Customer Reviews

How the First Amendment Came to Protect Topless Dancing: A Citizen's Guide to the Incorporation Doctrine

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The incorporation doctrine. Doesn't sound very exciting, does it? Yet it is extremely important concept in constitutional law, one which has radically transformed the meaning of the First Amendment, as I pointed out in my Kindle ebook Would The Real First Amendment Please Stand Up?.

While my book is focused exclusively on the First Amendment, author Susan Shelley analyzes the incorporation doctrine from a number of different perspectives. It is a very well researched, very well written book, and (as a not insignificant bonus), entertaining. The average reader might not think that a book on constitutional law would provide an evening's entertainment, but then again, the average reader is not aware of the Supreme Court's treatment of the Constitution, as humorous as it is frightening. So you get a comedy and a horrorshow for the price of one ticket.

To take just one of the many examples in this book, apart from the one mentioned in the title, were you aware that the state of California does not have the right to pass legislation that bans the sale of violent video games to children? Not according to the Supreme Court, it doesn't, although the Constitution is quite clear on the point: it does (read it sometime). By the same logic, no state has the power to ban the sale of "torture porn" to anyone, children included. This is the world our "supreme" court is creating.

NOTE: I agree with the author's point as it applies to the First Amendment only (the one with the word "Congress" in it. But that's enough).

Read this book. Read my book. Get reading! There's a lot to know . . .