Ronald K. L. Collins
Before he retired, Ronald K. L. Collins was the Harold S. Shefelman Scholar at the University of Washington Law School and prior to that was a scholar at the Washington, D.C. office of the Newseum’s First Amendment Center. He was a law clerk for Justice Hans A. Linde on the Oregon Supreme Court and a Supreme Court Fellow under Chief Justice Warren Burger.
Collins has written constitutional briefs presented to the Supreme Court and various other federal and state high courts. In addition to the nine books that he co-authored with David Skover, he is the editor of "Oliver Wendell Holmes: A Free Speech Reader" (2010) and co-author with Sam Chaltain of "We Must Not Be Afraid to Be Free" (2011). He also authored "Nuanced Absolutism: Floyd Abrams and the First Amendment" (2013). His latest book is "Tragedy on Trial: The Story of the Infamous Emmett Till Murder Trial" (2024).
Collins’ other books on free speech include: "The Death of Discourse” (3rd ed. 2023); "The Trials of Lenny Bruce: The Fall & Rise of an American Icon" (2002 and 2012); "On Dissent: Its Meaning in America" (2013); "When Money Speaks: The McCutcheon Decision, Campaign Finance Laws, and the First Amendment" (2014); "The People v. Ferlinghetti: The Fight to Publish Allen Ginsberg’s HOWL" (2019); and "Robotica: Speech Rights & Artificial Intelligence" (2018).
He coauthored a college text entitled "First Things First — A Modern Coursebook on Free Speech Fundamentals" (with Will Creeley, David Hudson, Jr., and Jackie Farmer, 2019).
Collins is the book editor of SCOTUSblog and writes a weekly blog (First Amendment News), which appears on the FIRE website.
His scholarly articles have appeared in numerous journals including the Harvard Law Review, Stanford Law Review, Michigan Law Review, and the Supreme Court Review, among other publications.
Collins is co-founder and co-director of The First Amendment Salons (Wash. D.C. and N.Y.C.) and the co-founder of The History Book Festival.
Recent Writings
- What to make of anti-mask laws and mask-required laws? — First Amendment News 429,
- FIRE pushes for a posthumous pardon: A symbolic act with a real-world wake-up message — First Amendment News 428,
- Comedy in the time of cancel culture — First Amendment News 427,
- Paul Clement hopes to file cert. petition calling on SCOTUS to overrule abortion buffer zone case — First Amendment News 426,
- On free and timely public access to transcripts in New York Trump trial — First Amendment News 425,
- Upside-down Justice – Samuel Alito, ‘Mrs. Alito,’ and the symbolic speech debacle — First Amendment News 424,
- Trump v. Merchan — Testing the limits of judicial contempt in criminal cases: 12 questions . . . and a just-released appellate ruling — First Amendment News 423,
- On resistance, revolution, and dissent — campus protests in 44 states and the District of Columbia — First Amendment News 422,
- Free Speech in (college) crisis times: Thoughts and resources — First Amendment News 421,
- Back into the FIRE: Hasen’s response to FIRE and Rohde: Don’t read the press clause out of the Constitution — First Amendment News 420,
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