ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, December 24, 1995 TAG: 9512270013
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: B-2 EDITION: METRO
AS PEACE and good will settle over the nation, our thoughts turn to . . . the First Amendment.
It poses a paradox.
To have any practical meaning, its free-speech guarantee cannot be confined to speech that is inoffensive, that hurts no one's feelings, that is not hateful. The content of a speaker's message, however despicable, should not be the test of whether the message is denied expression by the state.
That's why the Ku Klux Klan is granted parade permits to march down city streets. That's what's wrong with hate-crime laws that go beyond the crime itself and impose additional penalties for the content of the message. It's why the fortunately killed flag-burning amendment, by permitting the government to define a crime on the basis of viewpoint rather than behavior, would have diminished First Amendment liberties.
The paradox raised by such examples: How can a tolerant society afford to tolerate messages of intolerance?
The first part of the answer is that such speech often is accompanied by activity - from the petty, like trespassing, to the gravely serious, like plotting to blow up a federal office building - that would be a crime regardless of the explicit or implicit political message thereby conveyed. Therefore, it can be prosecuted without damage to the First Amendment (as long, that is, as no extra charges apply because of the particular beliefs held or promulgated by the criminal).
The second part of the answer is that communities of people struggling to fight hatred in their midst can exercise their own First Amendment rights. This does not mean imposing speech codes, as many universities are doing. It means denouncing extremist intolerance, and demonstrating through word and deed that the hatemongers aren't moving their product.
A Roanoke group's attempt to advertise the fact that "diversity enriches" - rebutting those who fear or despise the presence of gays and lesbians - is one example. Others from around the country were cited recently in The Christian Science Monitor:
In Glenwood, Ore., vandals broke windows and painted swastikas in a Jewish synagogue, causing $10,000 worth of damage. Local high-school students helped repaint and restore it.
In Somerville, Mass., police found anti-Semitic and racist neo-Nazi flyers. A coalition of community groups has undertaken a plan to demonstrate the lack of community support for such views by issuing statements, holding educational events and monitoring hate groups' meetings.
In Billings, Mont., an American Indian's home was spray-painted with racist graffiti, a Jewish cemetery was desecrated, a cinder block was thrown through the window of a home displaying a menorah. Labor-union members repainted the American Indian's home. Our favorite: The Billings newspaper printed a picture of a menorah; thousands of residents of Billings, whose Jewish population is about 100 out of 80,000, placed the picture in their windows as a sign of solidarity.
To the degree such spray-painting or window-breaking damages the property of others, it is a crime and should be prosecuted as such, and to the full extent of the law. But to the degree that such incidents are sometimes expressions for a message of sociopolitical hate, governmental suppression is not the answer.
The answer, rather, lies in the community's reaffirmation of the values despised by the haters.
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