Please link here to the Catalyst course Website:

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1 Please link here to the Catalyst course Website: RIGHTS IN AMERICA: EQUALITY, LIBERTY, AND DEMOCRACY Law B599, 4 cr, Autumn 2011, Professor Walsh Mon & Wed, p.m., William H. Gates Hall, Room 441 Course Description Deep historical exploration of a jurisprudentially revolutionary constitutional conflict that pits courts, local government, and the U.S. Congress in passionate struggles over gay and lesbian antidiscrimination rights; the freedoms of speech and religion; and African-American political equality in the nation s capital. Interdisciplinary graduate and advanced undergraduate students welcome. No prerequisites. Content and Method: An historical and jurisprudential analysis of the heated social conflict that arose when Roman Catholic Georgetown University refused to grant official recognition to two gay rights groups on its campus. The groups sued under the first statute in the nation to outlaw sexual orientation discrimination, leading to the landmark decision in Gay Rights Coalition of Georgetown University v. Georgetown University (D.C. 1987) (en banc). Congressional efforts to overturn that decision entangled the courts, local government and Congress in passionate struggles over gay and lesbian equality, free speech and religion, and self-determination for the largely African-American District of Columbia. Through an empirical and theoretical examination of these constitutional struggles, students will explore the multiple meanings of freedom, equality, and autonomy within a complex collision of social, political, and jurisprudential forces. Instructor: Associate Professor Walter J. Walsh teaches comparative law and constitutional history at the University of Washington School of Law, and in the university s interdisciplinary graduate Comparative Law and Society Studies (CLASS) Program and the undergraduate Law, Societies and Justice (LSJ) Program. Professor Walsh holds law degrees from University College Dublin (B.C.L.), Yale University (LL.M.), and Harvard University (S.J.D.), where he wrote his doctoral dissertation on early human rights advocacy, and has practiced and taught law in Europe and in the United States. He has also trained in his native Dublin, Ireland, at the Incorporated Law Society, and in Strasbourg, France, at the Institut Internationale des Droits des l Hommes. Professor Walsh is a founding faculty member and teaches each summer in the LSJ European Law & Society Program at the UW Rome Center. Assessment: Required UW Catalyst Rights in America course website posting for every class. plus 15-page final paper exploring some conflict over rights to equality, liberty or democracy (perhaps a civil rights case or some other civil rights struggle, but other interdisciplinary law and society approaches to studying rights are also encouraged ), selected by student with instructor s approval by Week 3, and due last day of exam period. Please view Professor Walsh s UW Catalyst Web page with course information at: For all other inquiries, please contact Professor Walsh s assistant Ruth Beardsley at: giaconi@u.washington.edu or (206)

2 RIGHTS IN AMERICA: EQUALITY, LIBERTY, AND DEMOCRACY... Syllabus follows: RIGHTS IN AMERICA: EQUALITY, LIBERTY, AND DEMOCRACY Law B599, 4 cr, Autumn 2011, Professor Walsh Mon & Wed, p.m., William H. Gates Hall, Room 441 Deep historical exploration of a jurisprudentially revolutionary constitutional conflict that pits courts, local government, and the U.S. Congress in passionate struggles over gay and lesbian antidiscrimination rights; the freedoms of speech and religion; and African-American political equality in the nation s capital. Interdisciplinary graduate and advanced undergraduate students welcome. No prerequisites. WEEK 1 Mon, 9/26, read and post on: RIGHTS IN AMERICA Visions, 1789 to 1989 The Bicentennial Chapter 1. An Excluded Minority and assigned documentary sources posted on our UW Catalyst course website Rights in America: Equality, Liberty & Democracy Wed, 9/28, read and post on: Chapter 2. Rights and Wrongs WEEK 2 Mon, 10/3, read and post on: Chapter 3. The Final Ruling? Wed, 10/5, read and post on: Chapter 4. The Virtue of Ambiguity WEEK 3 Mon, 10/10, read and post on: Chapter 5. Chapter 6. Strongarm Tactics The Ambiguity of Virtue Wed, 10/12, read and post on:

3 Chapter 7. Home Rule and Rome Rule RIGHTS IN AMERICA Divisions, 1990 to 2000 The Hinge Decade WEEK 4 Mon, 10/17, read and post on: Chapter 8. The Sting Wed, 10/19, read and post on: Chapter 9. A Veritable Scud Missile WEEK 5 Mon, 10/24, read and post on: Chapter 10. The Rose Garden Wed, 10/26, read and post on: Chapter 11. A Discriminating Taste WEEK 6 Mon, 10/31, read and post on: Chapter 12. Plantation Politics Wed, 11/2, read and post on: Chapter 13. Schism? WEEK 7 Mon, 11/7, read and post on:

4 Chapter 14. A Modernist Mess! Wed, 11/9, read and post on: Chapter 15. Names and Faces WEEK 8 Mon, 11/14, read and post on: Chapter 16. Wheeling and Dealing Wed, 11/16, read and post on: Chapter 17. Millennial Musings RIGHTS IN AMERICA Revisions, from 2001 The New Millennium WEEK 9 Mon, 11/21, read and post on: Chapter 18. The New Millennium Wed, 11/23, read and post on: Chapter 19. A Lonely Precedent WEEK 10 Mon, 11/28, read and post on: Chapter 20. Views from the Ivory Tower Wed, 11/30, read and post on: Chapter 21. Identity, Politics and Law

5 WEEK 11 Mon, 12/5, read and post on: Chapter 22. A Black and White Issue? Wed, 12/7, read and post on: Chapter 23. Rights in Obamerica Assessment: Required UW Catalyst Rights in America course website posting for every class. plus 15-page final paper exploring some conflict over rights to equality, liberty or democracy (perhaps a civil rights case or some other civil rights struggle, but other interdisciplinary law and society approaches to studying rights are also encouraged ), selected by student with instructor s approval by Week 3, and due last day of exam period. Posting Requirement: On our UW Catalyst course website, you must post something no later than 10 a.m. on the day of each Monday and Wednesday class, leading our discussion and showing that you have carefully read and considered the assigned book chapter and documentary sources. For clarity, please open your own new conversations for each class. For this purpose, every week you should write and post at least 3-4 double-spaced pages of your own thoughts (1,000 words or more), which can be weighted more heavily towards either our Monday or our Wednesday reading, so long as you still do post something before each day we meet. What should you write about? The choice is yours: you may ask and discuss your own question raised by the materials. In the responses, you will hear the reactions of other readers and you will have the opportunity to engage directly with those who have raised their own questions. Draft Presentation: By Week 9 (Wednesday, 11/23), please post the 1 st Draft of your 15-page final paper on our Catalyst course website for all of us to read and query. During the following Week 10 (Monday, 11/28 or Wednesday, 11/30), you will discuss your draft work-in-progress with our class, so that when you submit it later your final paper takes into account any written or classroom perspectives or information that you consider germane. Installments of the Text, and accompanying Documentary Sources: Your weekly readings consist of one book chapter for each class, together with accompanying assigned documentary sources. Your two book chapters and your other readings for the coming week are posted every Wednesday on our UW Catalyst Rights in America course website, in an installment for the next two classes. The structure of this class requires that we all read the text together, and that you post your simultaneous reactions to each chapter at the same time as the narrative and theory unfold. Office hours: My office hours are every Monday and Wednesday after class. Please sign up beforehand with my assistant Ruth Beardsley (giaconi@u.washington.edu or (206) , or else

6 speak to me during class to pick your time, or make an appointment for some other day or time through Ms. Beardsley. Please direct all to me through Ms. Beardsley, or best of all still just talk to me before or after class. W.J.W.