Those crazy "PATRIOTIC" Democrats: Free Speech Edition

"Foul-mouthed individuals who are found guilty under a bill introduced by Democratic representative Daniel J. Hunt would face a $150 maximum fine for the first offense, while repeat offenders would face up to six months' imprisonment, a $200 fine, or both. If enacted, 'b****' would be the only word in the English language to receive such special consideration in Massachusetts."

go Dems!!! make America great again.

https://freebeacon.com/politics/mass-dems-bill-would-make-it-illegal-to-call-someone-b****/

 

I.D.I.O.T.

 

here, perhaps you will enjoy this more:

https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion...0191022-cbejqiqtejcvddrnt33cwkewji-story.html

Connecticut vs. free speech

By Eugene Volokh
New York Daily News |
Oct 22, 2019 | 5:42 PM

Two University of Connecticut students are being prosecuted for “ridicule on account of creed, religion, color, denomination, nationality or race,” according to the Washington Post. If convicted, they could be sentenced to up to 30 days in jail. Except what they were doing — apparently saying the n-word loudly to each other, “getting louder with each iteration and laughing as they walk by student housing” — doesn’t actually violate state law. And even if state law did cover racial insults, it would be unconstitutional under a 1992 Supreme Court decision.

First, consider the text of the racial ridicule law: “Any person who, by his advertisement, ridicules or holds up to contempt any person or class of persons, on account of the creed, religion, color, denomination, nationality or race of such person or class of persons, shall be guilty of a class D misdemeanor.” The law is limited to “advertisements,” so it doesn’t cover personal conversations or even shouts, whether or not they are racist or religiously bigoted.

In our legal system, appellate courts can sometimes reinterpret statutes to mean something different than what the words say. But there has been no such appellate decision in Connecticut. Convicting the students under a statute that simply doesn’t cover them would violate the Due Process Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

But let’s for a moment assume that somehow “advertisement” could be read, contrary to its normal meaning, as “any statement.” Then the statute would be unconstitutionally overbroad, because it would cover a vast range of racial and religious ridicule — for instance, saying things that mock evangelical Christians as a group for their beliefs, or for that matter saying contemptuous things about blacks or whites or Israelis or Palestinians. Such speech, even if it is rude and offensive, is protected by the First Amendment.

Now face-to-face insults targeted at a particular person, of the sort that are likely to start a fight — the law calls these “fighting words” — can be constitutionally forbidden. Some uses of racial epithets, alongside other epithets, can be punished on this theory. Likewise, true threats of violence (racial or otherwise) are punishable.

I researched this statute in 2017, and found that Connecticut prosecutors have indeed tended to use this statute to prosecute racial and religious fighting words, with about one prosecution per year. Those prosecutions, though, have not led to appeals; defendants often don’t appeal low-level misdemeanor convictions.

But even if the statute were read, again contrary to its normal meaning, as limited to “fighting words,” it would still be unconstitutional. The Supreme Court made that clear in the R.A.V. vs. City of St. Paul case in 1992, when it expressly struck down a law that singled out race-based fighting words for special punishment. Even though an evenhanded ban on fighting words is permissible, the court held, the First Amendment forbids bans that involve “viewpoint discrimination” — for instance, bans that specially target “messages of ‘bias-motivated’ hatred” and “messages ‘based on virulent notions of racial supremacy.’”

Indeed, public universities can’t even impose viewpoint-discriminatory campus speech codes, though such codes are enforced only through administrative discipline. The government certainly can’t throw people in jail based on such viewpoint-based rules.

And, returning to our first point, the government can’t punish people — however loathsome their behavior might be — under a law that simply doesn’t apply to those people. Whatever stunt the students were pulling, it wasn’t an “advertisement.” Connecticut police and prosecutors must, above all, follow the law: both the First Amendment and Connecticut’s own state statutes. If the lawyers for the UConn students move to dismiss the charges against them, they should win, either in the trial court or, if necessary, on appeal.

So the government may evenhandedly punish true threats of violence. It may evenhandedly punish personal, face-to-face insults that are likely to start a fight. But it has to use laws that actually cover such behavior, and those laws have to apply neutrally, rather than targeting racist views or religious ridicule or any other viewpoint.

Volokh is Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law at UCLA.
​

 

fascinating that all the self-proclaimed lefty Democratic progressives come out of the woodwork to bash a thread and a poster advocating free speech.

go Dems!!! make America great again.