hmm. no responses to my last post ;)
I hope it wasn’t the content. Because i’m coming at you again with dark disconcerting news. This time i’m going to focus on one issue at hand. This is our nations idea that speaking against the government is a “bad” thing. We have seen a growing progression toward the limitation of negative statements regarding our government as a whole, which interestingly enough has not spurned much response from our fellow citizens. Perhaps i’m wrong, perhaps the response is there just muted by our government. I will not judge… yet.
Exhibit A:
The first ruling i disagree with issued by the new supreme court.
Exhibit B:
Here is the actual opinions.
My personal favorite is the dissenting opinions drafted by Justice Stevens. My favorite line is this:
The notion that there is a categorical difference between speaking as a citizen and speaking in the course of one’s employment is quite wrong.
He is responding of course to this quote:
When a citizen enters government service, the citizen by necessity must accept certain limitations on his or her freedom. See, e.g., Waters v. Churchill, 511 U. S. 661, 671 (1994) (plurality opinion) (“[T]he government as employer indeed has far broader powers than does the government as sovereign”). Government employers, like private employers, need a significant degree of control over their employees’ words and actions; without it, there would be little chance for the efficient provision of public services. Cf. Connick, supra, at 143 (“[G]overnment offices could not function if every employment decision became a constitutional matter”). Public employees, moreover, often occupy trusted positions in society. When they speak out, they can express views that contravene governmental policies or impair the proper performance of governmental functions.
It expresses a notion by the assenting opinion regarding the fact that an individual can act in a sort of dualist notion, at one point the individual may act as a citizen of the state, and at another point he may act as an employee of the state that allows for a restriction to the rights granted by the consitution, i.e. freedom of speech.
My biggest concern regarding this whole excersise is a concern for the academic world. It is largely a part of the public government, and so one would hope they would still be afforded the rights granted previously.
Exhibit C:
When confronted regarding this issue:
Second, Justice Souter suggests today’s decision may have important ramifications for academic freedom, at least as a constitutional value. See post, at 12-13. There is some argument that expression related to academic scholarship or classroom instruction implicates additional constitutional interests that are not fully accounted for by this Court’s customary employee-speech jurisprudence. We need not, and for that reason do not, decide whether the analysis we conduct today would apply in the same manner to a case involving speech related to scholarship or teaching.
No real answer seems forthcoming, but worry not they have a whole set of old fart’s lifetimes to go before they run out of time for considering this idea.
Oh woe is me, now that big brother has come home.
June 1st, 2006 at 4:22 am
ok, i confess, i don’t click on links much – takes too long what with my woefully slow laptop – so i didn’t click on the links in your last post, and my response to this post was actually simply going to be a link to the [url=http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/05/25/military.funerals.ap/index.html]funeral protest ban congress passed[/url] as a sort of complicating counterpoint for you to consider in conjunction with this particular instance of "case law" as you call it. though i think even in the case of "america’s fallen heroes act" (get a load of the bias in that title, eh?) i am still against the banning of any kind of protest on public property, as a matter of principle, you know, free country being dependent on free speech and all… also, the distinction the supreme court is making in the ruling you have quoted here sort of relates to the discussion we had the other day about the distinction between the ethics of "public" and "private" behavior. don’t you think?
June 1st, 2006 at 5:21 pm
interestingly enough, the ban at funerals is not in response to anti-war protests, which have for the most part avoided protesting at funerals, but in response to the anti-gay protesters who argue that the soldiers dieing in Iraq are our punishment for "allowing" gays to exist in our country. Even more interesting was the confrontation at the national memorial. A pro-bush church group showed up to support Bush as he did the memorial services at Arlington cemetery and got into a shouting match with the anti-gay protesters. It has come. A time when liberals need not do anything but watch the conservative side destroy themselves. oh if only the democrats had some balls they could take advantage of this. wilbur
June 1st, 2006 at 6:54 pm
[quote:e23313b093]interestingly enough, the ban at funerals is not in response to anti-war protests, which have for the most part avoided protesting at funerals, but in response to the anti-gay protesters who argue that the soldiers dieing in Iraq are our punishment for "allowing" gays to exist in our country.[/quote:e23313b093] yeah, i know, hence my ambivalence about the act and why i thought it was interesting… because it was actually designed to suppress people i oppose, i want (emotionally) to support it. however, rationally, i still think i oppose legislation aimed at curbing free speech on public property. even though funeral protests are in terrible taste, and even worse politics, i still feel like we’re teetering on the brink of a totalitarian regime here, and it makes me very nervous to see all these laws passing and court cases decided in such a way that they further limit our rights to free speech. [quote:e23313b093]Even more interesting was the confrontation at the national memorial. A pro-bush church group showed up to support Bush as he did the memorial services at Arlington cemetery and got into a shouting match with the anti-gay protesters. It has come. A time when liberals need not do anything but watch the conservative side destroy themselves. [/quote:e23313b093] i hope so!!! i am, so far, enjoying the show.
June 6th, 2006 at 2:06 am
gracious, if i wasn’t depressed enough with the government, then i have truly become that way now. 1984 being banned now we have freedom of speech being banned in classroom. you need to ask these questions of someone that can do something. don’t asked me who, but there has got to be someone out there who should respond to this.