News & Commentary

One week until the unofficial start of summer, folks. With Memorial Day and DC's inevitable barrage of heat waves around the corner, it's easy to forget that Election Day is less than six months away. That leaves us with limited time to pass all of the bills we want before the next Congress starts in January.

Sixty years ago this Saturday, the Supreme Court handed down their decision in the landmark civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education. This decision, which ruled state-sanctioned public school segregation unconstitutional, was a tremendous victory in the long-fought battle for civil rights in this country. The unanimous decision affirmed what civil rights leaders had always understood to be the "inherently unequal" state of segregated schools.

Rick Scott, the Governor of Florida, signed legislation earlier this week that would provide professional development for teachers in "single-gender" classrooms.

This piece originally appeared at The Huffington Post.
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Modern American privacy law begins with Charles Katz, an accused gambler, making a call from a Los Angeles phone booth. In a now-famous opinion, Justice John Marshall Harlan concluded that the US Constitution protected Katz's "expectation of privacy" in his call. American phone booths are now a thing of the past, of course, and Americans' expectations of privacy seem to be fast disappearing, too.

If there's one thing public officials have learned from activists over the past few years it's this: Do Not Anger the Internet. Online organizing has taken down multibillion dollar campaigns such as SOPA and PIPA, brought a national spotlight to injustices in small towns such as Trayvon Martin's, and helped allow political candidates to raise significant funds in small dollars from large numbers of donors, as was on stark display during the last presidential election.

In the wake of horrible tragedy, solace is often found in knowing that the truth will be sought, and justice will be delivered.

Listen, Trousdale County, Tennessee, I get it: When a big, powerful corporation comes to town and promises 400 new jobs, that's a huge deal. Especially if you're a small, rural community of hardworking people trying to make an honest living.

Forty years ago today, "Battling Bella" Abzug, a member of Congress from New York and a trailblazer for women, introduced a bill to protect gay people from discrimination for the first time in American history. The Equality Act of 1974 would have banned discrimination against lesbians, gay men, unmarried persons, and women in employment, housing, and public accommodations.