Thursday, November 6, 2008, ACS hosted a press briefing on Pleasant Grove City, Utah v. Summum, a case that will be argued next week before the United States Supreme Court which addresses whether the city of Pleasant Grove violated the First Amendment rights of Summum, a religious organization whose members believe in the “Seven Aphorisms of Summum” as part of their faith, when the city refused to display the group’s proposed Seven Aphorisms monument in a public park that contained other privately donated but government-owned monuments. Experts and advocates from a variety of perspectives offered their analysis of the First Amendment Freedom of Speech and Establishment Clause issues implicated in the case, and previewed some of the points likely to be raised when the Supreme Court hears oral argument on Wednesday, November 12, 2008.

ACS hosted a panel discussion on a new article published in the Harvard Law and Policy Review that concluded that workers bringing employment discrimination lawsuits increasingly fare poorly in the federal courts.

Studying data from the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, authors Stewart J. Schwab, dean of the Cornell Law School, and Kevin M. Clermont, law professor at the Cornell Law School, found that “the federal courts disfavor employment discrimination plaintiffs, who are now forswearing use of those courts.” The authors concluded that they’ve “unearthed an anti-plaintiff effect that is troublesome.”

The Northeast Ohio Chapter of the American Constitution Society held their annual luncheon on May 19, 2008, with keynote address by U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown.

Speeches included:

Leading legal scholars and advocates discussed the FBI’s forthcoming guidelines governing criminal, national security and foreign intelligence investigations at a panel discussion sponsored by the American Constitution Society on Tuesday, September 9, 2008 -- a week before a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing at which FBI Director Robert Mueller will testify. The proposed guidelines have raised concerns that they will allow government surveillance based in part on race, ethnicity, national origin or religion.