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If the court takes up cases regarding the names of the N.F.L. team and an Asian-American band, it could test a distinctly American commitment to free speech.

By ADAM LIPTAK

When a New Jersey police officer was mistakenly accused of political activity and demoted, he was still protected by the First Amendment, the Supreme Court decided.

By ADAM LIPTAK

A tawdry trial about sex tapes and celebrity shows how we should rethink information in the digital age.

By ROBERT LEVINE

Arguments in the jury trial start Monday in a case the celebrity wrestler says is about privacy, but the defendant, Gawker, argues is about the First Amendment.

By ERIK ECKHOLM

The state is one of eight that are considering blanket legal protection for discrimination on religious grounds. Its bill is one of the most alarming.

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD

The company, in its fight with the F.B.I., is defending its phones on grounds that its code represents free speech, and there is some precedent.

By STEVE LOHR

Crisis pregnancy centers in California are in a battle with the state over a new law requiring them to post a notice that free or low-cost abortion care is available.

By ERIK ECKHOLM

A judges order to release secret documents raises questions about how much involvement courts should have over settlements related to corporate wrongdoing.

By PETER J. HENNING

Mr. Kennedy defended John Gotti Sr., Huey P. Newton and Timothy Leary and won freedom for Jean S. Harris, who killed the Scarsdale Diet doctor.

By SAM ROBERTS

In recent years, the Supreme Court has waved the First Amendment banner ever higher to undermine long-accepted governmental regulatory authority.

By LINDA GREENHOUSE

In a California case, the justices are considering whether government workers who choose not to join a union may still be required to pay for collective bargaining.

By ADAM LIPTAK

A federal judge has warned that prosecutors may be going too far when they ask witnesses to keep quiet about receiving a subpoena.

By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD

Some legal scholars are asking whether it is time to reconsider the clear and present danger standard for curbing the freedom of speech.

By ERIK ECKHOLM

A federal appeals court, in a case involving an Asian-American dance-rock band, struck down part of a law that let the government reject trademarks it deemed offensive or disparaging to others.

By RICHARD SANDOMIR

An array of leading hip-hop artists, including T.I., Big Boi and Killer Mike, filed a Supreme Court brief in support of a high school student punished for posting a rap song that drew attention to complaints about sexual harassment.

The Alabama lawyer opposed The New York Times in a case that resulted in a Supreme Court decision establishing greater leeway for criticism of government officials and other public figures.

By BRUCE WEBER

On university campuses, First Amendment rights are colliding with inclusivity.

By NICHOLAS KRISTOF

Religious Arbitration Used for Secular Disputes | Soros Withdraws $490 Million From Janus Capital

A University of Michigan professor writes that many see this as yet another way the First Amendment is being hijacked.

A new class-action lawsuit says that New York City has a policy and a history of violating protesters constitutional rights.

If the court takes up cases regarding the names of the N.F.L. team and an Asian-American band, it could test a distinctly American commitment to free speech.

By ADAM LIPTAK

When a New Jersey police officer was mistakenly accused of political activity and demoted, he was still protected by the First Amendment, the Supreme Court decided.

By ADAM LIPTAK

A tawdry trial about sex tapes and celebrity shows how we should rethink information in the digital age.

By ROBERT LEVINE

Arguments in the jury trial start Monday in a case the celebrity wrestler says is about privacy, but the defendant, Gawker, argues is about the First Amendment.

By ERIK ECKHOLM

The state is one of eight that are considering blanket legal protection for discrimination on religious grounds. Its bill is one of the most alarming.

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD

The company, in its fight with the F.B.I., is defending its phones on grounds that its code represents free speech, and there is some precedent.

By STEVE LOHR

Crisis pregnancy centers in California are in a battle with the state over a new law requiring them to post a notice that free or low-cost abortion care is available.

By ERIK ECKHOLM

A judges order to release secret documents raises questions about how much involvement courts should have over settlements related to corporate wrongdoing.

