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The NAACP's interim president Derrick Johnson has officially requested a formal meeting with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to discuss NFL players and their ability to exercise their First Amendment rights.

According to a letter sent to the league by the NAACP, the meeting will specifically focus on Kaepernick's perceived "blackballing" by the league in light of his protests last season. It also questions the silencing of NFL players' platforms, citing Tommie Smith and John Carlos's black power salute at the 1968 Olympics, among other examples.

Kaepernick's lack of a job has raised many eyebrows throughout the offseason, particularly with the quarterbacks being signed ahead of him. Johnson penned a concern regarding Kaepernick's First Amendment rights and also strongly insinuated that his protest was the sole cause of him not being signed. An excerpt of the letter reads:

Last season, Mr. Kaepernick chose to exercise his First Amendment rights by protesting the inequitable treatment of people of color in America. By quietly taking a knee during the national anthem, he was able to shine a light on the many injustices, particularly, the disproportionate occurrences of police misconduct toward communities of color. As outlined in your office's public statement, this act of dissent is well within the National Football League's stated bylaws. Yet, as the NFL season quickly approaches, Mr. Kaepernick has spent an unprecedented amount of time as a free agent, and it is becoming increasingly apparent that this is no sheer coincidence.

"No player should be victimized and discriminated against because of his exercise of free speech -- to do so is in violation of his rights under the Constitution and the NFL's own regulations.

Obviously, invoking the Constitution is a powerful tool, and it raises questions about what's covered by free speech. The NAACP also stressed the important of free speech in the Civil Rights Movement, along with the importance that it's upheld moving forward.

The exercise of free speech has proven to be a vital tool in in bringing to the public's attention often ignored issues of social justice, particularly in the African-American community. The powerful act of utilizing one's platform to address issues of discrimination and inequality has long been employed by many of the world's greatest athletes.

Some teams may be a starting quarterback injury away from signing Kaepernick, but the Baltimore Ravens disproved that theory when rumors swirled after Joe Flacco's back injury. They ultimately chose to sign Thaddeus Lewis to spell Flacco. There have been protests in front of the NFL headquarters regarding Kaepernick, including one on Wednesday.

Since losing the starting job in San Francisco, Kaepernick has faced tremendous scrutiny. Other athletes have joined in on his protest, and depending on how the next few weeks go, these protests may start to pick up steam if Kaepernick remains unsigned -- whether it's fair or not.

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NAACP asks for meeting with Goodell over Colin Kaepernick's First Amendment rights - CBSSports.com

Bar Associations

Posted August 23, 2017, 4:00 pm CDT

By Debra Cassens Weiss

Shutterstock.com

A federal appeals court recently ruled against a North Dakota lawyer who alleged the mandatory state bar violated his First Amendment rights.

Arnold Fleck had claimed the bar should have given him the chance to affirmatively consent before using his money on activities that werent relevant to the practice of law. The St. Louis-based 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed in an Aug. 17 opinion (PDF).

The Goldwater Institute, which represented Fleck, said in a press release it plans to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case. The Associated Press has a story.

Fleck had objected because a portion of his mandatory dues went to a PAC that opposed a 2014 ballot initiative known as Measure 6, which would establish a presumption that each parent is entitled to equal parental rights. The measure was rejected by voters.

The state bar dues notice, which was revised as a result of Flecks lawsuit, says bar members can deduct a certain amount from their dues in a Keller deduction for activities that arent germane to law practice. The reference is to the 1990 U.S. Supreme Court case Keller v. State Bar of California.

Keller held that mandatory bars can use members required dues to fund activities germane to regulating the legal profession and improving the quality of legal services, but not to fund nongermane activities that a member opposes.

Fleck had argued the bar should have required him to opt in to use of his dues for nongermane activities, rather than requiring him to opt out. The 8th Circuit said the procedure satisfies Supreme Court precedent.

Continued here:
Lawyer who objected to mandatory bar's PAC contribution loses First Amendment appeal - ABA Journal

Splash News/Newscom"Words must do more than offend, cause indignation, or anger the addressee to lose the protection of the First Amendment," a municipal judge reminded us this week in a case involving social media, bow hunting, and a bear called "Pretty Mama."

On trial was Susan Kehoe, an animal rights activist in New Jersey who faced a harassment charge and a possible 30 days in jail.

Under New Jersey law, someone commits criminal harasssment by engaging in a "course of alarming conduct or of repeatedly committed acts with purpose to alarm or seriously annoy such other person."

Last October, Kehoe called out two men as the potential culprits in the death of Pretty Mama, based on a video someone had recorded of the bear being dragged from the woods. In a public Facebook post, Kehoe wrote that she "believed" Michael Bush and Nickey Pisco were the killers and linked to their Facebook profiles.

Bush and Pisco reported Kehoe to the Vernon Township Police for harassment, but the police declined to press charges. The men then filed a citizen's complaint, saying they had received death threats as a result of Kehoe's post and Bush had suffered a loss to his business.

Bush initially alleged that Kehoe had posted his home address, but this was later revealed as false. Kehoe had simply linked to his Facebook page, where Bush himself had publicly posted his address.

Still, prosecutor Lisa Thompson argued to the court that Kehoe's speech went beyond permittable free-speech parameters. "There is a not a First Amendment right to incite your followers to cause annoyance and alarm and death threats," she told the court in July.

