Category Archives: First Amendment

It won't surprise you to hear Twitter is fighting former President Trump's lawsuit over his ban. Bloomberg reports Twitter has asked a judge to dismiss the suit as it allegedly misinterprets and threatens the company's First Amendment free speech rights. The social network noted it was a private company that isn't obligated to host speech it doesn't like, and that Trump repeatedly violated the rules he agreed to when he chose to use the service. A forced ban reversal would challenge "bedrock principles of constitutional law," Twitter said.

Moreover, Twitter argued its editorial choices related to basic public concerns, including threats to a peaceful White House transition as well as statements that could foster "further violence." The company merely flagged Trump's tweets as misleading in the run-up to the January 6th Capitol assault, but banned him after he continued.

Lead attorney John Coale has contended Twitter is a "state actor" as Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act supposedly equates to a subsidy that forces it to honor the First Amendment like the government does. Biden's Justice Department has objected to this interpretation in a court filing, however, stating that Section 230 is only meant to protect against liability, not regulate the speech of officials like the ex-President.

Trump isn't waiting for a return to Twitter, Facebook and other social networks. He recently launched Truth Social in a bid to enable himself and other conservatives who've felt silenced by tech companies. If Twitter succeeds in its dismissal request, though, Trump won't have much of a choice but to give up his once-preferred platform.

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Twitter asks judge to throw out Trump's lawsuit over ban - Engadget

A federal court order against the Pennsbury School District for curtailing public comments that officials deemed abusive or irrelevant has districts across the region reconsidering how theyll handle heated or hateful speech during school board meetings a regular phenomenon in some communities over the last year.

The order, issued by U.S. District Judge Gene Pratter, came in response to a lawsuit filed Oct. 1 by four residents in the Bucks County district who said their comments were censored, limited, or disrupted by the board, largely as they questioned its equity initiatives.

The First Amendment protections for free speech apply to speaking at public school board meetings, Pratter said in an opinion accompanying her Nov. 17 order, which granted a preliminary injunction against the district but hasnt settled the case.

She agreed that Pennsburys policies prohibiting certain comments including those considered personally directed, offensive, abusive, and irrelevant appeared to be vague and overbroad, and directed the district to stop enforcing them.

Many area school boards have a similar policy in place, modeled after a template recommended by the Pennsylvania School Boards Association, and those boards are going to have to suspend it, said Jeffrey Sultanik, a solicitor for multiple Philadelphia-area districts.

While the Pennsbury order applies only to that district, it could be cited in lawsuits against other school boards. And Pennsbury says it plans to appeal which could lead to a decision that would be binding on all school systems within the nine counties of the federal courts Eastern District. In the meantime, Annette Stevenson, a spokesperson for the school boards association, said its model policy was currently under review but declined to comment further.

The Pennsbury school board is proud of its work during its meetings to ensure all children in the district have equal opportunity to an excellent education, and that work will continue, said spokesperson Jen Neill. The district welcomes the input of its stakeholders in a productive, respectful manner as a way to achieve this goal.

Among the residents who brought the lawsuit was Simon Campbell, a former Pennsbury school board member who said that the country was founded by disruptive, disrespectful people. He and fellow plaintiffs were represented by the Institute for Free Speech, which called the order a wakeup for school boards across America. The Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit is also representing members of the Moms for Liberty group in a similar case against Floridas Brevard County School Board.

Pennsburys board garnered broad attention this summer after a fiery speech by Campbell accusing the board of censorship including calling its president Benito Mussolini went viral. The president, Christine Toy-Dragoni, said she received death and rape threats that escalated with the national attention.

Some thought last months court decision could stoke more antagonism.

It has the potential to make public comment more disrespectful, said Kenneth Roos, another local school district solicitor, though he added that being recorded during meetings hopefully ... is a disincentive to people to behave in an egregious or inappropriate way.

In Central Bucks, school board member Karen Smith saw Pratters order as like putting gasoline on a fire at this point.

At that boards last meeting, some public comments drew outrage including one suggesting ties between Jews and organized crime and calling for a stand against Zionism and communism, and another worrying that transgender students had the right to rape girls in the womens bathroom.

Smith interjected during that latter comment, calling out, Thats enough. But the board president, Dana Hunter, allowed the commenter to continue noting that this is his three minutes.

