3.10 EOC Practice Activity

Which type of law is used to help solve disputes between people or organizations?

• constitutional

• criminal

• military

• civil

Which option refers to laws created by judicial decisions and precedents?

• civil law

• natural law

• common law

• constitutional law

This summary describes two U.S. Supreme Court decisions:

Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) established the “separate but equal” doctrine and upheld racial segregation. In his dissent of the decision, Justice John Marshall Harlan wrote that separating citizens by race could not be justified on any legal grounds. In 1954, the Supreme Court heard Brown v. Board of Education. The justices in Brown agreed with Harlan’s dissent in Plessy and overturned the doctrine.

Which type of law is represented by the decisions described in this summary?

• case law

• military law

• criminal law

• administrative law

The lists in the table identify actions that are subject to laws. Which list identifies actions that apply only to military law?

• Category A

• Category B

• Category C

• Category D

Which situation would most likely lead to a civil case?

• A person fails to stop at a red light

• A person is caught breaking into a house

• A person robs another person in a parking lot

• A person trips and breaks a leg at a friend’s house

This graph illustrates juvenile arrest rates for motor vehicle theft. Which type of law is illustrated in this graph?

• constitutional

• criminal

• military

• civil

This passage is from a U. S. Supreme Court opinion:

In 1989, the court held in Stanford versus Kentucky that the Constitution allows states to impose the death penalty on an offender who is 16 or 17 years old when he committed the crime. In the interpretation of its terms we have established …the necessity of …standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society. Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments forbid imposition of the death penalty on offenders who are under the age of 18 when their crimes were committed.

According to this opinion, which statement would the U.S. Supreme Court find constitutional?

• The death penalty may be imposed only on adults.

• The death penalty may be imposed only on juveniles.

• The death penalty may be imposed on both adults and juveniles.

• The death penalty may be imposed on neither adults nor juveniles.

Before the 1800s, it was common for states to prosecute children aged seven and older as adults. This practice changed in 1899 when the first court prosecuting cases involving children accused of crimes opened in Chicago, Illinois.

 

What has been a long-term impact of this change in U.S. Supreme Court decision-making?

• The Commerce Clause of Article I has been used to determine that children may not be sentenced without notifying their parents.

• The Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment has been used to determine that children may not be sentenced without notifying their parents.

• The Necessary and Proper Clause of Article I has been used to determine that separate but equal facilities in public school are unconstitutional.

• The Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment has been used to determine that separate but equal facilities in public schools are unconstitutional.