By PETER J. HENNING

Mr. Kennedy defended John Gotti Sr., Huey P. Newton and Timothy Leary and won freedom for Jean S. Harris, who killed the Scarsdale Diet doctor.

By SAM ROBERTS

In recent years, the Supreme Court has waved the First Amendment banner ever higher to undermine long-accepted governmental regulatory authority.

By LINDA GREENHOUSE

In a California case, the justices are considering whether government workers who choose not to join a union may still be required to pay for collective bargaining.

By ADAM LIPTAK

A federal judge has warned that prosecutors may be going too far when they ask witnesses to keep quiet about receiving a subpoena.

By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD

Some legal scholars are asking whether it is time to reconsider the clear and present danger standard for curbing the freedom of speech.

By ERIK ECKHOLM

A federal appeals court, in a case involving an Asian-American dance-rock band, struck down part of a law that let the government reject trademarks it deemed offensive or disparaging to others.

By RICHARD SANDOMIR

An array of leading hip-hop artists, including T.I., Big Boi and Killer Mike, filed a Supreme Court brief in support of a high school student punished for posting a rap song that drew attention to complaints about sexual harassment.

The Alabama lawyer opposed The New York Times in a case that resulted in a Supreme Court decision establishing greater leeway for criticism of government officials and other public figures.

By BRUCE WEBER

On university campuses, First Amendment rights are colliding with inclusivity.

By NICHOLAS KRISTOF

Religious Arbitration Used for Secular Disputes | Soros Withdraws $490 Million From Janus Capital

A University of Michigan professor writes that many see this as yet another way the First Amendment is being hijacked.

A new class-action lawsuit says that New York City has a policy and a history of violating protesters constitutional rights.

The rest is here:
First Amendment (U.S. Constitution) - The New York Times

"If Facebook ignores this request they could receive a subpoena, so I suspect they will cooperate," said Stephen Strauss, a former journalist who is now an attorney at Bryan Cave specializing in First Amendment issues.

He was referring to a letter sent by Senator John Thune to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg seeking an explanation of how Trending stories are selected and whether any conservative stories were taken out of the list or liberal leaning stories were inserted.

Joe Larsen of Sedgwick Law agrees that it would be risky for Facebook to ignore the request.

"That's just not a good idea, even where... I can see no clear legal basis for Senator Thune's request," Larsen said. "I expect Facebook will provide quite a bit of information."

Related: Did Facebook suppress conservative news?

One piece of what Thune is seeking was revealed Thursday when The Guardian published Facebook's manual for people who manage the Trending topics feature. Facebook confirmed the veracity of the 20 page document, which reveals that there is a lot of human decision making in choosing the stories on top of what the company's algorithms suggest. The manual includes when stories can be "injected" into the Trending topics list.

The controversy began on Monday when Gizmodo published a report with anonymous allegations that former contractors had ignored Facebook's algorithms for its Trending topics section and that links to conservative news stories were "routinely" suppressed.

Thune demanded to know exactly how Facebook decides what news stories to publish and to see a list of all the stories that were previously not distributed or manually inserted into Trending topics.

As a platform that's used by over 222 million people in the United States, the company is able to influence the perceptions of a large chunk of the U.S. population, Thune said.

Facebook has denied that anyone improperly tinkered with the list or that they were instructed to do so. A company spokesman said, "We have received Sen. Thune's request for more information about how Trending Topics works, and look forward to addressing his questions."

Related: Facebook's 'trending topics' spark debate

According to Strauss, Thune's request was legitimate.

"I think that this situation is different than an inquiry into a news organization's content," he said. "In this case Facebook has a 'trending' feature, and Facebook affirmatively stated particular standards for this 'trending' feature, and now there is some question as to the veracity of those representations."

Mark Bailen, a media attorney at BakerHostetler, disagrees. He argues that Facebook has the same right to distribute the news "without interference from the government" as any company or individual.

