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.
What is Darren’s role on this blog? Why does he feel he can direct the commenter’s here? Does professor Turley sanction this type of authoritarian role Darren seems to have here? How us it he gets to tell others to move on to another blog? Has Professor Turley given him such authority. It would be good to know why a free speech blog is policed in such a way.
Folks, the insolence needs to stop on all sides. If those who feel there is inequity, you can correct the matter by simply not engaging in juvenile behavior and act with respect of all others here. Then, you will not need to worry about tattling on others or pointing fingers and demanding that someone else be sanctioned while at the same time acting with a complete lack of decorum.
If you would prefer to not conduct yourself with a respectful and proper discourse, you can find other forums on the internet that cater to such banality.
Darren, the lack of decorum is always started by the same folks and directed toward the same folks.
It always starts the same way, Annie offers a valuable comment, Nick and Paul pounce on her. One can only take it so long.
You, as well as everyone else on this blog, know that they hijack threads and divert them into that typical no man’s land.
I suspect this entire conversation will be gone shortly.
THall, you are a better investigator than Nick ever was!
I mean, you got the guy pegged, and I am sure you did not even need trailing him, take up aliases or troll him across various blogs!
The guy you described is the dear Nick we all love, to a T!
I suspect that the Prof had a talk with him a couple of months ago, for a while his usual aggression turned to sad, sad passive-aggressiveness, where he would try to push his troops into carrying on his usual attacks.
He is a fascinating individual! for sure!
Wear a helmet, indeed.
BTW
As a matter of the historical record, the deletions were not any that were crude or uncivil. No one’s name was mentioned. Someone made a teeny tiny error in posting a comment that purported to be from a Democrat, a Hillary loving Democrat who was embarrassed by the other Democrats posting on the thread. Turns out that self-described Democrat wasn’t one at all and was posting under a ‘false flag’ and it was there for everyone to see.
And that’s the way it was.
Nick: Could you please be specific about those times Obama gave assistance to European countries cracking down on free speech?
Could you please explain how Obama’s State Dept policy differs from the Bush administration’s policy?
France is France, and there’s are reasons why I live in America and not France. One of them is the First Amendment. How are liberals destroying the First Amendment? In America?
The First Amendment wasn’t written to rationalize rude and boorish expression. I think you would like to use the First Amendment to excuse your offensive remarks. That’s not what it was written for. It was written to protect and encourage the free expression of ideas,
Regardless, you can’t expect not to be held accountable for rude and ignorant remarks. The First Amendment is no protection against accountability, no matter how fervently you wish it were.
I keep hoping It will live up to its reputation.
You ask too much, Annie. This is only a free speech blog. Keep your expectations focused.
Indulgence offends me. Special treatment offends me. Unequitable enforcement of civility rules offends me.
Speech does not offend me.
Deleted speech offends me.
As well it should, Annie. It presents a perfect example of the quality of debate that Nick engages in, and there it should stand for all to see.
Comments like the one at 9:46 also provide some insight into Nick’s thinking process; he’s not necessarily here to debate ideas, he wants agreement, demands conformity, and lashes out at those who hold different opinions and beliefs.
He’s unwilling to examine the ideas and concepts of the world that he’s received. It’s hard to fault him for respecting, even revering, those who imparted these lessons. Now for him, we represent all the thinking that’s wrong and misguided in America and it makes him angry.
On top of that, he appears to be looking for relationships on a deeper level than anyone else commenting here; there’s something needy in the way he interacts with others, and it’s quite strange. Most people post here to exchange ideas, yet he makes things far more personal than they need to be. It leaves people wondering what’s really going on.
Whether he’s engaged in petty insults, flaring away in petulant fits, making rude, profane remarks, or egging people to argue instead of debating the issues, and dragging the discussion down to insults and invective, his participation has unquestionably lowered the intellectual bar among these various threads.
I think the Prof. recognizes that Nick is has a preternatural investment, emotionally, in this blog and feels sorry on some level. Hence, he’s willing to indulge his behavior to a certain extent. Then again, there’s also the fact that Nick will not hesitate to importune the Professor whenever it suits him, Most of us see that as overstepping the bounds of respect, but there’s the difference.
Dear You People
Would you please stop annoying Nick? And could all the Kindergartners please go to bed before 8? And dear God, would you please bless all the intellectually honest people. Only they can save us from the LIBERALS (all caps required).
I heard, what moroons.
Well the RNC has followed the blog route in dealing with those who offend. They (the RNC) has deleted NBC.
http://rack.0.mshcdn.com/media/ZgkyMDE1LzEwLzMxL2U2L29iYW1hYmFieXBvLjNjZWU2LmpwZwpwCXRodW1iCTk1MHg1MzQjCmUJanBn/3870f219/70d/obama-baby-pope.jpg
President Obama got a kick out of this baby in a Pope costume, adorable.
I don’t know about you but I read The Paris Review. And the entire Encyclopedia (hard copy) every day.
Then I’m ready to tackle The Daily Mail.
Unhinged.
That was quick!
Intellectually honest liberals have BLASTED the CNBC announcers. I have found few, if any defense of those lightweights. Do you people read anything but HuffPo.? Hell, I think even HuffPo blasted CNBC. The moderators were and EMBARRASSMENT. They were unprepared. They asked few economic questions in a debate that was supposed to be about the economy.