Lessons on the Law is the ABA Division for Public Education’s column in Social Education, the flagship publication of the National Council for the Social Studies. Articles appear in Social Education, and are available here as PDFs.
2017-2018
- Freedom of Information Act and the Social Studies Classroom
- Supreme Court P/Review
- Independent Prosecutors, the Constitution, and Separation of Powers
2016-2017
- Equal Justice for Juveniles? In re Gault at Fifty
- Anti-Terrorism Policies Fifteen Years After September 11, 2001
- Supreme Court Review
2015-2016
- Legal Tender: A tale of Two President Roosevelts and the 1933 Gold Double Eagle
- Teaching Miranda v. Arizona at its 50th Anniversary
- Slavery and its Legacies: Marking the Sesquicentennial of the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution
- Supreme Court Review
- Mandated Reporting and the Confrontation Clause: When Are Teachers Like Police Officers?
2014-2015
- Monkeying Around with Selfies and U.S. Copyright Law
- Zivotofsky v. Kerry: A Study in Law, Policy, and Foreign Affairs
- The Second Act: Will America Get a Right to be Forgotten?
- 10 Things to Know About Magna Carta
- Supreme Court Preview
- What Constitution Day Means and Why it Matters
2013-2014
- Poetic Justice: Law & Literature in the Classroom
- Apartheid on Trial: Mandela's Rivonia Speech from the Dock, Half a Century Later
- Introduction to the International Court of Justice
2012-2013
- The Rule of Law and Disobedience: The Case Behind King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail
- Gideon v. Wainwright at Fifty: Lessons for Democracy and Civics
- How to Read a U.S. Supreme Court Opinion
- Did the Dog Sniff Violate the First Amendment?
- Demystifying the Electoral College
2011-2012
- Should Mandatory Voting Laws be Implemented in the United States?
- Are Voter Photo Identification Laws a Good Idea?
- Health Care and the High Court
- Norman Rockwell’s The Problem We all Live With: Teaching Bush v. Orelans Parish School Board
- Video Games and the First Amendment: Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association
2010-2011
- Is Julian Assange an International Version of Daniel Ellsberg and WikiLeaks the Modern Equivalent of the Pentagon Papers?
- Law, Pirates, and Piracy
- Antitrust Laws and Everyday Life
- The New World of Campaign Finance
2009-2010
- The Chicago 8 Trial, 40 Years Later: A Case Study in Teaching U.S. v. Dellinger
- Mexico: Democracy and the Future
- The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: Regulating Nuclear Weapons Around the World
- Trials as Stories: Teachable Trials in the Social Studies Curriculum
2008-2009
- The Reporter's Privilege Under Fire: Is the American Press Still Free?
- Supreme Court Biographies as a Classroom Resource
- Abraham Lincoln: American Lawyer-President
- Ensuring Access to the Ballot Box: Voting Rights in the United States
- How Do Tax Laws Reflect American Values?
2007-2008
- Across the Color Line: Diversity, Public Education, and the Supreme Court
- Chew Heong v. United States: Chinese Exclusion and the Federal Courts
- Out of Range: An Interview with Mark Tushnet on the Second Amendment
- "Standing:" Who Can Sue to Protect the Environment?
- Using Literature to Teach the Rule of Law
- You Should Have the Body: Understanding Habeas Corpus
2006-2007
- The Constitution in a Time of National Emergency
- The Immigration Reform Debate
- Object Lessons: The Law of Cultural Property
- Seeking Good Credit—And Keeping It
2005-2006
2004-2005
- Balancing Act: First and Sixth Amendment Rights in High Profile Cases
- Enemy Combatants and the Courts
- Selecting Supreme Court Justices: A Dialogue
- Update on Death Penalty for Juveniles: Supreme Court Decides Roper v. Simmons
- Voting Technology and the Law: From Chads to Fads and Somewhere in Between