Smith said her reaction grew out of an accumulation of comments during past meetings targeting transgender people. We dont have that many of these students, but its very difficult for them, she said. The boards policy would have justified ending the comments, she said, but now we cant do anything.

Smith and three other members of the nine-member board released a statement after the meeting condemning the comments. The board meets again with newly elected members on Monday.

Tina Stoll, the school board president in North Penn, said her board has been advised that it can respond to comments that may be hateful maybe not get into it tit-for-tat but make clear the board doesnt endorse such speech.

We cant grab the mic, or cut them off, or anything. Frankly, I think thats sometimes what they want to get the attention, said Stoll, whose board has hosted tense meetings, particularly around masking.

When people have leveled accusations against board members, theyve been permitted to speak: Stoll said: Weve always said, Thank you for your comment. Next.

Some have sought to limit the role of board members in policing public comment. In West Chester where school board president Chris McCune took the microphone this summer from a woman whose time limit expired as she was demanding to know whether the district taught critical race theory the district had its solicitor start attending meetings and enforce the limits.

In Philadelphia, the ACLU sued the district in March on behalf of two community groups alleging a new policy limiting the number of people who could comment at meetings prevented meaningful participation.

The Pennsbury parents lawsuit focused in part on actions by the districts solicitor, Peter Amuso. During a May board meeting, Amuso cut off three men who had begun to criticize the districts equity policy. One had said that diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts were based on a predetermined narrative, ignoring, for example, that first-generation Nigerian immigrants excel.

Youre done! Amuso shouted at each of the men, calling their comments irrelevant.

That meeting followed controversy around the districts handling of public comments at its March meeting. The man who spoke about Nigerian immigrants, Doug Marshall, also one of the plaintiffs in the censorship lawsuit, at the March meeting had questioned equity efforts while explaining the history of racial problems in the country.

Marshall wasnt interrupted that night. But at the urging of the districts equity and diversity director, the board later struck his remarks from a video recording of the meeting, issuing a statement that the comments escalated from expressing a viewpoint to expressing beliefs and ideas that were abusive and coded in racist terms, also known as dog whistles.

In her opinion, Pratter, while not calling Marshalls comments offensive, wrote that the First Amendment protects offensive speakers, and said censorship of comments deemed racist by the district was impermissible viewpoint discrimination.

She didnt agree with the districts argument that not enforcing its policies would lead to violence calling the claim deliberately provocative. She noted the board could call police if a speaker threatens violence, a policy the plaintiffs didnt challenge.

They also didnt challenge a ban on obscene comments. And while Pennsbury can no longer prohibit personally directed comments, lawyers say that doesnt mean school boards have to allow speakers to target a board members family or other personal characteristics only their role in the district.

Sultanik said the decision could be viewed optimistically, as an invitation for tolerance of another viewpoint that you might find personally offensive.

But in a time of heightened animosity and polarization and the potential for another round of contentious board meetings while the future of Pennsylvanias school-masking order is up in the air that might not be realistic, Sultanik said.

I really believe that much of this public discourse is doing very little to change anybodys mind, he said.

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Pennsbury school board now cant stop public comments it deems offensive. What does it mean for other districts? - The Philadelphia Inquirer

The realm of social media has been something of a minefield for public officials. Whether its Facebook, Twitter, Tik Tok or some other digital realm where folks gather to gab, scroll or troll, youll find plenty of elected officials trying to communicate their messages directly to the masses.

The problem whether youre a U.S. president or town councilman is that your message can get overrun with opposite-minded folks. But where the average social media user can simply delete unwanted material from their pages, elected officials cant. A number of courts have ruled that deleting opposing or unwanted comments or viewpoints abridges that persons First Amendment rights.

The U.S. Supreme Court calls social media sites the modern public square, where constituents can petition their elected representatives and otherwise engage with them in a direct manner.

None of which has stopped elected officials from deleting and hiding comments they dont like or agree with or that they consider off topic. But just because they all do it doesnt mean we should accept it. But given the bountiful case law, does it merit yet another federal lawsuit? Apparently so.

James Moore and Beth Ann Pratte, two Moore County residents already suing the Board of Education over another matter, joined forces with the same Raleigh attorney to file a federal lawsuit in the Middle District of North Carolina last month charging that board members Stacey Caldwell, Libby Carter and Ed Dennison deleted comments of theirs from their pages.

