There is an interesting en banc ruling out of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit where the court held that Christian evangelists who were “preaching hate and denigration to a crowd of Muslims” are entitled to damages for being ejected from participation as protesters in the 2012 Arab International Festival. The case raises the long-standing concern over the “heckler’s veto” where a speaker is silenced to appease an angry mob or crowd. The case is Bible Believers v. Wayne County, 2015 FED App. 0258P (6th Cir. 2015)
In his famous law review article coining this term, Harry Kalven observed “If the police can silence the speaker, the law in effect acknowledges a veto power in hecklers who can, by being hostile enough, get the law to silence any speaker of whom they do not approve.” See Harry Kalven, Jr., The Negro and the First Amendment 140 (Ohio St. Univ. Press 1965).
The Sixth Circuit clearly agreed. The Court detailed how in a prior year, the Christians were forced to end their protests. In anticipation of similar efforts by Deputy Chief Mike Jaafar and others involved in the earlier crackdown, the Bible Believers wrote to reconfirm that they would not be targeted to appease the crowd. They received a letter largely denying their account of the prior protests and reminding them that the police would act to stop any potential violence.
In the 2012 protests, the Christians would again be surrounded by irate Muslims and the police would again remove the Christians to avoid any violence. Muslims were incensed by one Christian carrying a severed pig’s head on a spike in a belief it would keep the Muslims at bay. Another declared that “You believe in a prophet who is a pervert,” and, “God will reject you.” Muslims counter-protesters started to take violent action like throwing objects at the Bible Believers.
In summary, the Bible Believers attended the 2012 Festival for the purpose of exercising their First Amendment rights by spreading their anti-Islam religious message. When a crowd of youthful hecklers gathered around the Bible Believers, the police did nothing. When the hecklers began throwing bottles and other garbage at the Bible Believers, a WCSO officer intervened only to demand that the Bible Believers stop utilizing their megaphone to amplify their speech. Virtually absent from the video in the record is any indication that the police attempted to quell the violence being directed toward the Bible Believers by the lawless crowd of adolescents. Despite this apparent lack of effort to maintain any semblance of order at the Festival, each time the police appeared on the video—to reprimand the use of the Bible Believers’ megaphone, to suggest that the Bible Believers had the “option to leave” the Festival, to trot by on horseback while doing next to nothing, and to expel the Bible Believers from the Festival under threat of arrest—the agitated crowd became subdued and orderly simply due the authoritative presence cast by the police officers who were then in close proximity. Only once is an officer seen removing one of the bottle-throwing teens. Israel, when faced with the prospect of being arrested for disorderly conduct, observed, “and you would think we would be complaining, but we’re not.” (R. 28-A, Raw Festival Footage, Time: 00:55:16). The Bible Believers were thereafter escorted from the Festival and ticketed by a large group of WCSO officers for removing the license plate from their van.
It is clear that the police were targeting the speakers rather than those who were threatening to take violent actions or actually taking such actions in response to their exercise of free speech. The Bible Believers were being blamed for “inciting” others — a dangerous standard that would gut the first amendment. Indeed, we have seen the erosion of free speech in the West based on such notions of incitement This includes some efforts in the United States by groups to ban free speech in subway advertisements and other forums.
The Sixth Circuit refused to join this trend:
Notably, a heckler’s veto effectuated by the police will nearly always be susceptible to being reimagined and repackaged [*63] as a means for protecting the public, or the speaker himself, from actual or impending harm. After all, if the audience is sufficiently incensed by the speaker’s message and responds aggressively or even violently thereto, one method of quelling that response would be to cut off the speech and eject the speaker whose words provoked the crowd’s ire. Our point here is that before removing the speaker due to safety concerns, and thereby permanently cutting off his speech, the police must first make bona fide efforts to protect the speaker from the crowd’s hostility by other, less restrictive means.
For me, the role of Corporation Counsel in this flagrantly unconstitutional action is the most disturbing. The Sixth Circuit noted “Corporation Counsel informed the Bible Believers by way of letter that ‘under state law and local ordinances, individuals can be held criminally accountable for conduct which has the tendency to incite riotous behavior or otherwise disturb the peace.'” That position is not only in direct conflict with core constitutional cases and principles, it would negate much of our free speech values in the United States. Fortunately, the Sixth Circuit has not lost sight of those values but it is a dangerous thing to have key police and lawyers in Wayne County who maintain such ill-informed and abusive views.
