Table of Contents
First Amendment News 307: Summer list of 30 new or forthcoming books on free expression

The following books are new or forthcoming for 2021 and 2022. If you see a title you like, check on Amazon or the punisher’s website for up-to-date information on the book’s release. Our last book review was "Robert Lasnik on critiquing the press," in FAN 302.1 (June 28, 2021).










2020-2021 SCOTUS term: Free expression & related cases
Cases decided
- (Consolidated with )
- (OA: April 28, 2021) (Re: K-12 punishment for online speech) (Held: 8-1, school district decision to suspend cheerleader for vulgar social media post violates the First Amendment)
- (OA: Nov. 4, 2020) (Religious expression: Free exercise & free speech claims) (decided on free exercise grounds)
- (Per curiam, 7-1 with Thomas, J., dissenting) (Judgment vacated and remanded to 5th Cir.)
- (OA: Dec. 8, 2020) (Telephone Consumer Protection Act robocall case — decided on statutory grounds)
Cert. granted
- (Judgment vacated and case is remanded to the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit for consideration in light of Americans for Prosperity Foundation v. Bonta)
- (Judgment is vacated, and the case is remanded to the Second Circuit to dismiss as moot)
Pending petitions
Cert. denied
- (Justice Thomas, dissenting from denial of cert. (Detached Opinion); Justice Gorsuch, dissenting from denial of cert. (Detached Opinion)
- (See Josh Blackman, “,” The Volokh Conspiracy (July 2, 2021))
- (Institute for Free Speech in support of Petitioners)
First Amendment-related
- (Re: Scope of Noerr-Pennington doctrine) (Cert. denied)
- (Cert. denied)
- (Nominal damages and mootness in campus speech context) (Cert. granted: 8-1 held Art. III claim not moot)
- (Re: Section 202(h) of the Telecommunications Act of 1996) (Cert. granted & case argued) (Held: 9-0: FCC decision to repeal or modify three of its media ownership rules was not arbitrary or capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act)
- (Re: FCC cross-ownership restrictions) (Cert. granted & case argued — held the FCC’s decision to repeal or modify three of its media ownership rules was not arbitrary or capricious for purposes of the Administrative Procedure Act.)
- (State anti-SLAPP laws in federal diversity cases) (Cert. denied)
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