Interestingly, the legal outrage appears to be situational. Moore and Pratte left out of the lawsuit other board members who have also deleted, hidden or redirected comments from their various pages over the past year. Board member David Hensley admits he hired his own lawyer earlier this year when he was called out for removing content on his page.

Moore and Prattes other lawsuit is filed in state court and seeks to block the sale of the former Southern Pines Primary School campus to the West Southern Pines Land and Housing Trust. That suit alleges an open sale to the highest bidder is the proper way to go.

Moore and Pratte have spoken out against face mask mandates and other policy issues at previous board meetings. In this newest suit, they say their First Amendment rights were violated when certain comments were removed from Facebook pages by Caldwell, Carter and Dennison.

The comments themselves are all relatively minor: Youre a big disappointment, Pratte wrote on Dennisons page. You need to take a class on the constitution. RINO.

OK, not exactly the Federalist Papers, but a federal case?

Lets be clear: We stand for the First Amendment and against elected officials who seek to delete content on their social media pages. If youre going to communicate directly to the people, youd better be prepared to hear directly from the people, too.

And it doesnt matter if you say its not an official page, so you can do what you want were looking at you, Bob Levy. Levy says his page is not a public or gov. page but then adorns the top with a giant yellow school bus and posts comments about school business and politics. If youre on social media and youre an elected official, youre stuck with the fanboys and the trolls. Get over it.

As for this being grounds for a federal lawsuit, its all just meant to distract and waste time and government money. No federal judge is going to let this case go forward. Its really about public embarrassment. Frankly, were all embarrassed of all the parties involved.

In one of Prattes undeleted comments on Carters page, she asks, When will the board of education start to focus on education?

Maybe when they can stop dealing with all the antics and breathless embellishments.

Read the rest here:
Column: Tripped Up By Social Media | Opinion | thepilot.com - Southern Pines Pilot

LANCASTER The three Fairfield County commissioners have no control over how state and federal authorities manage the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. But for almost two years now the pandemic is basically all citizens who speak at the weekly commissioner meetings talk about.

Citizens are granted three minutes to address the commission on any topic they choose. However, the commissioners rarely respond on the spot because the three minutes are not a question-and-answer session.

Commission president Dave Levacy and commissioners Jeff Fix and Steve Davis all said they welcome public comments and have no plans on changing the format or allowing only comments related to county business.

"Obviously, we could do that," Levacy said. "But we don't want to be too restrictive in what people want to talk about. I think people have concerns and it's OK if they want to express those concerns."

However, Levacy and Fix said they wish speakers would stick to county issues instead of issues like COVID-19 mask mandates and vaccine mandates. For example, one speaker gives the commissioners handouts each week on issues that are not county specific.

But Levacy, Fix andDavis all said they have no issues with how the public comment portion of the meetings are going.

"First of all, I respect everybody's right to speak," Levacy said. "Obviously, the First Amendment gives us that privilege. I think it's important we stay focused andlook at the things we can possibly change and not focus on areas that we can't change. People should focus on the things we in Fairfield County can change and not in areas that we have no ability to change."

Some speakers have asked the commissioners to make the county a sanctuary county for various issues like mask mandates and Second Amendment issues. Levacy, though, said that is not a place he wants to go.

"We county commissioners don't have the ability to legislate," he said. "So when some of the counties take that approach, basically they're doing it for the visuals, for the optics. It really has no legal justification. I think it's a waste of time. We don't have the legislative authority. That's done by the state legislature."

Therefore, Levacy said people should talk to their state officials on state-related issues instead of the commissioners. However, he said it's important that everyone voice their concerns and that he has no problem with that.

But he said long-winded conversations rob the commissioners the time needed for county business.

"That's my only concern," Levacy said. "If we had an unlimited amount of time it wouldn't be an issue. But we don't."

Fix said the commissioners welcome public comment. But like Levacy, he said he wishes people would stick to county issues.

"We every week get a reading of things that don't apply to what we do as county commissioners," Fix said. "I've told those people that they'rewelcome to come in and talk to us about that stuff, but that's not what we do.

