English
Meyer v. Nebraska (1902) dealt with the concept of there being an “official language” in the U.S. The state of Nebraska had criminalized the teaching of contemporary foreign languages such as German, Spanish, and Italian. Archaic languages like Latin and Hebrew were exempted. The intent of the legislation was supposed to facilitate the process of children becoming “useful citizens” by declaring that English was:
“the mother tongue of all children reared in the state”
Training Killers
The longstanding tradition of military schools being open only to males came crushing down around the diminutive shoulders of Ruth Bader Ginsburg with the declaration that the Virginia Military Institute’s denial of female applicants was nothing more nor less than sexual discrimination. At hand was the school’s methodology of “teaching” its students to become trained killers which essentially consisted of demeaning, dehumanizing and destroying their individuality. Of course, such an instructional philosophy was not one that could be easily sold using those words, so the school came up with a creative metaphor for their practice of social annihilation:
“the adversative method"
With the ruling, it was determined that young women could just as easily handle being dehumanized as young males as the court’s decision had nothing to do with actually changing the VMI’s curriculum.
“Conduct Speech”
Through various court decision, a new metaphor was created to stand in place of a variety of acts of dissent. The First Amendment covered opening threatening to burn the U.S. flag, but actually burning it was not speech but action. Burning the flag to keep warm is still just an action and one which could result in charges based on statutes of against proper handling of the flag. Burning the flag as an expression of protest, however, is now covered by the First Amendment as an expression of free speech even though it is the very same action. The difference, as with so much of the law, is metaphorical: burning a flag to keep warm is not conduct expressing free speech. Burning the flag in protest is a literal act that is also at the very same time a symbol of something larger.
Freedom from Religion
While the free expression of religious beliefs is outlined vaguely in the First Amendment, there is another aspect of that freedom which many people believe is also there which, in fact, is not. The common vernacular used to describe this misapprehension that there is a Constitutional mandate for freedom from religion is “separation of church and state.” While this has long been considered a foundation of American constitutional law, both the metaphor and the precedent are found not in the Constitution itself, but rather a private letter from Thomas Jefferson. The actual metaphorical imagery is even different from the standard terminology as Jefferson writes to a friend about the necessity for:
“building a wall of separation between church and state”
“Saturday Night Massacre”
The “Saturday Night Massacre” is a term which was coined to describe the actions taken by President Richard Nixon on October 20, 1973. On that date, the beleaguered President facing the greatest pressure yet from the Watergate investigation ordered his Attorney General to fire the Special Prosecutor investigating the case since he, himself, did not have the authority. The Attorney General refused and resigned and was immediately replaced by an Acting Attorney General who also refused to carry out the order and resigned. Since then the term “Saturday Night Massacre” has evolved into a metaphor covering any actual or perceived attempt by some under criminal investigation obstruct justice by abusing their authority to interfere with that investigation.
