Desegregation, School Integration (24) State and Local Government Law (24) State Constitutionalism (25) The Constitution, Democracy and U.S. History (25) The Great Writ (SC) (24,25) The Right to Protest (SC) (24)
Professor Xiao Wang of the University of Virginia School of Law has won an Association of American Law Schools award for his paper on the increase and success of religious freedom lawsuits.
Professor Leslie Kendrick ’06 discusses First Amendment policies, and the law and norms of free speech in the law school education process. She spoke as part of the Class of 2026 orientation.
This yearlong clinic is supervised by lawyers at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and supported in part by a gift from the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression. In the clinic, students work closely with RCFP lawyers on timely and vital matters involving free speech and press freedom. The support of the Thomas Jefferson Center and the partnership with RCFP enable students to gain practical legal experience on cutting-edge First Amendment issues. Students work as a team in conducting legal research, meeting with clients and co-counsel, and drafting legal memoranda and briefs. Assignments involve both appellate-level and trial-level litigation, but more frequently the former, including the U.S. Supreme Court.
This yearlong clinic allows 12 students to engage in the hands-on practice of appellate litigation through actual cases before various federal circuit and/or state courts of appeals. The students are teamed up and assigned to handle primary responsibility for work on at least one appellate case during the course of the year. In addition, the students work together as a small law firm to provide secondary-level assistance to each other.
Students work on cases that have potential to provide real and concrete relief and legal support to people and communities that have been harmed by the criminalization of poverty and other forms of discrimination or deprivation of rights.
Working in teams, students in this yearlong clinic handle actual cases, from seeking Supreme Court review to briefing on the merits. Students identify candidates for Supreme Court review; draft petitions for certiorari, amicus merits briefs and party merits briefs; and attend moots and Supreme Court arguments.
Clinics at the University of Virginia School of Law shaped public policy, helped clients in court, appealed cases to the Supreme Court and more in the 2023-24 academic year.
During his Constitutional Law course, UVA Law professor Bertrall Ross discusses the history of the 13th and 14th Amendments, the Dred Scott case and the Slaughter-House cases.
In light of the recent Grants Pass ruling, Professors Kevin Cope and Mila Versteeg at the University of Virginia School of Law explain how courts have shifted public policy on the homeless.
Take a summer road trip through local “landmarks” in case law throughout Virginia and Washington, D.C., selected and summarized by University of Virginia School of Law faculty.
Clinics at the University of Virginia School of Law shaped public policy, helped clients in court, appealed cases to the Supreme Court and more in the 2023-24 academic year.
Actress Scarlett Johansson recently accused OpenAI of stealing her voice. Professor Dotan Oliar of the University of Virginia School of Law examines the controversy, the legal questions at stake and how artificial intelligence is changing intellectual property law.
Alice Abrokwa, a U.S. Education Department lawyer with expertise in disability law, health law and antidiscrimination law, will join the University of Virginia School of Law faculty this summer.
The American Law Institute recently approved a restatement on children and the law co-authored by Professor Richard Bonnie ’69, among other achievements and recognition for members of the University of Virginia School of Law community.
Two professors at the University of Virginia School of Law join the “Common Law” podcast to discuss how their research into the past, from the Civil War era to the 1960s, helps us understand today’s legal landscape.
To foster a sense of inclusiveness and compassion while maintaining its commitment to free expression, administrators, faculty and student leaders at the University of Virginia School of Law have implemented a number of formal and informal policies, practices and programs to ensure the Law School is a place where diverse and conflicting ideas and viewpoints flourish.
Prominent Milwaukee civil rights advocate James H. Hall Jr., a 1979 graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law, died from cancer Jan. 1 at the age of 69.
Professor Xiao Wang of the University of Virginia School of Law has won an Association of American Law Schools award for his paper on the increase and success of religious freedom lawsuits.
The University of Virginia announced Monday that Leslie Kendrick has been selected to serve as the 13th dean of the School of Law. Her term begins July 1.
New research by Professor Thomas Frampton of the University of Virginia School of Law pieces together the history and evolution of the jury box as a locus for Black Americans’ fight for political and civil rights.
Professor Richard Bonnie is retiring from the faculty of the University of Virginia School of Law after nearly 51 years of teaching and research, 44 years of death row advocacy, and decades of shaping public policy and law on drugs, mental health, youth offenders and guns.
Leaders across the education field helped kick off the Education Rights Institute at the University of Virginia School of Law on Monday, launching an effort designed to improve access to high-quality education for disadvantaged students.
University of Virginia School of Law professor Frederick Schauer explores the tensions between political speech and conspiracy allegations in the criminal charges against former President Donald Trump.
The new Education Rights Institute at the University of Virginia School of Law aims to help eliminate racial and class disparities in K-12 education. The institute, led by Professor Kimberly Jenkins Robinson and supported by a $4.9 million gift, will mark its launch with an Oct. 16 event.
Professor and privacy expert Danielle K. Citron of the University of Virginia School of Law calls for reforming the “permanent surveillance state” imposed on American public school students.
The Annual Law and Religion Roundtable, a two-day symposium that brings together an interdisciplinary and international group of scholars to discuss works in progress and emerging issues involving religious freedom, was held at the University of Virginia School of Law on June 22 and 23.
Four alumni — Shirin Baradaran ’18, Nick Matich ’13, John Cooper ’08 and Patricia Tolliver Giles ’98 — discuss the paths their careers have taken 5, 10, 15 and 25 years after graduating from the University of Virginia School of Law.
To foster a sense of inclusiveness and compassion while maintaining its commitment to free expression, administrators, faculty and student leaders at the University of Virginia School of Law have implemented a number of formal and informal policies, practices and programs to ensure the Law School is a place where diverse and conflicting ideas and viewpoints flourish.
Na’ilah Suad Nasir, president of the Spencer Foundation, delivers the keynote address at the launch of the Education Rights Institute, “Toward a High-Quality Education for All Students: Contemporary Questions for Law and Policy.” Dean Risa Goluboff, UVA President Jim Ryan ’92 and Education Rights Institute inaugural director Professor Kimberly Jenkins Robinson also deliver remarks.
To celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Education Rights Institute’s one-year anniversary, legal and education experts will discuss current issues affecting whether students receive a high-quality education, including race and national origin discrimination, the impact of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the intersection between education and civil rights. Catherine E. Lhamon, assistant secretary for civil rights at the U.S. Education Department and former chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, will deliver the keynote address at 12:30 p.m. Lunch will be available on a first-come, first-served basis beginning at 12:15 p.m.
A panel of commentators will discuss the book “Hot Flash: How the Law Ignores Menopause and What We Can Do About It,” by Professors Naomi Cahn, Bridget J. Crawford and Emily Gold Waldman.
In the book, the authors explore the culturally specific stereotypes that surround menopause as well as how menopause is treated in law and medicine. Taking U.S. law regarding pregnancy and breastfeeding as an entry point, the authors suggest changes in existing legislation and workplace policies that would incorporate menopause as well.
Cahn is the Justice Anthony M. Kennedy Distinguished Professor of Law and Armistead M. Dobie Professor of Law, and co-director of the Family Law Center at the University of Virginia. Crawford is University Distinguished Professor and Waldman is professor of law and associate dean for faculty development, both at the Pace University Elisabeth Haub School of Law.
During his Constitutional Law course, UVA Law professor Bertrall Ross discusses the history of the 13th and 14th Amendments, the Dred Scott case and the Slaughter-House cases.