"It's well established that the government has no role in dictating what is newsworthy," said Bailen. "The idea that the government is going back and looking into and investigating [Facebook's activities in distributing the news] conflicts with decades of jurisprudence under the First Amendment."

Floyd Abrams, a prominent First Amendment attorney, compares Thune's request to one issued by Congress in the 1970s when politicians sought to require CBS to turn over outtakes of a controversial CBS documentary, "The Selling of the Pentagon." The network refused and eventually the inquiry was dropped.

"It was an example of a news organization that was prepared to take great risks to defend its editorial independence," said Abrams.

Related: Senate demands answers from Facebook

"I don't mean to suggest that Facebook must remain silent when it is under attack. But it should take care not to cede its own hard won authority about what articles to cite or recommend to Congress."

One issue about this controversy that troubles some is the way that Facebook depicts its role in selecting what news is shown.

"It has always represented itself as an unbiased aggregator of news on its trending site," according to Larsen. "That is, Facebook says it doesn't have an editorial position."

After the Gizmodo report was published, Facebook Trending manager Tom Stocky wrote that the company has "rigorous guidelines in place for the review team to ensure consistency and neutrality."

Those guidelines don't allow reviewers to suppress or prioritize political perspectives or media outlets, he says. And these are the guidelines that Thune and others want to know more about.

The company's official description of the feature is simply: "a list of topics and hashtags that have recently spiked in popularity on Facebook. This list is personalized based on a number of factors, including Pages you've liked, your location and what's trending across Facebook."

Until the Gizmodo report, many people weren't aware that Facebook had a team to oversee the Trending Topics feature.

Suzy Fulton, a technology lawyer said that it's possible someone might sue Facebook based on fraud or deceptive practices -- but it would be hard to see what the damages would be, "even assuming you have a valid claim to begin with."

"We are certainly a litigious society," she said. "[But] you can opt out, you can go to Fox or some other conservative news media for your news if you feel Facebook is not telling the right story on its Trending Topics."

CNNMoney (New York) First published May 12, 2016: 1:58 PM ET

See the original post here:
Is Facebook protected under the First Amendment? - May. 12, 2016

Central to the mission of the Institute for Justice is reinvigorating the founding principles of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. We seek to defend the free flow of informationinformation that is indispensable to our democratic form of government and to our free enterprise economy.

To protect free speech rights, IJ litigates to protect commercial, occupational and political speech. Because free markets depend on the free flow of information, IJ has long defended the right of business owners to communicate commercial speech to their customers. The Institute for Justice has also litigated groundbreaking cases in defense of occupational speech, protecting authors, tour guides, interior designers and others who speak for a living or offer advice from government regulations designed to stifle or silence their speech. Finally, we have been at the forefront of the fight against laws that hamstring the political speech of ordinary citizens and entrench political insiders. These laws include burdensome campaign finance laws and restrictions on grassroots lobbying.

Through IJs litigation, we seek to ensure that government regulation is constrained and that speakers and listeners are able to freely exchange information on the topics that matter most to them. Speakers and listeners should determine the value of speech, not the government.

