FARMINGTON — The University of Maine at Farmington will celebrate Constitution Day with its seventh annual review of cases considered by the U.S. Supreme Court. 

Free and open to the public, the event will be held at 11:45 a.m. Monday, Sept. 23, in Lincoln Auditorium at Roberts Learning Center.

Presented by Jim Melcher, professor of political science and adviser for UMF’s pre-law program, the event features a docket of U.S. Supreme Court cases that discuss last term’s highlights and this term’s coming attractions.

The cases include a review of opinions from the past term Fisher v. Texas: Affirmative Action and colleges; Hollingsworth v. Perry and U.S. v. Windsor: Landmark same-sex marriage cases; Shelby County v. Holder: Voting Rights Act; and Maryland v. King: Police and swabbing for DNA.

A review of cases to be considered in the upcoming term include Bond v. U.S.: Application of chemical weapons treaties; Cline v. Oklahoma Coalition for Reproductive Justice: State regulation of abortion drugs; McCullen v. Coakley: Massachusetts case about limits on protests near abortion clinics; Town of Greece v. Galloway: Prayers at town meetings; and
Fernandez v. California: 4th Amendment and home searches.

Opinions on the past term’s cases can be found at www.supremecourtus.gov.

Previously known as Citizenship Day, Constitution Day was created by Congress in 2004. The federal holiday was revised to recognize not only those who have become U.S. citizens, but also the ratification of the U.S. Constitution on Sept. 17, 1787. 

In addition to renaming the holiday “Constitution Day and Citizenship Day,” the act mandates that all publicly funded educational institutions provide educational programming on the history of the U.S. Constitution on that day.

UMF’s Constitution Day event this year is sponsored by the UMF Provost’s Office, UMF Pre-Law Program and UMF Department of Political Science.

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