This original and provocative book looks at an important constitutional freedom that today is largely forgotten: the right of assembly. While this right lay at the heart of some of the most important social movements in American history—abolitionism, women's suffrage, the labor and civil rights movements—courts now prefer to speak about the freedoms of association and speech. But the right of “expressive association” undermines protections for groups whose purposes are demonstrable not by speech or expression but through ways of being. John D. Inazu demonstrates that the forgetting of assembly and the embrace of association lose sight of important dimensions of our constitutional tradition.
“The Framers of the Bill of Rights took care to protect not just speech, but speech in association with others, which they called ‘freedom of assembly.’ The Supreme Court, of late, has reduced this important right to a mere appendage to freedom of speech. This important book explains why an independent right of assembly or association matters to civil liberties, and why it is in danger.”

—Michael McConnell, Richard & Frances Mallery Professor and Director of the Constitutional Law Center, Stanford Law School

“Inazu offers the most thorough survey we have of the changing conceptions of freedom of assembly in America.”

—Andrew Koppelman, John Paul Stevens Professor of Law, Northwestern University School of Law, and author of A Right to Discriminate? How the Case of Boy Scouts of America v. James Dale Warped the Law of Free Association

“The First Amendment’s guarantee of ‘the right of the people peaceably to assemble’ is the neglected stepchild of modern constitutional law. John Inazu’s Liberty’s Refuge breathes new life into the clause. His careful historical and analytical reading of the clause explains it as a core component of the constitutional protections available to all individuals.”

—Richard Epstein, Laurence A. Tisch Professor of Law, New York University School of Law

“This is a scholarly book, written in a style that is accessible to anyone with a serious interest in the freedom of assembly in the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. Inazu’s historical narrative is important, and his normative arguments are deep and interesting. Although scholars will have quibbles (about his treat of Rawls, for example), this is the best contemporary book about this topic.”

—Lawrence Solum, John Carroll Research Professor of Law, Georgetown Law School

“Inazu’s clear prose style and relentless intellectual honesty enable and even invite criticism while also forcing critics to acknowledge and confront the force of his ideas. Inazu’s avowed goal with this book is to start a discussion, and he has achieved that goal brilliantly.”

—Gregory Magarian, Professor of Law, Washington University School of Law

(From Goodreads)