"We don't decide on mandates for vaccines or masks for anything like that. That's all outside of our purview.But nonetheless, if they want to come and air their grievances and this is the place they feel comfortable doing that, so be it."

Fix said Levacy is technically correct in saying that outside issues take time away from dealing with county issues. But he said he wants all constituents to feel comfortable coming to meetings and talking about what's on their mind.

As for limiting discussion to only county business, Fix said that would be less welcoming to speakers.

"I know there are people who attend our meetings virtually or in person who get frustrated and often leave the meeting when people get up to talk about vaccine mandates that don't really have anything to do with us," he said."But some people who choose to spend their time and talk to us about what's important to them, that's important to them.

"As challenging as it may be to go through that every week when it doesn't really apply to what we do, I feel like we owe it to the public to hear them out on whatever topic is on their mind."

Davis would appear to be the most lenient of the three commissioners on the issue. He said he has no problem with people talking about issue not related to county business.

"We shouldn't be trying to monitor content because I just don't know when to stop it you start doing that," Davis said. "It's really hard for me to intellectually think about what is or isn't county business. We're a very complex $190-millon organization and we touch a lot of things.

"So for me to say that, 'Well, you said this and we don't have anything to do with that.' In some attenuated way we probably do. So I just don't want any content regulations."

jbarron@gannett.com

740-304-9296

Twitter: @JeffDBarron

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Commissioners get a lot of public comments on things they have no control over at meetings - Lancaster Eagle Gazette

CLOVIS, N.M.(KRQE) One southeastern New Mexico town is trying to come into compliance with federal law. It involves the billboards and what a community must allow on them.

The city of Clovis met last week to discuss a revised ordinance on the signs in the city. This chapter shall be interpreted in a manner consistent with the first amendment of the United States constitution, which guarantees free speech including prohibition of regulating signage based on content viewpoint or message, said Mike Morris the mayor of Clovis.

The citys ordinance is trying to come in compliance with the constitution and not regulate what kinds of signs can go up. Justin Howalt, Clovis city manager, said, what the means is basically you cannot regulate signage by what can potentially be on that sign.

The signage ordinance would also have rules based on where they are in the city. They are looking to regulate the height of signs, how long they can stay up, and what to do with them if they stay vacant.

The reason for doing that obviously is the feel of the different zones and the aesthetics of the different zones we wanted to make sure that we were honoring and trying to make it that the property owners that live in that area or the other businesses in that area have the ability to still advertise for their business, Howalt said.

At the meeting last week, citizens were concerned about the ordinance being a one-size-fits-all that doesnt work. People were worried about the safety of large distracting signs. The thing that I have the biggest concern for is one size doesnt fit all, one resident said.

You know somewhere around 60 ft along the highway where people are driving fast is a lot different than where you have stoplights, another said.

The city of Clovis is having the open comment period through next month, the council will then vote on the revised ordinance in January.

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City of Clovis looking at sign ordinance to follow U.S. Constitution - KRQE News 13

