Jesse Choper

Jesse Choper Explains Nuance of First Amendment Rights

Parade, February 28, 2010 by George Vernadakis
http://www.parade.com/news/intelligence-report/archive/100228-can-campus-religious-groups-exclude-non-believers.html

Jesse Choper, a law professor at UC Berkeley, says that conflicting legal precedents are at work. In 2000, the Supreme Court decided that the Boy Scouts were within their rights to deny membership to homosexuals. However, Choper notes, “even if you have a First Amendment right to do something, it does not entitle you to funding to exercise your right.”

Jesse Choper Comments on SCOTUS Ruling against Cameras in Prop 8 Court

Los Angeles Times, January 12, 2010 by David G. Savage and Carol J. Williams
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-prop8-cameras12-2010jan12,0,1169353.story

“It’s obviously a disagreement between the 9th Circuit and the Supreme Court on bringing television or live video into a federal courtroom,” said Jesse Choper, a constitutional law scholar at UC Berkeley…. They disagreed, and the Supreme Court has the final word.”

Christopher Edley, Chris Kutz, Jesse Choper Discuss Academic Freedom and Prof Yoo

PBS, The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer, October 20, 2009 by Spencer Michels
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/education/july-dec09/tenure_10-20.html

Christopher Edley, dean, U.C. Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law: While many students and faculty are critical of the Bush administration policies and even of some of John’s actions, they think that academic freedom means that his right to be here and to teach has to be protected, until or unless there’s some sort of a conviction.

Christopher Kutz, president, U.C. Berkeley Academic Senate: You need something more than simply incompetence to revoke a professor’s tenure, especially somebody who’s been hired, promoted, published in the top journals. John is one of the most prolific scholars on the Boalt faculty.

Jesse Choper, law professor: He gave them an approach that was wholly consistent with virtually everything he did as a scholar beforehand.

Richard Buxbaum, Mel Eisenberg, Jesse Choper, Stephen Sugarman Remember Stephen Barnett

-Los Angeles Times, October 18, 2009 Editorial Board
http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-passings18-2009oct18,0,3963453,print.story

Colleagues said Barnett, who retired in 2003, was a tireless advocate of free speech rights and had spent his last years as a vocal critic of the speed with which the California Supreme Court handed down its decisions and the way it went about much of its day-to-day business.

-The Recorder, October 19, 2009 by Petra Pasternak
http://www.law.com/jsp/ca/PubArticleCA.jsp?id=1202434697325&slreturn=1&hbxlogin=1

“If there is such a thing as a constructive gadfly, that was Steve,” said Berkeley law professor Richard Buxbaum, who knew him since Barnett joined the faculty in 1967…. He had an engaging way of making deans and faculty members uncomfortably aware of some of the consequences of their decisions,” Buxbaum said, “often to the betterment later.”

Choper said he often called Barnett a muckraker because the professor would uncover policies at the school he didn’t agree with and “he just wouldn’t let it go…. He wanted to do something about it.” Choper, who served for a time as the dean, said he’d receive regular memos from Barnett outlining what he could be doing better.

-San Francisco Chronicle, October 21, 2009 by Bob Egelko
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/10/21/BAH11A6VDB.DTL&type=printable

He was a leader in “shaping public policy concerning the industrial structure and public regulation of both print and visual media,” said Richard Buxbaum, a fellow Berkeley law professor.

“In his scholarship, Steve was a devastating critic of the practices of the California Supreme Court and the California State Bar,” said another UC Berkeley colleague, Melvin Eisenberg. “He did a lot of acute, penetrating research that no one else has done regarding judicial transparency and legitimacy.”

-The New York Times, October 21, 2009 by William Grimes
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/22/us/22barnett.html?_r=2

“Stephen Barnett was probably California’s leading analyst and critic of the way the California Supreme Court goes about its business,” said Stephen Sugarman, a professor and associate dean at Berkeley’s law school.

Jesse Choper Says Nonsectarian Prayer at Public Meetings Okay

The New York Times, October 1, 2009 by Malia Wollan and Jesse McKinley
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/us/02lodi.html?_r=2

Jesse H. Choper, a professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley, said that the 1983 Supreme Court ruling in Marsh v. Chambers found that prayer before public meetings was allowed if the prayers remained nonsectarian. “What we do know is the use of God is not unacceptable,” Professor Choper said.

Jesse Choper Comments on Hate Letter that Frightened Humboldt Faculty Member

Contra Costa Times, September 29, 2009 by Allison White
http://www.contracostatimes.com/california/ci_13443210

Jesse Choper said the letter constitutes hate speech, which is constitutionally protected. “If you could find out who sent the letter, then it becomes a matter of freedom of speech,” he said. However, that would not apply if the letter had been threatening. “If it had said, ‘If you stay on the job, you’ll suffer,’ that’s not protected,” he said.

Jesse Choper Thinks Constitutional Interpretation May Depend on Political Point of View

The Oakland Tribune, September 20, 2009 by Josh Richman
http://www.contracostatimes.com/politics/ci_13354829?source=rss

“I think that great dangers to the Constitution are very much in the eyes of the beholder. When an administration is in power that people don’t like, they often find that what that administration does is threatening to our basic values,” said Jesse Choper…. And for all the rhetoric cavalierly cast about over what is and isn’t constitutional, Choper said, few people truly understand what the Constitution actually does and doesn’t say.

Jesse Choper Says First Amendment May Protect G-20 Activists

Pittsburgh Post Gazette, September 12, 2009 by Rich Lord and Paula Reed Lord
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09255/997503-482.stm

Mr. Choper said governments “can stop people from protesting so it disrupts the event.” But demonstrators are “entitled to some place where [they] can effectively communicate … within sight” of the targets of their message. Rules that aim to keep demonstrators from embarrassing their host city or guests have been struck down, he said.