Due Process: Historic Supreme Court Decisions (Litigator Series)

This casebook contains 34 historic Supreme Court decisions that interpret and apply the Due Process Clauses of the Constitution. This second edition includes concurring and dissenting opinions. As in the first edition, The text of the US Constitution is also included.

The Fourteenth Amendment provides that no State shall "deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." We have long recognized that the Amendment's Due Process Clause, like its Fifth Amendment counterpart, "guarantees more than fair process." Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U. S. 702, 719 (1997). The Clause also includes a substantive component that "provides heightened protection against government interference with certain fundamental rights and liberty interests." Id., at 720; see also Reno v. Flores, 507 U. S. 292, 301-302 (1993). Troxel v. Granville 530 U.S. 57 (2000)

In a long line of cases, [the Supreme Court has] held that, in addition to the specific freedoms protected by the Bill of Rights, the "liberty" specially protected by the Due Process Clause includes the rights to marry, Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1 (1967); to have children, Skinner v. Oklahoma ex rel. Williamson, 316 U. S. 535 (1942); to direct the education and upbringing of one's children, Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390 (1923); Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U. S. 510 (1925); to marital privacy, Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479 (1965); to use contraception, ibid.; Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U. S. 438 (1972); to bodily integrity, Rochin v. California, 342 U. S. 165 (1952), and to abortion, Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey, 505 U. S. 833 (1992). Washington v. Glucksberg 521 U.S. 702 (1997)