Luke Sheahan: Why Associations Matter – The Case for First Amendment Pluralism

Crowd of people, 1940

Why Associations Matter: The Case for First Amendment Pluralism

By Luke Foster

 

JMC fellow Luke Sheahan’s recent book, Why Associations Matter: The Case for First Amendment Pluralism, examines freedom of association:

First Amendment rights are hailed as the hallmark of the US constitutional system, protecting religious liberty, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of association. But among these rights, freedom of association holds a tenuous position, as demonstrated in the 2010 Supreme Court ruling in Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, which upheld a public university’s policy requiring groups seeking official recognition to accept all students regardless of their status or beliefs. This demotion of freedom of association has broad ramifications for the constitutional status of voluntary associations in civil society, Luke C. Sheahan suggests. His book offers a cogent explanation of how this came about, why it matters, and what might be done about it.

Sheahan’s argument centers upon what he calls the “First Amendment Dichotomy” in the Court’s theoretical framework: an understanding of the state and the individual as the two analytically exclusive units of constitutional analysis. Why Associations Matter traces this dichotomy through Supreme Court jurisprudence culminating in Martinez, revealing a pattern of free association treated only as an individual right of expressive association derived from the Speech Clause alone. Sheahan then draws on the political sociology of Robert Nisbet to make a case for recognizing the social importance of associations and institutions that cannot be reduced to their individual members or subsumed into the state for purposes of constitutional analysis.

Translating the sociological qualities of associations into jurisprudential categories, Why Associations Matter provides practical advice for protecting freedom of association through the judiciary and the legislature—and guaranteeing this fundamental right its proper place in American society.

Order now from University Press of Kansas or Amazon >>

 


 

Luke Sheahan is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Duquesne University and a non-resident scholar at the Program for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society at the University of Pennsylvania. He teaches courses in public law and American politics. Professor Sheahan’s research focuses on First Amendment rights, with special focus on the freedom of association. In addition to his work on freedom of association, he has also published on academic freedom and various figures in twentieth century political and social thought, especially the American sociologist Robert Nisbet. He has lectured extensively on religious liberty, freedom of speech, and freedom of association at colleges and universities across the country.

Professor Sheahan is a JMC fellow.

Learn more about Luke Sheahan >>

 


 

Facebook iconTwitter iconFollow us on Facebook and Twitter for updates about lectures, publications, podcasts, and events related to American political thought, United States history, and the Western political tradition!

 


 

Want to help the Jack Miller Center transform higher education? Donate today.