Today we made posters or skits about our cases and the precedents that apply. You should have taken notes about each precedent in your notebook.
Should you be able to say whatever you want to say whenever you want to say it according to the law? Today we attempted to answer this question. We looked at a short video about the Westboro Baptist Church and then wrote a response in our journals.
I divided you into groups and each group looked at a case. If you were absent, choose a case and fill out the following in your journal: 1. What are the sides of the case and what are arguments for each party involved? 2. What should the police or government do about the situation? 3. What are your thoughts on the case? Is this speech supported by the constitution? Should it be? Cases 1. A speaker in a hall says Hitler was right to exterminate the Jews during World War II. Outside the hall, several hundred people are shouting threats against the speaker, breaking windows with rocks, and preventing others from going inside. 2. About 25 Ku Klux Klan members choose a neighborhood with predominantly African American residents to hold a march protesting the observance of Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday. Before the march begins, the police receive phone calls from several individuals threatening to shoot the Klan members if they show up. 3. The British Sun newspaper hinted that Diaz had an affair with Shane Nickerson, a friend. When the article was published, she and Nickerson were in relationships and the hardly recognizable image posted with the article caused damage to both relationships 4. About 30 anti-abortion protesters march in a circle on a sidewalk in front of a clinic where abortions are performed, chanting slogans and carrying signs. As women attempt to enter the clinic, the protesters try to block the entrance and verbally harass the women, trying to persuade them not to have an abortion. 5. An out-of-control influx of near-naked women jockeying for tips has turned Times Square into the XXX-Roads of the World — shocking children and incensing legions of tourists and New Yorkers alike. 6. In 1984, during a protest against the policies of the Reagan administration in Dallas, Texas, Gregory Lee Johnson doused an American flag that was given to him by a fellow demonstrator with kerosene and set it alight while those around him chanted "America the red, white and blue, we spit on you." The expanding cadre of topless talent — wearing only a thong, a thin layer of paint and a smile — fight it out with the usual cast of amateur Buzz Lightyears and Spider-Men for souvenir photographs at $10 to $20 a pop. “It’s inappropriate,” fumed Odessa Leitch, 38, watching the provocative parade of ladies with her 12-year-son and 3-year-old daughter at her side. Odessa calls the police. Then, look at the precedents below. Precedents are rules set by previous court cases. What precedents apply to the case? Explain. Precedents Incitement: The courts decided that they could not punish mere advocacy. That means that they cannot limit speech that advocates, supports or describes a particular viewpoint. EVEN if that viewpoint is violent. They can only limit speech that expresses an immediate or imminent call to violence. In other words, they can limit speech that incites violence. Fighting words: In Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire (1942), the Supreme Court held that speech is unprotected if it constitutes "fighting words". Fighting words, as defined by the Court, is speech that "tend[s] to incite an immediate breach of the peace" by provoking a fight, so long as it is a "personally abusive [word] which, when addressed to the ordinary citizen, is, as a matter of common knowledge, inherently likely to provoke a violent reaction". Additionally, such speech must be "directed to the person of the hearer" and is "thus likely to be seen as a 'direct personal insult'". Along with fighting words, speech might be unprotected if it either intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly inflicts severe emotional distress. Miller test: Under the Miller test (which takes its name from Miller v. California [1973]), speech is unprotected if (1) "the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find that the [subject or work in question], taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest" and (2) "depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, contemporary community standards, sexual conduct defined by the applicable state law" and (3) "the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value". Defamation: is the communication of a false statement that harms the reputation of an individual person,business, product, group, government, religion, or nation as well as other various kinds of defamation that retaliate against groundless criticism.Under common law, to constitute defamation, a claim must generally be false and have been made to someone other than the person defamed. Some common law jurisdictions also distinguish between spoken defamation, called slander, and defamation in other media such as printed words or images, called libel. False light laws protect against statements which are not technically false but misleading. In some civil law jurisdictions, defamation is treated as a crime rather than a civil wrong. The United Nations Commission on Human Rights ruled in 2012 that the criminalization of libel violates freedom of expression and is inconsistent with Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.A person who defames another may be called a "defamer", "famacide", "libeler" or "slanderer". Symbolic Speech: Symbolic speech is a legal term in United States law used to describe actions that purposefully and discernibly convey a particular message or statement to those viewing it. Symbolic speech is recognized as being protected under the First Amendment as a form of speech, but this is not expressly written as such in the document. One possible explanation as to why the Framers did not address this issue in the Bill of Rights is because the primary forms for both political debate and protest in their time were verbal expression and published word, and they may have been unaware of the possibility of future people using non-verbal expression. Content neutral: No speech may be limited based on the content of the speech. All rulings must be neutral toward opinions. We looked at the three-fifths compromise and are beginning to look at the Bill of Rights. See powerpoint attached. Take a look at the bill of rights including amendments 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 8, 13, 14, 15, & 19. We will start looking at the first amendment on Friday/Monday I apologize for not updating the website! I have been sick but I'm starting to get better. This week we did a Constitutional Convention Simulation. If you were absent, PLEASE CHECK IN DURING TUTORIAL! You will have to make up your grade for missing the discussion. Also, answer the questions attached in your notebook based on the text of the constitution (easy to find with a google search). We also watched the Republican debate and I highly recommend you watch the one that aired on 8/6 and the one on 9/16. They are both available on youtube. Stay informed! For the past two classes, you have been creating an ideal society and creating a visual representation to explain your society to the class. In class, you will analyze you classmates' societies (pro/con list) and write a paragraph explaining what the best society was.
Today we looked at important news articles from the summer and tried to make sense of them. If you were absent, please:
1. Find a news article that means something 2. Summarize 3. Explain why it was a government issue 4. Explain your opinion on the issue 5. Write a haiku about the issue Haikus have three lines. The first line should be 5 syllables, second line, 7 syllables, third line 5 syllables. Please hand this assignment in to the government box. We read our FOr My people poems aloud and had a class tour. Please come to next class with your for my people poem ready to share with others. Thanks! |
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January 2016
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