Free speech rights

[SapereAude]

Free speech, like free trade and free immigration should not refer to any kind of speech involving the initiation of force. We don't say “free trade should be limited because you can't steal” or “free immigration should be limited because you can't trespass,” etc. We should not say “free speech should be limited because you can't make threats!” So using the “yelling in a crowded theater” example as some kind of limitation on free speech isn't really valid. And it's not like the government will arrest you for yelling in a theater. The old example was supposed to be yelling “fire!” falsely and causing someone to get hurt in the panic and disrupting the paid performance. It is not a limitation on free speech.

I'm not sure if you are referencing my statements..?

If so, I did not say those instances were a "limitation on free speech" but are outside of freedom of speech.

Edited October 7, 2010 by SapereAude

[Zip]

I'm not sure if you are referencing my statements..?

If so, I did not say those instances were a "limitation on free speech" but are outside of freedom of speech.

Right, they are outside of freedom of speech precisely because they are an initiation of force and therefore would infringe on the right to life.

[Jake_Ellison]

Free speech, like free trade and free immigration should not refer to any kind of speech involving the initiation of force.

It doesn't. The sense the authors of the Constitution use the word speech in is "the act of communicating information or ideas".

Ordering someone's murder, or yelling "Fire" in a theater are clearly not regarded as a form of speech, but rather action through speech. The act of yelling fire isn't the problem (a person can yell fire all he wants, if it doesn't lead to people taking action), the action it causes is the problem. Suggesting that the First Amendment is wrong in guaranteeing freedom of speech because yelling fire is a form of speech is just an equivocation on the word "speech".

Suggesting that the word speech in the First Amendment really means "political speech" is also baseless. It means every form of communicating ideas, but it does not mean the initiation of physical force through the act of speaking. That is a distinction consistent with everything in the Constitution, as well as other documents from the era, which declare the rights to life, liberty and property (or the pursuit of happiness, in the case of the DOI) inalienable.

Libel and slander laws would be unconstitutional if this claim were true.

Some definitely are, others aren't. I think I remember reading David Odden give a good explanation on which forms of slander initiate force (and are therefor not just speech, but a form of criminal fraud), and which don't, in a thread about that subject. (I'm not 100% sure it was David, but I am 100% sure that the thread and the explanation both exist. No idea what it's called and how old it is, but it exists.)

Either way, the claim is obviously true. I quoted the US Constitution explicitly stating that the freedom of speech cannot be "abridged" (abridged is used to mean curtailed/infringed upon, not the other meaning) by Congress (or, by extension, any other government entity). The Constitution is the supreme law of the US, so there really aren't any "if"s about the legality of legislative acts curtailing speech.

Edited October 7, 2010 by Jake_Ellison