Laws and Court Cases

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Entry Category: Laws and Court Cases - Starting with P

Pfeifer v. City of Little Rock

Pfeifer v. City of Little Rock was a lawsuit filed in 1999 by Eugene Pfeifer III that, had it been successful, would have upended all the developing plans for the presidential library of President Bill Clinton. The suit stemmed from a dispute and the resulting failed negotiations surrounding the effort to plan and eventually construct a presidential library in Little Rock (Pulaski County) following Clinton’s election in 1992. Not long after Clinton’s election to the presidency, a group of his supporters established the Clinton Presidential Library Study Commission and began to look for a suitable place in Arkansas to establish the former Arkansas governor’s presidential library. The creation of the commission set in motion a lengthy process that had lawyers …

Phillips, et al. v. Weeks, et al.

Phillips, et al. v. Weeks, et al. was a sweeping lawsuit in federal district court at Little Rock (Pulaski County) alleging that the municipal police engaged in systematic discrimination against African Americans, including illegal detention, physical brutality, verbal abuse, and segregation in jail. The class-action suit was filed in January 1972, and the trial lasted two and a half months in 1974–1975. The case languished in the court for another eight years before all the issues were finally settled, with only a partial victory for the class of people for whom the suit was filed. U.S. District Judge G. Thomas Eisele eventually ordered an end to jail segregation and to the illegal detention of blacks, an infamous system in which …

Pugsley v. Sellmeyer

Pugsley v. Sellmeyer is the title of an Arkansas Supreme Court case that dealt with a disciplinary decision made by the school district of Knobel (Clay County) pertaining to a student being suspended for wearing talcum powder on her face. The case has been cited in other legal actions, namely in students’ rights lawsuits, and appears in various books focusing on these matters. At the beginning of the 1921–22 academic year, Knobel High School principal N. E. Hicks informed a student assembly of new rules of conduct adopted by the district’s school board. One of the mandates prohibited female students from wearing low-necked dresses or immodest clothing, as well as banning cosmetics. Earlier in the day, senior Pearl Pugsley had …