Mrs. Case
EH 101x
11/10/16
Freedom of Speech Is Not Free
Freedom of speech is an essential part of democracy. The signers of the Constitution recognized this. Therefore, they included freedom of speech in the First amendment. The First Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits ‘the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of speech, interfering with the right to peaceably assemble or prohibiting the petitioning for a governmental redress of grievances.’ Abridge means to shorten and infringe means to limit or undermine. Thus, the Constitution …show more content…
This gives them a platform to express and share their ideas. Also, creating the opportunity to discover others who agree with their point of view and purpose. In The case of Healy v. James (1972) the college committee for campus organizations denied the Students for Democratic Society official recognition. This was due to the organization promoting civil disobedience and violent disruption the college community. The president refused to officially recognize them. He had them disbanded when they tried to meet at a campus coffee shop to discuss the rejection. The Supreme Court ruled a student group cannot be refused recognition (peacefully assemble) based on unsupported fear of …show more content…
Papish v. Board of Curators of the University of Missouri (1973) Barbara Papish, a graduate student from the university of Missouri, was expelled for distributing a newspaper that contained two features that the university deemed "indecent." A circuit court ruled against her but the supreme court overturned that decision and ordered Papish reinstated to the university. "We think Healy v. James makes it clear that the mere dissemination of ideas no matter how offensive to good taste on a state university campus may not be shut off in the name alone of "conventions of decency." "The First Amendment leaves no room for the operation of a dual standard in the academic community with respect to the content of speech." In the case of Antonelli v. Hammond (D. Mass. 1970), because the student newspaper reprinted an article with four letter words, the president of Fitchburg State College wanted to withhold the funding for the student newspaper. The U.S. District Court of Massachusetts said “administrators could not require prior review of articles by an advisory board and that officials could not censor expression solely because they did not like it.” “ In cases concerning school supported publications or the use of school facilities, the courts have refused to recognize as permissible any regulations infringing free speech when not shown to be necessarily related to the maintenance of