Law Commons^™

Discussing The First Amendment, Christina E. Wells

Michigan Law Review

Since the First Amendment's inception, Americans have agreed that free expression is foundational to our democratic way of life. Though we agree on this much, we have rarely agreed on much else regarding the appropriate parameters of free expression. Is the First Amendment absolute or does it allow some regulation of speech? Should the First Amendment protect offensive speech, pornography, flag-burning? Why do we protect speech - to promote the search for truth, to promote self-governance, or to protect individual autonomy?2 History is rife with disagreements regarding these issues to which there are no definitive answers. Certainly, the text of …

Attacking Brandenburg With History: Does The Long-Term Harm Of Biased Speech Justify A Criminal Statute Suppressing It?, Anuj C. Desai

Federal Communications Law Journal

Book Review: Destructive Messages: How Hate Speech Paves the Way for Harmful Social Movements, Alexander Tsesis, New York: New York University Press, 2002, 246 pages.

A review of Alexander Tsesis's Destructive Messages: How Hate Speech Paves the Way for Harmful Social Movements, New York University Press, 2002. At one level, Alexander Tsesis's thesis is simply one in a long line of arguments about the need to regulate racist speech. Yet on another level, it is fundamentally different from much American literature on "hate speech" because Tsesis draws on a broad historical swath, and because he contends that the United States …