Kenneth McKinley wrote: “Almost every liberal woman, but for one has left this blog, anyone wonder why?”
It is obvious that liberalism is based upon emotions and feelings. It cannot abide logic for long, so they will wander elsewhere to get their emotional support.
Cato
Dedicated to free, unfettered markets. Lovers of Ayn Rand. Fits right in with Spinelli’s idea of all governance being done by members of the Chamber of Commerce.
Owned lock, stock and barrel by the Koch brothers. Father Koch: founder of the Birch Society.
The other night there was an interview with one, either David or Charles. Says Dad taught him everything. I believe that.
It would be great if everyone were held to the same standard here.
“Please tell me, other than to personally attack some here, what is the purpose of your quoted comment?”
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Jack, to ridicule!
Guilty pleasure, I admit it.
Folks,
I think it would be better if the tit for tat bantering and resurrecting old arguments stopped and instead issues are debated with respect.
Once again T. Hall, you attack what is said by appealing to your own authority. Try using somebody else.
Whaddya know, Billy Joel sounds petty sober
But Jack knows Robert Levy! Let us all be duly impressed.
po said;
David taught college
Nick taught highschool
Paul taught community college…
Poor kids, no freaking wonder!
Please tell me, other than to personally attack some here, what is the purpose of your quoted comment?
The Cato institute? Really, that’s what you’re going with. I’d be better off studying Ben Tillman for insight into property ownership.
And both Heller and McDonald were poorly reasoned, no different than Roe v. Wade or Dred Scot were.
Remember those gems of Supreme Court wisdom?
David taught college
Nick taught highschool
Paul taught community college…
Poor kids, no freaking wonder!
It’s amazing. Nobody gets off scot free with just a: should do a great job. No. It always has to include a poke, a jab, look what I know, look how I predict he will fail.
Amazing.
T. Hall,
“You’re doing nothing more than pulling selective quotes untethered from the context in which they were made.”
And you’re doing nothing more than telling me I’m wrong. Back it up with something other than your own claims.
Who have you quoted? I don’t see anyone.
I have been recognized to an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, by a sitting state judge with a Masters in Law from Harvard, for my knowledge of the history of U.S. Law. As such I find it extremely funny when you try to pretend that the role of the individual citizen somehow changed between the Articles of Confederation and the adoption of the U.S. Constitution. It did not. You are free to stomp your feet or even take your ball and go home, but I’ll be damned if I waste my time with someone who appeals to their own authority. I have no time for that.
FYI: My good friend Robert Levy and I have discussed the Second Amendment on a number of occasions. Who is Robert Levy, you may ask? Why he’s the Chair of the Cato Institute, and was the lead attorney for the winning team in D.C. v Heller. (You know, that case where the Supreme Court declared the individual right to keep and bear arms was not limited to their role in the militia.)
How can a person who is the furthest thing from being a liberal say with any credibility what whit liberals “want”?
7:33
Idiotic, thoughtless, nonsense that is a product of blind political hatred of liberals and Democrats.
Hey, you’re not thinking of stalking Billy Joel now, are you?
David
You might want to research a new case that may be approaching the Court on one man, one vote. It prompts other ideas about our gridlock much of which I think is due to gerrymandering. If the court takes it and the right prevails, it will alter our country profoundly. And that’s no hyperbole. (Jack)
Jack, Were you aware “criminal assaults in the near absence of policing” were relegated to the 1700’s? Apparently the poor black folks in the inner cities of Chicago, Detroit, Baltimore, etc. didn’t get that memo. White liberals don’t want black people to be able to protect themselves. They don’t want women to protect themselves. The gubment is their answer. Ironically, they want the police to the be the sole protectors, you know, the people they hate.
Billy Joel is singing the National Anthem tonight. He should do a good job..if he’s sober.
David,
Thanks for responding.
Geller is a noted anti-Islamist activist.