The Supreme Court stated that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to
possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia in:
a. United States v. Miller
b. District of Columbia v. Heller
c. Presser v. Illinois
d. Stevens v. United States
In which case did the plaintiffs claim that they were being denied their right to equal
protection of the law and that the laws of “separate but equal” were, in fact, not equal?
a. Marbury v. Madison
b. Dred Scott v. Sanford
c. Regents of the University of California v. Bakke
d. Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka
The Supreme Court held that the right to keep and bear arms is fundamental to our
scheme of ordered liberty and that it was clear that the framers of the Fourteenth
Amendment deemed such a right as fundamental in:
a. McDonald v. Chicago
b. District of Columbia v. Heller
c. Presser v. Illinois
d. Stevens v. United States
Which of the following have lower courts not yet recognized as analogous to plain
view?
a. plain feel
b. plain smell
c. plain hearing
d. plain taste
A Terry stop requires:
a. reasonable suspicion.
b. informational probable cause.
c. observational probable cause.
d. corroborating information.
Formal ties between Great Britain and the United States were severed:
a. when the American Declaration of Independence was signed.
b. when the colonists boarded British ships and threw tea overboard.
c. through the drafting of the Magna Carta.
d. at the meeting of the First Continental Congress.
Which of the following has been held to be a violation of a prisoner’s right against cruel
and unusual punishment?
a. Suspending visiting privileges for an inmate who failed more than one drug test.
b. Exposure to second-hand smoke posing an unreasonable risk of damage to health.
c. A prisoner shot in the leg during a riot to maintain discipline.
d. The use of chain gangs.
Time and Reader’s Digest are examples of:
a. popular literature
b. professional literature
c. primary sources
d. scholarly literature
Freedom of the press was made binding on the states through the Fourteenth
Amendment in Near v. Minnesota (1931), in which the Supreme Court ruled that:
a. no newspaper could be banned because of its contents, regardless how scandalous.
b. obscenity is not a constitutionally protected form of speech.
c. government may halt publication of books that endanger national security.
d. the press has no constitutional right to disregard promises of confidentiality.
The exclusionary rule prohibits the use of confessions obtained in violation of a
person’s constitutional rights and those that are otherwise coerced for all of the
following reasons, except:
a. they are inherently unreliable.
b. to do otherwise would be a violation of due process.
c. of a need to hold government accountable by holding such confessions inadmissible.
d. the concern for public safety is not a Fifth Amendment issue.
States’ rights proponents asserted that:
a. everyone in the state has a right to keep and bear arms.
b. gun control should not be the business of federal government.
c. the Second Amendment was adopted with the primary purpose of preserving the state
militia.
d. gun control laws protect and modify Article 8, Section 23 of the Constitution,
allowing the president to declare war on other nations.
Which of the following would not constitute a lawful warrantless search?
a. dumpster-diving
b. looking at curtilage from the air
c. using a thermal imaging device to find a “grow” room
d. covert involuntary DNA sampling
The reason a Supreme Court appointment is lifetime is:
a. so a justice may not be unduly influenced.
b. because it is very time consuming to select and train a justice.
c. because it would be age discrimination to require them to retire.
d. to continue the political legacy of the appointing President.
Which of the following is not guaranteed or prohibited by the Fifth Amendment?
a. right against self-incrimination
b. trial by jury
c. double jeopardy
d. just compensation
Courts have used all of the following in assessing what constitutes cruel and unusual
punishment, except whether the punishment:
a. “shocks the general conscience” of a civilized society.
b. is specifically prohibited in the Eighth Amendment.
c. is unnecessarily cruel.
d. goes beyond legitimate penal aims.
Which of the following would be considered a violation of a subject’s reasonable
expectation of privacy, requiring a warrant?
a. Police put a “beeper” on a vehicle to monitor its location.
b. Undercover officer converses with suspects and uses information in court.
c. Taking photographs of curtilage from an aircraft.
d. Placing listening device in public telephone booth to monitor conversations.
The U.S. Supreme Court held that confessions obtained through brutality and torture by
law enforcement officials are violations of constitutionally protected due process rights
in:
a. Brown v. Mississippi
b. Fikes v. Alabama
c. Katz v. United States
d. Dickerson v. United States
Women were given the right to vote by the:
a. Fifteenth Amendment
b. Seventeenth Amendment
c. Nineteenth Amendment
d. Twentieth Amendment
The ____________ was designed in response to fear of a national government with too
much power which was, at the time, considered to be the greatest threat to liberty.
a. Eleventh Amendment
b. Fourteenth Amendment
c. Tenth Amendment
d. Twelfth Amendment
The case which authorized the Court to maintain a position of the ultimate de facto
lawmaker by deciding what legislation is and is not constitutional is:
a. Martin vs. Hunter’s Lessees
b. Ex parte McCardle
c. Plessy v. Ferguson
d. Marbury v. Madison
Which is not one of the three conditions set forth in Faretta v. California that must be
met before a person can represent him or herself?
a. awareness of the right to counsel.
b. valid waiver
c. competency
d. legal knowledge
Freedom of the press protects:
a. the right to publish information without governmental control.
b. magazine publishers from being told they can”t print obscene material.
c. the public from the publication of offensive material.
d. press premises from being searched by law enforcement.