Extensive redactions in public investigative reports into a scandal that rocked the town of Danvers are raising legal and ethical questions about how town officials chose to balance privacy rights with the publics right to know.This comes as Danvers school leaders for the first time acknowledged and praised the one hockey player who told 5 Investigates the disturbing details of racist and homophobic hazing rituals conducted by the boys high school hockey team in the locker room.Despite that praise for the anonymous whistleblower, school officials have given no indication they will uncover blacked-out information in investigative reports about their findings.The hockey player who would later talk to 5 Investigates and the Boston Globe had told town investigators all about it months earlier, but the Danvers community never saw those statements because town officials redacted them in all three public investigative reports.5 Investigates interviewed the hockey player on camera on the condition that we shield his identity.5 Investigates: Do you believe there is a cover-up?Player: I do.5 Investigates: Why?Player: How much black writing is there? That's a cover-up.This hockey player was talking about reports produced by three different town investigations in Danvers involving alleged violent, racist and homophobic hazing rituals inside the boys varsity hockey team locker room.He told 5 Investigates the disturbing details of what he said happened behind closed doors in the teams locker room, including what he said were called, "Hard-R Fridays." He said players who refused to say the N-word with a hard "R" were physically assaulted, sometimes with a red sex toy.I would refuse to say it and get held down by multiple of my friends and beaten, the player said.But if you read copies of reports by the Danvers school department, the Danvers Police Department and an outside consultant paid by the town, you have no idea what took place there.The reason? The town of Danvers redacted almost all the keywords throughout the reports.These are public records. The public owns these records, said Jeff Pyle, a First Amendment lawyer at the Boston law firm of Prince Lobel, who reviewed the reports for 5 Investigates.Pyle said state law permits redactions in public records for certain reasons, including to protect people's privacy, but not, in this case, to shield unpleasant details of the hockey team's rituals from public scrutiny. The law provides that the public has a right to know what's in the record unless there's a very specific and narrow legal exemption, Pyle said. These (records) are very broadly redacted, and that leads me to suspect that they're more redacted than is possible or permissible under the law.In the school department's report, Pyle found redactions he says had no legitimate purpose.There is a conclusion that's redacted that says a culture of normalizing blank and blank language existed among the blank team, he said. Whose privacy are they trying to protect by redacting words like racism or anti-gay from a report like this? Are they trying to protect racism's privacy? Because this is not a privacy redaction. This is a redaction to try and cover up the conclusions of an investigation. Danvers School Superintendent Lisa Dana declined 5 Investigates' request for an interview. Attorneys for the Danvers School Department said they were careful to protect the privacy rights of the students involved. The chair of the Danvers School Committee recently described the town's thinking at a public meeting.Would it have helped them to have details of any of the conduct that we acknowledged publicly was inappropriate? Eric Crane asked. Would that have served (the players) emotional safety in the school if we came out with it publicly?But Pyle said the town took another questionable step in its handling of the investigative reports by leaving visible, not redacting, many statements that said nothing seriously wrong happened in the Danvers boys hockey locker room.It says to me that the municipality is over redacting these reports in order to prevent embarrassment to itself, Pyle said.The Danvers school department said its redactions were approved by the state's supervisor of public records.The Danvers police said the town balanced any right the public has to information in the records with the privacy interests of the individuals involved.

Extensive redactions in public investigative reports into a scandal that rocked the town of Danvers are raising legal and ethical questions about how town officials chose to balance privacy rights with the publics right to know.

This comes as Danvers school leaders for the first time acknowledged and praised the one hockey player who told 5 Investigates the disturbing details of racist and homophobic hazing rituals conducted by the boys high school hockey team in the locker room.

Despite that praise for the anonymous whistleblower, school officials have given no indication they will uncover blacked-out information in investigative reports about their findings.

The hockey player who would later talk to 5 Investigates and the Boston Globe had told town investigators all about it months earlier, but the Danvers community never saw those statements because town officials redacted them in all three public investigative reports.

5 Investigates interviewed the hockey player on camera on the condition that we shield his identity.

5 Investigates: Do you believe there is a cover-up?

Player: I do.

5 Investigates: Why?

Player: How much black writing is there? That's a cover-up.

This hockey player was talking about reports produced by three different town investigations in Danvers involving alleged violent, racist and homophobic hazing rituals inside the boys varsity hockey team locker room.

He told 5 Investigates the disturbing details of what he said happened behind closed doors in the teams locker room, including what he said were called, "Hard-R Fridays." He said players who refused to say the N-word with a hard "R" were physically assaulted, sometimes with a red sex toy.

I would refuse to say it and get held down by multiple of my friends and beaten, the player said.

But if you read copies of reports by the Danvers school department, the Danvers Police Department and an outside consultant paid by the town, you have no idea what took place there.

The reason? The town of Danvers redacted almost all the keywords throughout the reports.

These are public records. The public owns these records, said Jeff Pyle, a First Amendment lawyer at the Boston law firm of Prince Lobel, who reviewed the reports for 5 Investigates.

Pyle said state law permits redactions in public records for certain reasons, including to protect people's privacy, but not, in this case, to shield unpleasant details of the hockey team's rituals from public scrutiny.

The law provides that the public has a right to know what's in the record unless there's a very specific and narrow legal exemption, Pyle said. These (records) are very broadly redacted, and that leads me to suspect that they're more redacted than is possible or permissible under the law.In the school department's report, Pyle found redactions he says had no legitimate purpose.

