The Supreme Court May Criminalize Immigrant Advocacy

November 18, 2019 12:20 PM

The case could let the government prosecute people for routine legal work or even sympathetic tweets.
posted by Homo neanderthalensis (12 comments total)

Freedom of speech is one of the few issues that could be said to have bipartisan support at the Supreme Court. While the justices might differ as to what exactly counts as “speech”—money, for example—they agree that it takes a lot for the government to overcome First Amendment objections.

Now the conservative justices have a chance to prove their commitment to that principle.

Fuuuuuuuu
posted by schadenfrau at 12:46 PM on November 18, 2019 [6 favorites]

I could end up in jail for the snarky response to a Request for Evidence I wrote on a client's behalf just this morning.
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:02 PM on November 18, 2019 [4 favorites]

C'mon, they've never supported freedom of speech for people with opinions different from theirs. Remember the Hayes code and HUAC? That the FBI had license to make war on leftists for over 50 years? "War on drugs" to make sure liberals and minorities couldn't serve in police or government without breaking an oath? None of that went away.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 1:17 PM on November 18, 2019 [25 favorites]

well this is completely horrifying
posted by supermedusa at 1:35 PM on November 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

I think I once saw a tweet that said something along the lines of: "You can trace the history of 1st amendment jurisprudence through the 'fire in a theater' standard. It was introduced in Schenk to put socialist anti-draft leafleteers in jail and then relaxed in Brandenburg to allow Nazis to march in Ohio." This is, perhaps, a drastic interpretation; and yet, that is pretty much what happened.
posted by mhum at 1:47 PM on November 18, 2019 [40 favorites]

This is, perhaps, a drastic interpretation; and yet, that is pretty much what happened.

... So not a drastic interpretation so much as a plain language discreption of the face value of the cases in question.
posted by PMdixon at 3:26 PM on November 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

PMdixon: "So not a drastic interpretation so much as a plain language discreption of the face value of the cases in question."

Indeed. However, I suppose that instead of "interpretation", perhaps "juxtaposition" might have been more apt, i.e.: there was probably other 1st Amendment stuff that happened in the intervening years. Overall, I wonder if it'd be a useful exercise to identify all the times where 1st Amendment-type rights have been expanded versus all the times where they've been contracted.
posted by mhum at 4:15 PM on November 18, 2019 [1 favorite]

Landmark first amendment cases.
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:40 PM on November 18, 2019 [1 favorite]

Here's the opinion from the ninth circuit.
posted by gryftir at 8:49 PM on November 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

So, the panel ruled the sentence was "unconstitutionally overbroad in violation of the First Amendment because it criminalizes a substantial amount of protected expression in relation to its narrow band of legitimately prohibited conduct and unprotected expression."
posted by aspersioncast at 12:05 PM on November 19, 2019

Yeah, I don't think for an instant the Republicans on the Supreme Court will think for even a moment about the sheer breathtaking hypocrisy of ruling that money is speech but speech is not speech.

Because, again, it isn't really hypocrisy. It's worse than that. It's aristocracy. It's the belief that the rule of law should not be equal but that some people should be treated better than others in the courts. Fundamentally Republicans do not believe in equality, either legally or socially. This will be another 5-4 ruling in favor of Trump.
posted by sotonohito at 6:14 PM on November 19, 2019 [2 favorites]

There's a reason Frank Wilhoit gets quoted so often these days: "Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition. There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect."
posted by tavella at 9:55 AM on November 20, 2019 [1 favorite]