When would a traffic stop require Miranda warnings?
a. An officer is asking for consent to search the vehicle.
b. The officer is going to arrest the driver.
c. Miranda warnings are not required for traffic stops.
d. A records check reveals an expired license.
The Sixth Amendment guarantees a right to counsel during:
a. civil proceedings.
b. hostile contractual negotiations.
c. criminal proceedings.
d. any and all court proceedings
When an appeals court’s holding returns the case to the lower court for further action, it
is said to have:
a. reversed the decision.
b. remanded the case.
c. concurred with the outcome.
d. affirmed the lower court’s ruling.
A legal citation is:
a. a brief summary of the ruling in a case.
b. a standardized way of indicating the location of a specific legal document, opinion,
or publication.
c. the constitutional definition of a legal term or concept.
d. an element of common law.
The Fourth Amendment regulates the actions of all of the following, except the:
a. Internal Revenue Service
b. Secret Service
c. United Parcel Service
d. Food and Drug Administration
The Court has jurisdiction over two general types of cases, cases that reach it on appeal
and cases over which the Court has:
a. original jurisdiction.
b. appellate jurisdiction.
c. the power of judicial review
d. subject-matter jurisdiction
The Articles of Confederation formally pledged the states to:
a. a unified tax structure.
b. a perpetual union.
c. the formation of the Confederate Army.
d. maintain a centralized government.
Pluralism refers to:
a. a society in which numerous distinct ethnic, religious or cultural groups coexist
within one nation, each contributing to the society as a whole.
b. the combination of constitutional, statutory and common law.
c. a single act being classified as both a crime and a tort.
d. a society in which numerous distinct ethnic, religious or cultural groups maintain
their individual beliefs and form of government.
Of the cases put before the Court, it accepts for review about:
a. 1%
b. 10%
c. 50%
d. 85%
The current Chief Justice is:
a. Sandra Day O”Connor.
b. William Rehnquist
c. Clarence Thomas
d. John G. Roberts, Jr.
The Fourteenth Amendment:
a. guarantees equal protection of the laws.
b. abolished slavery.
c. allows free travel throughout the nation.
d. granted the right to vote to freed male slaves.
United States v. Miller (1939):
a. is the case that set the precedent for the dozens of cases the Supreme Court hears
every year concerning the issue of an individual’s right to bear arms.
b. is a relatively insignificant case in the interpretation of Second Amendment rights.
c. was the first Supreme Court case that specifically addressed the scope of the Second
Amendment.
d. is the basis upon which Congress passes federal gun control legislation.
Relationships where third-party consent to search is allowed include all except:
a. parent/child.
b. employer/employee.
c. landlord/tenant.
d. host/guest.
Explain Miranda requirements as they relate to private security.
Lying by the police to obtain a confession is a violation of the Fifth Amendment.
Courts with general jurisdiction may hear a wide range of cases, whereas those of
__________________ jurisdiction hear a much narrower range of cases.
Common law has held that anyone witnessing certain crimes may make a(n)
____________ and then turn that individual over to authorities.
Representing oneself does not preclude a later claim of ineffective assistance of
counsel.
Discuss how the Constitution ensures individual liberty.
Discuss the historical background of the Second Amendment.
A stop is a seizure of the person within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.
One consideration in determining whether a search or seizure is reasonable is whether a
person’s reasonable expectation of privacy has been violated by the government.
After a person has __________ property, he or she has no reasonable expectation of
privacy relative to that property.
A waiver of Miranda is valid even if the suspect thought the questioning was going to
be about a minor crime and the questioning switched to a more serious crime.
Asset forfeiture may constitute double jeopardy.
Local jurisdictions, such as at the county or municipal level, may enact their own
specific codes, often referred to as __________________.
List the five factors used to determine witness reliability in pre-trial identification
procedures.
Case law is promulgated by legislatures or governing bodies.
In Virginia v. Black, the Supreme Court ruled the singular act of cross burning was not a
form of free speech protected by the First Amendment.
In determining when speech should not be protected, the courts replaced the clear and
present danger test with the ____________ test.
Constitutionalism is one of the most original, distinctive contributions of the American
system of government.