There is a conclusion that's redacted that says a culture of normalizing blank and blank language existed among the blank team, he said. Whose privacy are they trying to protect by redacting words like racism or anti-gay from a report like this? Are they trying to protect racism's privacy? Because this is not a privacy redaction. This is a redaction to try and cover up the conclusions of an investigation.

Danvers School Superintendent Lisa Dana declined 5 Investigates' request for an interview. Attorneys for the Danvers School Department said they were careful to protect the privacy rights of the students involved. The chair of the Danvers School Committee recently described the town's thinking at a public meeting.

Would it have helped them to have details of any of the conduct that we acknowledged publicly was inappropriate? Eric Crane asked. Would that have served (the players) emotional safety in the school if we came out with it publicly?

But Pyle said the town took another questionable step in its handling of the investigative reports by leaving visible, not redacting, many statements that said nothing seriously wrong happened in the Danvers boys hockey locker room.

It says to me that the municipality is over redacting these reports in order to prevent embarrassment to itself, Pyle said.

WCVB

The Danvers school department said its redactions were approved by the state's supervisor of public records.

The Danvers police said the town balanced any right the public has to information in the records with the privacy interests of the individuals involved.

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Did Danvers officials try to cover up hockey team hazing scandal? - WCVB Boston

In two cases that could have sweeping implications for free speech online, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter are challenging new laws in Florida and Texas that limit their ability to decide which content appears on their platforms.

The companies are right that the laws violate the First Amendment, but some of the arguments they are making are deeply flawed. If these arguments get traction in the courts, it will be difficult for legislatures to pass sensible and free-speech-friendly laws meant to protect democratic values in the digital public sphere.

The Florida and Texas cases are unusually important because they concern the first significant efforts by states to regulate social media companies. The laws differ in some respects, but between them they prevent the companies from removing certain content, limit their use of algorithms and require them to publish information about their content-moderation practices. They also restrict the companies ability to attach their own labels to users posts.

The power that a few technology companies wield over public discourse is a real problem, but the two states laws are less an effort to address this problem than an attempt to punish certain social media companies for their supposed political views. In the months before the laws were passed, Twitter and Facebook kicked President Donald Trump off their platforms, blocked or limited access to a news story about Hunter Biden and attached labels to what they determined to be misleading claims about the election and the pandemic.

The Florida and Texas laws were payback. Legislators were candid about this, as were the states governors. Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida declared that the law was intended to take back the virtual public square from big tech oligarchs and their radical leftist narrative. Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas explained that his states law was intended to stop the companies from silencing conservative viewpoints and ideas.

The laws themselves reflect this intent. This is especially true of the Florida law, whose definition of social media platform is gerrymandered to reach the Silicon Valley companies alleged to harbor liberal sympathies but to exclude platforms owned by Disney, which has extensive operations in Florida.

The companies are correct that the two laws discriminate against certain platforms based on their perceived political views and two federal district courts have enjoined the laws pending appeal. Whats concerning is that the companies have made arguments that go much further.

For instance, they contend that the courts should extend to social media platforms exactly the same very broad First Amendment protections that have been afforded in the past to newspapers. They also argue that any law that burdens their exercise of editorial judgment, however minimally, should be deemed unconstitutional. These arguments are deeply misconceived and would, if the courts agree with them, pre-empt even laws that do not share the Florida and Texas laws fundamental defects.

The truth is that social media platforms are like newspapers in some ways but not others. Like other media organizations, social media companies sometimes make decisions about which content to publish, and they sometimes add their own voices to public discourse as they do when they attach labels to users posts. When the companies engage in these activities, they are exercising the kind of editorial discretion that the Supreme Court has protected against government interference again and again.

But social media platforms are different from newspapers in important ways. They are primarily vehicles for others speech, rather than their own. They do not exercise close curatorial control over the content they publish. They do not take responsibility for the content they publish in the same way that newspapers do and the law does not require them to. There is also an incredible disparity in scale between (many) social media platforms and newspapers. Over the course of a day, the newspaper you are reading publishes a couple of hundred articles, but the big platforms publish hundreds of millions of posts.

Florida and Texas contend that these kinds of differences mean that social media companies are outside the protection of the First Amendment. That is clearly wrong. But the First Amendment should apply differently to social media companies than it does to newspapers, because social media companies and newspapers exercise editorial judgment in different ways.

