The First Amendment prohibits the federal government from making law that would abridge the "right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
Some citizens, however, have found that our current president doesn't want any protests or demonstrations to spoil his public appearances. A young Texas couple, Jeffery and Nicole Rank, learned that the hard way on July 4, 2004, when they were arrested on the West Virginia capitol grounds after peacefully expressing their opposition to President Bush.
The two wore homemade T-shirts on which the international "no" symbol (a circle with a diagonal line across it) was superimposed over the word "Bush." One shirt said "Love America, Hate Bush" on the back; the other said "Regime Change Starts At Home."
They were asked to leave or cover up the shirts, and when they didn't do either, they were arrested, charged with trespassing, handcuffed and taken to jail despite their protests that they had the right to express their opinions under the protection of the First Amendment.
Later, charges were dismissed and the City of Charleston apologized to the couple.
The Ranks sued the federal government, which settled with them in August for $80,000, but not before the couple's ACLU lawyers managed to win release of a heavily redacted classified document (only a few of the 130 pages still show their content) that is a field manual for those who set up presidential appearances around the nation. The manual contains sections such as how to recognize demonstrators and how to stop them (literally: "Preventing Demonstrators").
The tactics used against the Ranks, though later costing the government some money, effectively did just that.
The question is: How should we interpret the First Amendment? If we have the right peaceably to assemble and protest, does government have the right to remove that inconvenient protest from sight and apologize later for the First Amendment infringement? Or does government have an obligation to allow the protestors to be seen and possibly heard (citizens with opposing viewpoints could drown them out -- and in fact, the manual suggests doing that before removal)? Where should the line be drawn, if at all?
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16 comments:
Howdy this is Betne McCoy--
I believe in the first amendment and I also believe that it should be monitored. I think that the government should be able to put barricades around certain parts of the first amendment (ex. to BLEEP out curse words on the radio). However in this case, where two individuals were doing nothing but wearing an anti bush t-shirt, I think the govenment crossed the line. In no way did it pose as a danger to anyone else and in no way did they break any laws. So, even though I think that the government has the right to limit the first amendment I don't think that this was a time that they needed to do so.
The first amendment is what it is, it seems people in general are always trying to find round-about ways to make things legal, or justified, when they clearly are not.
I don't think the couple should have been arrested for peaceably assembling/protesting against President Bush. HOWEVER...I beleive that Americans should respectibly show their opinions. If someone is trying to give a speech, then let the protestors say what they have to say before, BUT people should know that there is such a thing as respecting what the other people need to say, meaning they need to allow eachother their right to speak, instead of interupting speeches or trying to be louder than the speaker.
There is always a line to be drawn, with out it, the country would result to caos,ultimately corrupting society.
I believe the government was in the wrong in this situation. The couple was peacefully assembling, just like the first amendment states. If a fascist president does like this, then that is his problem. The couple did nothing wrong and their was no right for them to be arrested. People may not agree that others are protesting, but they need to understand that they do have the right to protest. The couple was demonstrating their right of free speech, which the first amendment also states. So not only did the government cross the line by arresting the couple for peacefullty assembling, but also for denying their right of free speech.
People need to understand that there is always a line to be drawn. Why? It's to prevent conflict. There is nothing wrong with people saying what they want to say... that they love this country but hate Bush. That's perfectly fine because that's their opinion. But because so many people have such strong opinions both in support and against their same opinion, there has to be a limit as to how open we are with how we truly feel. Otherwise, there is open posibilities for conflict to arise. That's what we need to prevent. So, it's okay to express your opinion, but it's even better if it's done in a respectful way.
I think that the government, in this situation, recognized that President Bush has a lot of opposition and they're trying very desperately to change that. They have no right to infringe on first amendment rights and then later apologize for them. I also think that by taking protestors away, it kind of defeats their whole purpose anyway. If they take protestors away, then they will later go to the media which will then put them in a bad light as a government who does not recognize citizens' rights. So let them take them away because those who want to be heard, will eventually be heard.
The first amendment is really open for discussion. It is true you are supposed to be able to speak freely but as this case shows, those in power can stifle that freedom of speech and they do many many times. If there were true freedom of speech nothing would be monitered. This as one writer wrote would result in unrest. However, we cannot live our lives trying to avoid conflict. We should welcome it because that means we are thinking! We should challenge the powers that control our lives. Another writer was right in that by making a fuss over these two people the administration actually drew more negative attention to themselves than would have otherwise occured.
There is no debate about what every citizen of the US has with their first amendment rights. The Bush Administration have gone too far in abusing citizen's rights. It is going to take a long time to undo all injustice they (Bush)have done but I hope that will make the citizens remember how to handle this kind of gigantic judical mess. Every one has the right to be heard. That is what our US democracy is all about and we need not fear what reprisals may be made against us. Laws are made to be used for all our benefit and if we do not use them then they are useless.