Bush testified in court that he received threats through direct messages, public Facebook posts, and comments on his business' Facebook page. But none of the threats came from Kehoe directly, nor had she urged people to threaten Bush and Pisco.

On Monday, Mount Olive Municipal Court Judge Brian J. Levine found Kehoe not guilty, citing a 2016 case in which a state appellate court overturned a harassment conviction.

In that case, a former Union County corrections officer was convicted on two counts of harassment "based upon his creation of two 'flyers' that contained the wedding photo of a fellow Union County corrections officer (the Sergeant), which was altered to include vulgar handwritten comments in speech bubbles." But the appellate court reversed the conviction, holding that "the commentary defendant added to the Sergeant's wedding photograph was constitutionally protected speech."

Kehoe's attorney, Daniel Perez, said the judge's ruling in her case "shows that the First Amendment matters."

Read more from the original source:
The First Amendment Protects Social-Media Speculation About Bear Killers - Reason (blog)

Two different cases raising similar issues about advocating suicide may shape US policy for years to come. In Massachusetts, Michelle Carter was sentenced to two and a half years in prison for urging her friend Conrad Roy not to abandon his plan to kill himself by inhaling carbon monoxide: Get back in that car! she texted, and he did. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has already ruled that prosecuting her for involuntary manslaughter was permissible, even though she was not on the scene. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court was careful to insist that its holding did not criminalize assisting the suicide of a person with a terminal illness:

It is important to articulate what this case is not about. It is not about a person seeking to ameliorate the anguish of someone coping with a terminal illness and questioning the value of life. Nor is it about a person offering support, comfort and even assistance to a mature adult who, confronted with such circumstances, has decided to end his or her life.

And now the case of Final Exit v. Minnesota is before the Supreme Court, with Final Exit asking the Supreme Court to take the case and overturn its conviction for assisting the suicide of Doreen Dunn on First Amendment grounds. Notably, no individual was convicted in that case: the medical director was given use immunity to testify against the organization, which was found guilty of the crime, and was fined $30,000.

Final Exit was convicted under an interpretation of the assisted suicide law first outlined in a different case, Minnesota v. Melchert-Dinkel. In that case, the Minnesota Supreme Court held that advising or encouraging an individual to commit suicide was protected First Amendment activity, but assisting suicide, including enabling suicide by instructing a specific person how to do it, could be criminalized. Mr. Melchert-Dinkel struck a deal with prosecutors, and therefore never appealed his conviction.

Final Exit has asked the Supreme Court whether Minnesotas criminal prohibition of speech that enables a suicide violates the First Amendment. The Supreme Court has not yet decided whether to accept the case.

Both the Carter case and the Final Exit case involve the issue of the limits of criminalizing speech, and in both cases, the defendants foresaw and even intended that the people with whom they were communicating would die. There are several noteworthy distinctions between the two cases. In the first place, Conrad Roys competence to make the decision to die was (at least on the face of the court decisions) far more questionable than that of Ms. Dunn in Minnesota. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court put great emphasis on his vulnerability and fragility. Relatedly, and crucially, Conrad Roy was wavering, and Michelle Carter put her thumbindeed, her entire fiston the pro-suicide scale. First amendment purists might say this makes no difference, and indeed criminalizing her speech constitutes viewpoint discrimination, the worst kind of First Amendment violation. Criminal lawyers, on the other hand, might argue that Roys ambivalence provides support for the contention that Ms. Carter caused his suicide. Final Exit argues that they did not coerce or pressure Ms. Deen; they provided information and comfort and support, but not persuasion.

Whether suicide or assisted suicide, this issue is not only about speech, but also fundamentally about individual agency. Promoting the agency of competent individuals is good, even if they make decisions that we would not make. Overriding a persons will, whether by keeping him or her tethered to a life-support machine or haranguing him to get back in the car and die, is different from assisting him or her to implement a decision made thoughtfully and carefully.

Given Justice Gorsuchs interest in and familiarity with the assisted suicide, and his announcement of his perspective through books and articles, it will be interesting to see whether the Court accepts the Final Exit case. Michelle Carters lawyers have promised to appeal on the issue of whether her texts and communications with Conrad Roy constituted protected speech, although the 2016 Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court decision appears to have largely foreclosed that avenue of appeal. As more states legalize assisted suicide, this issue will continue to recur, and these early rulings have the potential to shape policy around the country.

Featured image credit: Lady Justice by jessica45. CC0 public domain via Pixabay.

Read the original post:
Is advocating suicide a crime under the First Amendment? - OUPblog (blog)

First Amendment is a fundamental building block of our society

Editor:

In a letter recently published in your paper, a writer indicates that she wont lose sleep if a Christian must bake a cake or a church is denied participation in a government grant program. I disagree. Both examples are taken from court cases focused on religious liberty and First Amendment freedoms in this country. In addition to affirming the free exercise of religion, the rights outlined in the First Amendment serve as fundamental building blocks of our society and a protection against government censorship and punishment. Combined with other ideals contained in our countrys founding documents, such as the truth that we are all created equal, the rights contained in the First Amendment provide protections for minority groups and demand that we reject racial bigotry, anti-Semitism and hatred in all forms. In the current state of our country, I cant think of anything more important.

Jon Terry

Petoskey

See the article here:
Letter First Amendment is a fundamental building block of our society - Petoskey News-Review