The following summaries, when complete, will cover all of the 735 cases in which the ACLU was involved at the US Supreme Court level (overwhelmingly as amicus filers), from their first case decided on June 8, 1925 through Dec. 31, 1999.
These "layman" summaries are targeted primarily for non-lawyers, so the case descriptions and related information are in straightforward easily understood language.
Some of the summaries and case descriptions (that are and will be) presented were written by law students and researchers, and therefore may be missing some important legal nuances or contain erroneous data. However, in the majority of the cases, in order to avoid rewriting or reinterpreting the opinion of the Court, we used verbatim the relevant portions of the case summaries and opinions as published by the Supreme Court.
As of Nov. 6, 2009, we have summarized 500 of the 735 cases. We intend to have all 735 case summaries completed by the end of 2009. Please visit our Volunteers Needed page to find out how you can get involved in this important and interesting project.
Thank you to the following people for their volunteered research contributions to this project (in alphabetical order): Erica Bianco, Elena Colle, Karen Ann Deluca, Ogochukwu Ekwuabe, Rachel Espana, Grant Hubbard, Ashley Kay, Ian Li, Johnny Lo, Jamie Lowry, Allison Martins, Melanie McClinnis, Dillon McGrew, Pavan Nagavelli, Roger (Rusty) Nichols, Robyn Nolan, Parul Parikh, Lindsey Phoenix, Jason Rapp, Kimberlee Ray, Tracey Resetar, Jonathan Saine, Sheel Seidler, Neetul Sharma, Hanna Terhaar, Hsi-Ju Yang, and Gulcin Yilmazer.
The ACLU in the Supreme Court (500 out of 735 cases, 1925-1999) All cases argued and decided in the United States Supreme Court, in which the ACLU was involved as a party, counsel, or amicus ("friend of the Court"), in chronological order (oldest first).
See our Glossary for a definition of legal terms used in the cases, such as amicus curiae, respondent, appellee, petitioner, appellant, writ, and certiorari.
CASE (Click for summary, question presented, arguments, amicus filers, holding, and ACLU position)
The following summaries, when complete, will cover all of the 735 cases in which the ACLU was involved at the US Supreme Court level (overwhelmingly as amicus filers), from their first case decided on June 8, 1925 through Dec. 31, 1999.