The 1st Amendment is important and must be acknowledged. To determine whether or not the government over-stepped its boundries would require more information. The story certainly makes it sound as though these two were merely standing in the presence of an appearance and should this be the case then yes, they had every right to be there. However some of the story may or may not be missing. Regardless of that however there are other factors that should be taken into consideration. Where these two trespassing? Legally speaking they would then be subject to legal recourse. While I do not support a disregarding of the 1st amendment, I also do not believe that it was designed to supercede other laws in place. Based upon the following aspect to this particular story (settlement of law suite) it would seem as though the 1st amendment has been infringed upon. In regards to future appearances though it only makes sense that a fieldbook would address protesters. Protests will occur and may need to be dealt with. The biggest problems with this is the very vague term "peacful assembly." Some would consider any disruption to be a breach in the term "peacful." Others would argue that as long as they stay constrained to non-violent acts they are within their rights. There is no clear-cut line as of yet however rules need to be set in place to help determine was is to be considered lawful vs not.
I feel that in this case the government was overstepping their rights to control the assembly. If the Ranks had been loud, obnoxious, and violent, then there would have been good reason to remove them from the assembly. As it stands, they were just wearing shirts that declared their dislike for Bush. It's no great secret that many people dislike our current president, and now it was just a case of location rather than actions that got these two arrested.
It may have been different if the shirts were pro violence or terrorism, but they weren't. They were still patriotic, just for the country rather than its leader. That the government feels they can remove people just because they don't like something and then apologize later and expect it to be all better is wrong.
The First Amendment of the Constitution does give us, Americans, the right to petition and assemble. I think that this can be and has been taken too far many times and people take advantage of it. However, in this case, the Ranks had every right to display their shirts in front of the president. As long as they weren't disrupting anything or becoming violent while petitioning then I don't see what the problem is. People have the right to their own opinions and as long as it isn't distracting or harmful to others than I do think that it's their right to speak freely.
Wow, this is common sence of the amendments. I think that they were wrong to be arrested for something like this when they have a right to do it thanks to our lovely comstiution. The citizens have their opinions about demonstrations, thanks to the first amendment also, but they need to also understand the other parts of this amendment. Though they didn't abide my the authorities requests, i really don't think that they were in the wrong in the first place.
The First Amendment explicitly states that citizens of the United States have the right to peacefully protest. If these demonstrators had been protesting about other issues not pertaining to the government or the president, there would probably not have been any interference into the situation. However, because of the small number, and the influence of the president, immediate and infringing action was immediately taken. Regardless of whether or not the president of the government agreed or disagreed with the protest campaign, they had not right in removing said individuals. In this situation, I do not believe the law suit that Ranks filed was frivolous in the least. In fact, I think it was the only appropriate course of action to demonstrate the suppression of freedom of protest. The only thing I am disappointed about was the lack of press covering the situation however I am glad that the American Civil Liberties Union took a firm stance in the situation.
Protestors have every right to show thier opinion and show it peacfully which seems to be the case. The goverment is based on the that very same principal that it was created from including every right made. For the goverment to treat any person with an opinion is a direct defiance to the law. The law made no such law on itself in the sense that the law can not break the law. The president of our present has begun a scary and hopefully temporary movement in justifying current negative actions (that have taken place by him or around him) that would have most likely been unacceptable in past. Issues such as stopping the public from expressing thier opinion is wrong and deffinently unjustifiable. The line should have only been drawn if the opinionatirs had unpeacefully made thier protest; the fact that this was taking place during a public political speaking bothers me in the sense that our current president does not care about any public opinion except for people who agree with him. It is terrible on the entire system.
I believe that no matter what, our first amendment rights must be upheld whether those being protested against like it or not. I do believe that Americans should use their better judgement and protest in a peaceful and tasteful way but no matter what they do have the right. To take away that right or to censor it in any way, especially by the government, simply breaks away at the very foundation that our country and government was built on.
Our government always talks about how they always want to make sure that our rights are protected and we are able to use those rights. I think that the reason these people got removed from the Bush speech was because he didnt want to look bad. I think that our president was scared and embarassed that some people in america dont support him. People are supposed to support our president and when him and his people found out that someone didnt, they got defensive and said it was wrong. I think the president should just give it up. He should already know that some people support him and some dont. Those two INNOCENT people were just trying to show their opinion and maybe persuades others in a peaceful, and respectful way.
It looks like the Bush administration is just puling what they have always been pulling. As soon as Bush makes a decision such as his policies or the war, any opposition he meets is just covered up or ignored. The reason he removed those protesters was because the majority of people only see him speak on tv and if all he shows during his broadcasts are Bush supporters cheering for him it makes him look like he's in the right. Like in Iraq, for many of the news stories the news reporters only showed the people who said they loved America and loved the fact that we went over there. But the other side of the story where some of the people despised us for butting in to their life was never covered on networks that were one sided like Fox News. What I'm trying to get at is that Bush keeps trying to put up a false curtain of lies in front of us so that he can try to be in good standing in the history books. I know being president is a hard job but when you use that responsibility to hide the truth you become the lowest of the low.
posted by Thomas Johnson
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