(1962) Mandatory prayer in schools is a violation of the establishment clause.
Craig v. Boren
(1976) Ruling that classification of individuals based on gender must be related to an important government objective; replaced minimum rationality standard.
Gregg v. Georgia
(1976) Death penalty is not "cruel and unusual punishment" in cases of murder.
Planned Parenthood v. Casey
(1992) Upheld the constitutional right to have an abortion but lowered the standard for analyzing restrictions of that right, invalidating one regulation but upholding the others.
Woodson v. North Carolina
(1976) Ruled that a North Carolina law establishing a mandatory death sentence for all convicted first-degree murderers constituted a violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution.
Branzburg v. Hayes
(1972) Ruled against a special First Amendment privilege that would allow the press to refuse to answer grand jury questions concerning news sources.
Mapp v. Ohio
(1961) Established exclusionary rule; illegally obtained evidence cannot be used in court; Warren Court’s judicial activism.
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas
(1954) Unanimously held that the racial segregation of children in public schools violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
McCulloch v. Maryland
(1819) The Court ruled that states cannot tax the federal government, i.e. the Bank of the United States; the phrase "the power to tax is the power to destroy"; confirmed the constitutionality of the Bank of the United States.
NAACP v. Alabama
(1958) The Supreme Court ruled that Alabama's demand for the lists had violated the right of due process guaranteed by the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution.
