Constitutional Law
Constitutional Law questions test structure before doctrine: whether the plaintiff can be in court, whether Congress or the state acted, and which level of scrutiny applies.
Justiciability and federalism
- Standing: injury in fact (concrete and particularized), causation, redressability; no generalized grievances; taxpayer standing exists only for Establishment Clause challenges to exercises of the taxing and spending power.
- Eleventh Amendment: states are immune from damages suits in federal court; Ex parte Young permits prospective injunctive relief against state officers; Congress may abrogate under §5 of the Fourteenth Amendment.
- Dormant Commerce Clause: facial or purposeful discrimination is per se invalid unless the state shows a legitimate local purpose that cannot be served by nondiscriminatory alternatives; neutral laws with incidental burdens get Pike balancing.
Individual rights
- Procedural due process: notice plus a meaningful hearing, weighed under the Mathews factors.
- Equal protection: strict scrutiny for suspect classifications and fundamental rights; intermediate for sex; rational basis for age, wealth, and sexual orientation.
- First Amendment: content-based restrictions get strict scrutiny; content-neutral time, place, and manner rules need a significant interest, narrow tailoring, and ample alternatives.
- Takings: permanent physical occupation or total loss of value is per se; otherwise the Penn Central factors apply.
Worked example
A state requires every watermelon sold in the state to be grown there. The law is facially discriminatory and protectionist, so it is per se invalid under the Dormant Commerce Clause. The asserted food-safety interest fails because the state could inspect out-of-state growers instead; a discriminatory means with a nondiscriminatory alternative is fatal.
Traps
Suing a state agency for damages; forgetting that the Fourteenth Amendment needs state action (the Thirteenth does not); treating a protectionist licensing scheme as "neutral"; analyzing a content-neutral permit scheme under strict scrutiny; recasting a fundamental-right case as substantive due process when equal protection supplies the test.