Free speech is most endangered when the speech at issue is unpopular. In the case of the fringe Christian, homosexual-baiting Westboro Baptist Church, it is repugnant. All the same, a federal appeals court has ruled, it is protected. Now the United States Supreme Court is to consider the question.
Westboro, a small Kansas congregation, has brought itself into disrepute by appearing near the funerals of service people killed in Iraq and Afghanistan to preach that its god sanctions those deaths because America tolerates gays. Actually, the church’s message is uglier than that, so ugly that families of the fallen have suffered emotional distress and reactions to Westboro’s sign-carrying faithful have disrupted services. Aggrieved relatives sued for damages and collected, but lost on appeal.
Westboro has scrupulously avoided committing any illegal act. Next week, the nation’s highest bench considers the legality of Westboro’s speech itself.
If the First Amendment was intended to protect anything it was intended to protect speech that is objectionable, even outrageous—to say nothing of the right of wacky religious groups to pursue their beliefs, no matter how silly they may to others seem. Popular speech needs no protection from the tyranny of majority—until, of course, the majority in its righteousness changes its mind and comes to despise what it once applauded.
The Constitution does not allow the prior restraint of expression. Will it permit, as it does in the cases of libel and invasion of privacy, the collection of damages for harm that expression may cause?
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I'm surprised that the Supreme Court has decided to hear this case. Members of this "church" can say what they want so long as they break no laws. The beauty of the First Amendment is that all points of view can be heard. By exercising their free speech rights these people reveal to everyone what a miserable bunch of bigots they are.
As much as I deplore what the Westboro Church members are doing to the soldier's grieving families, I wouldn't give up the right to free speech for anything in the world. I hope the sympathy and support shown to these military families far outweighs the insensitive and hurtful actions of a handful of religious fanatics.
As to your specific question: Will it permit, as it does in the cases of libel and invasion of privacy, the collection of damages for harm that expression may cause?
I do not believe that such is the issue in this case. The appellate court appeared to rely solely on the fact that the statements of the defendants could not be interpreted to claim to be factual and therefore should not have been responsible for any harm. Therefore the Supreme Court will probably not rule on that issue. As to my personal belief, if direct harm can be shown from someone's speech, then I think that the First Amendment should not absolve the speaker from responsibility.
[There was another statement that I am having difficulty understanding: "Popular speech needs no protection from the tyranny of majority—until, of course, the majority in its righteousness changes its mind and comes to despise what it once applauded." Could you enlarge on that, please?]
Noticed today I had missed your question:
[There was another statement that I am having difficulty understanding: "Popular speech needs no protection from the tyranny of majority—until, of course, the majority in its righteousness changes its mind and comes to despise what it once applauded." Could you enlarge on that, please?]
I was thinking of such instances as when, during Washington's presidency, the Federalist and Democratic Republican parties began to emerge, and the give and take of press and private criticism, as well as the defense, of the administration was regarded as healthy debate.
That changed, when the Federalists secured power in the Adams'
administration and criticism of the government (to over simplify) became sedition punishable at criminal law.
A litany of embarrassing examples follows—the official suppression of popular pro-labor union speech in the era between world wars are well- known—but I'll mention just one, from the late 1930s when sincere citizens—Charles Lindbergh, among them—spoke against American involvement in another European war. Their position was so popular that it restricted F.D.R.'s options to aid England in 1939. After December 7, 1941, the America Firsters became suspected of treason and, perhaps more chilling than any official repression, the press excluded doubters from the marketplace of ideas.
Between us we could, I think, recall scores more examples of when "the majority in its righteousness changes its mind and comes to despise what it once applauded."
Listening to today's news reports of the Supreme Court arguments in the Westboro case, I gather it is going off on First Amendment grounds. I've not had the chance to read the briefs, but it seems to me that the case law is so dispositive of the free speech issues that I can't imagine why the court granted cert unless it 1) Wants to modify the Hustler case, or 2) Wants to address the dissent in the court of appeals case.
Guess we'll find out in the spring.
I agree, more or less. What caught my attention was that the appellate court applied First Amendment standards to the Maryland tort of "invasion of privacy by intrusion on seclusion."
In any case, it occurred to me that the Supreme Court agreed to take the case so that it could consider the arguments made in the dissent for the power of the appellate court to take notice of issues the plaintiff abandoned on appeal.
It should be protected. That Church as the right to say whatever it wants. If we allow our teenagers and youth to say curse words and foul language in every other word, then that Church can say what it wants to.
i'm mostly conservative but I think they're a bunch of nutters. Even though I disagree with their message I think they have a right to say it. If we allow profanity and vulgarity in the common place in the name of free speech then we should allow various Worship and Faith speech, even if we don't agree with it.
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