Re: Ketanji Jackson Worried That the 1st Amendment is Hamstringing Government Censorship

BTR1701 <atropos@mac.com> wrote:

FPP <fredp1571@gmail.com> wrote:

On 3/22/24 4:13 PM, trotsky wrote:

On 3/21/24 12:29 PM, BTR1701 wrote:

FPP <fredp1571@gmail.com> wrote:

On 3/20/24 2:50 PM, BTR1701 wrote:

FPP <fredp1571@gmail.com> wrote:

On 3/19/24 10:29 PM, BTR1701 wrote:

Jackson said a "once-in-a-lifetime pandemic" or other emergencies
would provide grounds for the government to censor social media posts
that are misinformative.

The government has the power and, indeed the right to make sure that
harmful information doesn't get to the public.

(1) The government has no rights. Only citizens have rights. Government
only has powers granted to it by the citizens.

(2) Whatever power the the government may have with regard to 'harmful
information' is limited by the 1st Amendment's prohibition on
government censorship.

The 1st Amendment doesn't say, "...shall make no law abridging the
freedom of speech, except if some government bureaucrat decides what
you're saying is harmful".

(3) This restriction on government power doesn't even go away when
there's an emergency, as the Supreme Court has ruled:

"Neither the legislature nor any executive or judicial officer may
disregard the provisions of the Constitution in case of emergency."� Ex
parte Milligan, 71 U.S. 2 (1866)

"I'm interested in your view that the context does't change the 1st
Amendment principles," she said. "I understood our 1st Amendment
jurisprudence to require heightened scrutiny of government
restrictions of speech, but not necessarily a total prohibition when
you're talking about a compelling interest of the government to
ensure, for example, that the public has accurate information in the
context of a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic."

Try telling kids to eat Tide Pods because they're good for them and
see where it gets you.

Or try publishing National Defense secrets...

No, Effa, we already resolved that one and, as usual, your point of
view loses:

New York Times v. United States, 403 U.S. 713 (1971)

RULING: The New York Times' publishing of the national security
information found in the Pentagon Papers is protected speech under the
1st Amendment, even during time of war.

Once again reinforcing that there is no 'emergency exception' to the
requirements and restrictions the Constitution places on the
government.

(This is one of those landmark cases that you should have learned about
in grade school, Effa. Certainly something a self-proclaimed amateur
historian should-- but apparently doesn't-- know.)

And the press is a protected institution. You're not the press.

Nowhere does the 1st Amendment limit press protection to only people who
work for big legacy corporations. Indeed, the Supreme Court has ruled
that citizen media-- bloggers, YouTubers, individual citizens commenting
on websites-- all fall under the 1st Amendment's press protections.

You're 0 for 2 on this one, Shit-Shoes. Wanna go for the hat trick?

He hasn't given a citation, has he? Last I checked, as of Feb 2024, 2
cases were still before the court.

No decision I've seen yet. But, Thanny doesn't need citations. He just
makes it up these days.

You can't stop lying, can you, Shit-Shoes? I literally gave you
citations to two different Supreme Court cases in this thread alone.

You're the one who makes shit up (like "only employees of big legacy
media corporations are covered by the Free Press Clause") with no
citations to back it up, despite boldly proclaiming in the past that you
never post anything without a citation to back it up.

The civil right protecting the liberty of freedom of the press protects
any publisher. "Publishing" includes all aspects of the process of
communication: putting it into a fixed form, printing or copying it or
reproducing it electronically or photographically if it's not literally
on paper, and then distributing it to its intended audience.

The government cannot interfere in any aspect without infringing upon
this liberty with civil rights protection. For instance, it cannot say
that it's alright to mass produce a newspaper but making it illegal to
sell or distribute it.

If you are the publisher, then you are protected from censorship. There
is no limitation on which publishers are protected in the Constitution.

How did Fred Phelps not learn this in elementary school?