Shelley v. Kraemer (1948) is a U.S. Supreme Court case that held that restrictive covenants in real property deeds which prohibited the sale of property to non-Caucasians unconstitutionally violate the equal protection provision of the...
the Constitution
Slaughterhouse Cases
The Slaughterhouse Cases, 83 US 36, was an 1873 U.S. Supreme Court decision on a series of cases in which the Court expressed its first interpretation of the privileges or immunities clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Court interpreted...
slavery
Slavery is the practice of forced labor and restricted liberty. It is also a regime where one class of people - the slave owners - could force another - the slaves - to work and limit their liberty. Throughout history, some forms of slavery...
sovereign immunity
Definition
The sovereign immunity refers to the fact that the government cannot be sued without its consent.
OverviewSovereign immunity was derived from British common law doctrine based on the idea that the King could do no wrong. In the...
spending power
Under Article I, Section 8, Clause 1 of the Constitution, Congress is granted the power to lay and collect taxes in order "to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and General Welfare of the United States." As required by United States v....
strict construction
Strict construction is a form of judicial interpretation of a statute. The fundamental principle behind this construction is that the text of a provision in a statute should be applied as it is written (see also: statutory construction). Such...
strict scrutiny
Overview
Strict scrutiny is a form of judicial review that courts use to determine the constitutionality of certain laws. Strict scrutiny is often used by courts when a plaintiff sues the government for discrimination. To pass strict scrutiny, the...
substantive due process
Substantive due process is the principle that the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments protect fundamental rights from government interference. Specifically, the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments prohibit the government from depriving any person of...
Supremacy Clause
See Preemption; constitutional clauses. Article VI, Paragraph 2 of the U.S. Constitution is commonly referred to as the Supremacy Clause. It establishes that the federal constitution, and federal law generally, take precedence over state laws, and even...
suspect classification
Suspect classification refers to a class of individuals that have been historically subject to discrimination.
OverviewUnder Equal Protection, when a statute discriminates against an individual based on a suspect classification, that statute...