So not a lawyer, and any more legally astute posters please set me straight on this if I'm wrong.
Having seen the upteenth video of the anti-ice protesters acting like animals and saying really nasty stuff to law enforcement, I remembered the the limits on free speech and Chaplinsky vs New Hampshire.
Simple version: an asshole was upset by something in the city and walked up to an official and screamed that he was a racketeer and facist. He was arrested, sured and lost. The Supreme Court ruled that fighting words are not free speech and defined fighting words as speech that "tends to incite an immediate breach of peace) and/or "inflict injury by their very utterance."
As it seems to me that these protestors are attempting to incite a violent response from ICE and other law enforcement, could they be arrested for that?
Is there more recent case law that makes this not an option? Or as I suspect does law enforcement think there are no prosecutors with the balls to actually prosecute?
I'd love to see these smug assholes get some consequences.
I asked Google AI about whether this was still valid case law, here is what it said:
Yes, Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire (1942) is still a valid, foundational case establishing the "fighting words" doctrine, but its application has been significantly narrowed by subsequent Supreme Court rulings, meaning states can't easily ban speech just because it's offensive; it must directly incite immediate violence. While never overturned, courts now closely scrutinize statutes for overbreadth, and the Court hasn't upheld a conviction under the doctrine since Chaplinsky itself, limiting its scope to personally abusive epithets inherently likely to provoke a violent reaction.
In my personal opinion, the anti-ICE folks are committing far worse crimes than merely insulting agents, they are trying to cause bodily harm, and interfering (big time!) with law enforcement.
You are right, and I suppose if they aren’t going to go after the antifa types for assault, expecting them to get prosecuted for incitement is probably not going to fly
This is a slippery slope, just look at the UK where a public servant (prosecutor) can interpret words questioning public service policy as being a form “violence”.
Do you see the problem giving these self serving parasites ANY form of interpretive authority?
I’m not condoning their behaviour, but I would rather them charged for public order offences (demonstrably attempting to damage hearing) etc.
THIS!! Too many times we see these people using megaphones and whistles aiming directly into the ear of police or counterdemonstrators. They need to be charged with assault.
I say have ICE slam the butt end of their rifles into the rabblerousers mouths. That would shut them up for a while.
More word games; who defines words which "inflict injury by their very utterance."?
There is protection of speech. I have no issues with allowing all the speech in any of these videos.