Tim Walz Abhors the First Amendment.

October 2, 2024 9:15am

During last night's VP candidate debate, Tim Walz defended his desire to obliterate the First Amendment by saying, "You can't yell fire in a crowded theater. That's.... that's the test. That's the Supreme Court test!"

NO, IT IS NOT THE SUPREME COURT TEST! WALZ IS WRONG! And so is every Leftist tyrant who uses that line to defend their desire to infringe on the free speech rights of Americans.

It was Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes who said, "Free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theater and causing a panic" (Schenck v. United States). But neither that quote nor that case permitted censorship or criminalized speech. It criminalized the REACTION the speech directly caused. In that case, it violated the Espionage Act of 1917.

If I went into a crowded theater and shouted "Fire!" but nobody reacted, I would not be charged with a crime (except perhaps for the overly ambiguous "disturbing the peace," which would certainly be dismissed by the court). Legally, it would be no different than me yelling "Free Popcorn!" with no reaction.

Further, Holmes' opinion was largely overturned in subsequent Supreme Court rulings such as Abrams v. United States and Brandenburg v. Ohio. I do not understand why the concept is so difficult for Leftists to grasp. SPEECH CANNOT BE CRIMINAL except for very narrow circumstances such as making a direct threat with the ability to carry out the threat. And government censorship is only permitted in the narrow but nebulous category of "obscenity." But even that category of expression has been largely eviscerated.

The Supreme Court ruled in the 1969 case of Brandenburg v. Ohio that the constitutional right to free speech protects inflammatory rhetoric unless it’s intended to incite “imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.”

What the Left calls "misinformation" or "hate speech" does not come anywhere near meeting that standard. Those terms are just epithets for "free speech the Left doesn't like." It's shameful. And it's dangerous.

"Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech." - Benjamin Franklin