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It does not come easy for me to root for the police and prosecutors, especially when they're dealing with non-violent protesters, but as nearly as I can tell, the Denver Police Department acted properly last October to protect the rights of American citizens to express themselves, and a jury last week acted improperly in acquitting the people who tried to deprive others of their civil rights.
At issue was the annual Columbus Day parade and protest last year. More than 200 people were arrested in downtown Denver on Oct. 9 after they blocked the parade, which was organized by the Sons of Italy -- New Generation. The protesters were charged with failure to obey a lawful police order, and eight of their leaders were tried, and acquitted, last week.
One of those acquitted leaders was Glenn T. Morris, an associate professor of political science at the University of Colorado at Denver. Even though the college catalog says that he holds a juris doctorate from Harvard, his understanding of American constitutional principles seems dubious, to say the least.
After the trial, he said What this verdict says is
that hate speech should be relegated to the past.
He makes two assumptions: 1) That a Columbus Day parade
is a form of hate speech,
and, 2) That the
government has an obligation to suppress hate
speech.
Neither holds up.
Christopher Columbus was certainly no saint, but he did
accomplish something, and if celebrating that is a form of
hate speech,
then what parade is not a form of
hate speech
?
For instance, many cities hold parades for St. Patrick's Day. It's an expression of Irish-American pride. But it doesn't really cover all the Irish, just the Catholic Irish from the south part of the island. Up north, there are the Protestants, also known as Orangemen or Ulster Scots. Fleeing oppression, thousands of them emigrated to America in the 18th century, among them one Elijah Quillen in 1755.
In Ireland, the Orange and the Green have been at each
other's throats since the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, and
the violence sadly continues in our time. By Morris logic,
a St. Patrick's Day parade could be viewed as a form of
hate speech
and ethnic intimidation
directed
at those of Irish Protestant descent.
But the celebration of St. Patrick with shamrocks, leprechauns and green beer is not the promotion of violence in Ireland.
Celebrations are not hate speech,
and even if
they were, so what? The First Amendment to the federal
constitution protects the right to free speech. It does not
say anything about content. It says Congress shall make
no law ...
not Congress shall enjoy the power to
prohibit hate speech, ban material deemed harmful to
minors, suppress utterances that hurt people's feelings ...
and this power may be delegated to college professors who
can determine the allowable range of public
expression.
We have the right to march in parades to celebrate Martin Luther King or Nathan Bedford Forrest, to honor Sitting Bull or George Armstrong Custer, and we have the right to stand on the sidelines and heckle the paraders. The Denver Police were protecting those rights when they arrested those who were blocking the parade.
Thus it seems odd that the defense attorneys portrayed
their clients as heroic defenders of civil rights. James
Castle told the jury that The civil rights movement of
today is embodied by the individuals at that table. They're
being called criminals. I call them heroes.
If the civil rights movement of today is embodied by people who want to deprive other people of their civil rights, then we're in a lot of trouble. Civil rights belong to all of us, not just people who pass muster with Glenn Morris.
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