The stakes here are high. The constitutional protection the Supreme Court has afforded to editorial judgment is essential and worth defending for newspapers and for social media companies as well. This protection safeguards the right of editors of all kinds to decide for themselves which speech to publish and promote. It also serves as a crucial bulwark against government efforts to distort and control public discourse.

But the companies arguments would make it almost impossible for legislatures to enact carefully drawn laws that protect the integrity of the digital public sphere. They would make it difficult for legislatures to impose even modest transparency requirements on the companies, to require the companies to share data with academic researchers or to require them to provide explanations to users whose posts are removed or whose accounts are suspended. They would also make it difficult for legislatures to pass straightforward privacy laws limiting the information companies can collect and how they can use it.

Of course, whether any particular legislative proposal is constitutional will turn on its specifics. If the courts accept the companies arguments, however, many legislative proposals worth considering will be dead on arrival.

The federal appeals courts should not allow the companies to turn the First Amendment against the values it was meant to serve. They should strike down the Florida and Texas laws but reject the social media companies broader arguments. It would be terrible if the First Amendment were allowed to become an obstacle to carefully drawn legislation meant to strengthen democratic values online.

Jameel Jaffer is executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University and was a deputy legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union. Scott Wilkens is an attorney at the Knight Institute and was a partner at the law firm Jenner & Block, where he focused largely on intellectual property disputes involving technology companies.

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Originally posted here:
Opinion | Social Media Companies Are Trying to Co-opt the First Amendment - The New York Times

In June, I wrote aboutBurns v. Town of Palm Beach. This case presented a perennial conflict at the intersection of property law and constitutional law: is architectural design protected by the First Amendment. A divided panel of the Eleventh Circuit rejected the claim that architectural design would be understood as protected speech.

Burns has now filed a cert petition. It prevents a recurring question in land-use litigation:

Did the Town of Palm Beach violate Burns's First Amendment rights by denying his proposed home design based solely on aesthetics when the design met all objective zoning criteria?

The brief flagged exchanges from the Masterpiece Cakeshoporal arguments that I had forgotten about. Justices Alito and Breyer inquired about the relationship between the First Amendment and architecture.

JUSTICE ALITO: What would you say about an architectural design? Is that entitled to -- not entitled to First Amendment protection because one might say that the primary purpose of the design of a building is to create a place where people can live or work?

JUSTICE BREYER: So, in other words, Mies or Michelangelo or someone is not protected when he creates the Laurentian steps, but this cake baker is protected when he creates the cake without any message on it for a wedding? Now, that -- that really does baffle me, I have to say.

The Goldwater Institute and the Cato Institute also filed an amicus brief that offers three procedural safeguards:

This Court has said that any time government requires a person to obtain a permit in order to exercise any of the "freedoms which the Constitution guarantees," three procedural safeguards must be satisfied: (1) the criteria for obtaining the permission must be clear and unambiguous, (2) there must be a specified deadline on which the applicant will receive an answer, and (3) the applicant must have an opportunity to go before a neutral judge to challenge the denial of a permit if she believes that denial wrongful

The town's brief is due on January 24.

Read more from the original source:
Architecture and the First Amendment Before the Supreme Court - Reason

The Daily Iowan Opinions Staff discusses the settlement from two lawsuits that dealt with First Amendment rights.

Shahab Khan (Opinions Columnist): So, the University of Iowa was embroiled in two First Amendment lawsuits about religious freedom.

Hannah Pinski (Opinions and Amplify Editor): Indeed. One of them was from 2017 and involved Business Leaders in Christ, also known as BLinC, and the other was from 2018 from Intervarsity Christian Fellowship. The Eighth Circuit Court ordered that the UI pay $1.93 million for attorney fees and damages.

Shahab: Looking through the details of the case, these groups were both deregistered by the university.

For BLinC, it started when an LGBTQ+ member was blocked from becoming a leader when he didnt affirm that same-sex marriages are against the Bible.

Meanwhile, Intervarsity sued after Andrew Kutcher, the former coordinator for student organizations development, notified the group that their constitution violated the UIs human rights policy by barring non-Christians from leadership roles.

Hannah: Although the rulings have already been made, Im sure the settlement money is going to spark debate again in the community over these decisions. I think its important to look at this from a moral and legal standpoint because they are two different perspectives.

