ST. PAUL, Minn. — Abortion-rights supporters filed a lawsuit Wednesday seeking to overturn Minnesota’s restrictions on abortion, including its 24-hour waiting period and parental notification requirements. The suit argues that opponents have chipped away at a 1995 state Supreme Court decision that affirmed a woman’s right to an abortion. “Minnesota’s abortion laws are not only outdated, they’re …
With Alabama signing its new abortion bill into law, it has adopted the most restrictive stance on abortion in the country. Under the law, abortion has been made a felony in nearly every instance, with the only exception being medical emergencies. It was announced on Friday that Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union have filed a federal lawsuit against Alabama regarding the …
The ACLU of Texas announced Monday that it has filed a lawsuit on behalf of three homeless Houston residents asking a federal judge to halt the city’s new ordinances limiting panhandling and camping in public. City Council passed the two ordinances last month. The encampment rule forbids tents or other structures for living in public areas and requires that all of a person’s belongings fit into a three-foot cube; it took effect Friday. …
A firearms advocacy group has gone to court to challenge the constitutionality of California’s new assault weapons ban, as well as other major gun control laws passed last year by the Democratic-controlled state Legislature, arguing that “assault weapon” is a “political term.” The California Rifle & Pistol Association filed a lawsuit against the state Monday in federal court targeting six laws …
A recently-filed federal lawsuit aims to loosen the restrictions placed on registered sex offenders in North Carolina, claiming the state’s laws go too far, and do little to actually make children safer. The National Association for Rational Sexual Offense Laws filed the federal civil rights action, challenging North Carolina’s sex offender registration requirements. The organization and two unnamed plaintiffs allege that the restrictions placed on sex offenders have expanded continuously over the past decade and are now crippling. North Carolina’s laws restrict …
But what does free speech online have to do with any of this? Airbnb claims that it shouldn’t be on the hook for what users put in their listings, and that it isn’t breaking laws, its users who failed to go through a lengthy registration process for renting out their living spaces are. “Further, Airbnb’s argument that the city violated the First Amendment is moot because the ordinance ‘was not …
Retroactive enforcement of Tennessee’s sex offender registry law is being challenged in a federal court lawsuit that mimics a separate, successful appeal that led to the nullification of retroactive laws in Michigan. The case, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Nashville, argues that Tennessee’s registration laws are illegally applied retroactively. It notes that the laws and restrictions on those offenders have become significantly more burdensome since the laws were first enacted in 1994. The first registry law deemed the register of sex offenders confidential and only accessible by law enforcement. The General Assembly tweaked the law multiple times, and made registrants public, and then…
A Ramsey County judge on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit challenging Minnesota teacher tenure laws, rejecting its arguments that the laws protect ineffective teachers and deprive low-income and minority students of a high-quality education. The suit, filed in April by national and local education reform groups, argued that state laws shield veteran teachers from layoffs even when they perform …
A Birmingham man is asking a judge to remove a statewide amendment from the Nov. 8 ballot because he says it could overturn a judge’s ruling that halted Jefferson County’s plan to refinance more than a half-billion dollars in school construction debt and divert much of the $60 million in savings to the county’s general fund and other non-educational projects. Besides the general …
Less than a month after he denied a motion by minor-league baseball players to classify their lawsuit against Major League Baseball as a class action, the U.S. district court judge presiding over the case has given the plaintiffs a second chance. In an order issued Aug. 19, Judge Joseph C. Spero granted a motion by the plaintiffs to reconsider his order to deny class certification in the case, …