Shahab: Right, I agree with you on that part. Oftentimes, when law is discussed, conversations tend to assume that legality implies that the law is moral. However, as many jurists have noted over the time, it is important to recognize that morality is not necessarily an antecedent for legality.

Hannah: What are your thoughts from the moral perspective?

Shahab: We have to recognize that this decision represents the conundrum when it comes to squaring morality with our constitution. The beauty and limitation of the First Amendment is that it protects speech of all people regardless of their moral systemunless that moral system calls for causing injury to people.

In the eyes of BLinC and Intervarsity, by shunning the LGBTQ+ community, they are preserving their moral tradition against what they see as immoral behavior. In my opinion, the moral tradition that these groups want to protect is a backward and dangerous system that facilitates discrimination against people who do not identify as Christian.

I guess what I am trying to get at is that there is tension in the liberal principles that guide our constitution and my own ethical philosophy requires that I tolerate the rights of the other side to express themselves. Even if those views are grounded in bigotry.

Hannah: From the legal perspective, the student organizations had a much stronger argument than the university. These organizations do have First Amendment rights. If other student organizations such as other religious groups or womens leadership groups are allowed to restrict leadership based on things like gender or ideology, then it would be hypocritical to not allow Christian organizations to do so.

Shahab: Yeah, I agree with you there, based on how our current legal system interprets the First Amendment, the student organizations do have a stronger case to make. That being said, it is also worthwhile to remember that what the discrimination that these groups are promoting shows the limits of our legal system in litigating morality.

Columns reflect the opinions of the authors and are not necessarily those of the Editorial Board, The Daily Iowan, or other organizations in which the author may be involved.

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A free speech advocacy group on Tuesday called on Rep. Thomas MassieThomas Harold MassieOcasio-Cortez criticizes Boebert Christmas tree and guns photo First Amendment group calls on Rep. Massie to unblock critics on Twitter Press: GOP freak show: Who's in charge? MORE (R-Ky.) to restore access to Twitter users who were blocked from his official account amid a backlash to a controversial family photograph the congressman tweeted.

In a four-page letter, the Knight First Amendment Institute pointed Massie to court rulings that interpreted government officials Twitter accounts to be public forums, and said blocking followers due to their critical views violated constitutional speech protections.

Multiple courts have held that public officials social media accounts constitute public forumswhen they are used in the way that you use the @RepThomasMassie account, and they have made clear that public officials violate the First Amendment when they block users from these fora on the basis of viewpoint, reads the letter from the Institute, which is housed at Columbia University.

Massie sparked outrage last week when he tweeted a Christmas card photograph depicting himself and family members clutching AR-15-style semi-automatic rifles and other firearms just days after a deadly school shooting in Michigan. The shooting renewed calls by lawmakers and advocates for gun control legislation.

"Merry Christmas!" Massie's tweet said, adding, "ps. Santa, please bring ammo."

The post drew widespread condemnation on Twitter, apparently prompting Massie or the manager of his account to block critics.

Among those blocked were Mike Masnick, founder and editor-in-chief of the tech policy website Techdirt, whom the Knight Institute is representing in the matter.

Attempts to reach Massies office were not immediately returned.

A major First Amendment court clash over government officials blocking of Twitter critics arose under former President TrumpDonald TrumpOn The Money Senate risks Trump's ire with debt ceiling deal Bank regulator erupts in partisan split as Democrats go rogue Biden to appear on 'The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon' on Friday MORE.

Lower federal courts found that Trumps Twitter account, where he often weighed in on official matters, constituted a public forum and that blocking his detractors violated their free speech rights.

The Trump administration had asked the Supreme Court to take up its appeal in the case. But following Trumps 2020 electoral loss and his ban from Twitter, his administration dropped its request on the eve of President BidenJoe BidenNicaragua breaks diplomatic relations with Taiwan, recognizes Chinese sovereignty Biden reassures Ukraine's Zelensky of U.S. support amid Russian aggression On The Money Senate risks Trump's ire with debt ceiling deal MOREs inauguration, arguing that the change in administrations would make the case moot.

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First Amendment group calls on Rep. Massie to unblock critics on Twitter | TheHill - The Hill