See original here:
First Amendment - Institute for Justice

American Government 1. The Nature of Government a. The Purposes of Government b. Types of Government c. What Is a Democracy? d. Democratic Values Liberty, Equality, Justice 2. Foundations of American Government a. The Colonial Experience b. Independence and the Articles of Confederation c. Creating the Constitution d. The Bill of Rights 3. Federalism a. The Founders and Federalism b. Tipping the Scales Toward National Power c. Federal-State Relations Today: Back to States' Rights? 4. American Political Attitudes and Participation a. American Political Culture b. What Factors Shape Political Attitudes? c. Measuring Public Opinion d. Participating in Government e. Voting: A Forgotten Privilege? 5. How Do Citizens Connect With Their Government? a. Political Parties b. Campaigns and Elections c. Interest Groups d. The Media e. The Internet in Politics 6. Congress: The People's Branch? a. The Powers of Congress b. Leadership in Congress: It's a Party Matter c. The Importance of Committees d. Who Is in Congress? e. How a Bill Becomes a Law 7. The Presidency: The Leadership Branch? a. The Evolution of the Presidency b. All the President's Men and Women c. Selection and Succession of the President d. The President's Job e. Presidential Character 8. The Bureaucracy: The Real Government a. The Development of the Bureaucracy b. The Organization of the Bureaucracy c. Who Are the Bureaucrats? d. Reforming the Bureaucracy 9. The Judicial Branch a. The Creation of the Federal Courts b. The Structure of the Federal Courts c. The Supreme Court: What Does It Do? d. How Judges and Justices Are Chosen e. The Power of the Federal Courts 10. Civil Liberties and Civil Rights a. Rights and Responsibilities of Citizens b. First Amendment Rights c. Crime and Due Process d. Citizenship Rights 11. Policy Making: Political Interactions a. Foreign Policy: What Now? b. Defense Policy c. Economic Policy d. Social and Regulatory Policy 12. State and Local Governments a. State and Local Governments: Democracy at Work? b. Financing State and Local Government c. Who Pays for Education? 13. Comparative Political and Economic Systems a. Comparing Governments b. Comparing Economic Systems c. A Small, Small, World?

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." -First Amendment to the Constitution

A careful reading of the First Amendment reveals that it protects several basic liberties freedom of religion, speech, press, petition, and assembly. Interpretation of the amendment is far from easy, as court case after court case has tried to define the limits of these freedoms. The definitions have evolved throughout American history, and the process continues today.

The First Amendment guarantees freedom of religion in two clauses the "establishment" clause, which prohibits the government from establishing an official church, and the "free exercise" clause that allows people to worship as they please. Notice that the phrase "separation of church and state" does not appear in the First Amendment, nor is it found anywhere else in the Constitution. Most people do not realize that the phrase was actually coined later by Thomas Jefferson. In 1802, when he was President, he wrote the opinion that the First Amendment's freedom of religion clause was designed to build "a wall of separation between Church and State."

Court cases that address freedom of religion have dealt with the rejection of prayer in public schools, the denial of aid to parochial schools, the banning of polygamy (the practice of having more than one wife), the restriction of poisonous snakes and drugs in religious rites, and limiting the right to decline medical care for religious purposes.

Free speech is one of the most cherished liberties, but free speech often conflicts with other rights and liberties. The courts have had to consider the question, "What are the limits of free speech?"

The "clear and present danger" test is a basic principle for deciding the limits of free speech. It was set by the famous Schenck v. the United States case from World War I. Antiwar activist Charles Schenck was arrested for sending leaflets to prospective army draftees encouraging them to ignore their draft notices. The United States claimed that Schenck threatened national security, and the justices agreed. The principle was established that free speech would not be protected if an individual were a "clear and present danger" to United States security.

What is free speech? The definition is not easy, and the courts have identified three types of free speech, each protected at a different level:

Many of the same principles that apply to freedom of speech apply to the press, but one with special meaning for the press is prior restraint. The courts have ruled that the government may not censor information before it is written and published, except in the most extreme cases of national security.

Freedom of assembly and petition are closely related to freedom of speech, and have been protected in similar ways. Former Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes wrote, "Peaceable assembly for lawful discussion cannot be made a crime." Generally, that point of view has prevailed. Freedom of assembly has to be balanced with other people's rights if it disrupts public order, traffic flow, freedom to go about normal business or peace and quiet. Usually, a group must apply for a permit, but a government must grant a permit provided that officials have the means to prevent major disruptions.

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Originally posted here:
First Amendment Rights [ushistory.org]

A Guide to the First Amendment

The First Amendment, sometimes called Amendment 1, is the first amendment to the United States Constitution and is also one out of ten amendments in the Bill of Rights. The First Amendment makes it illegal to make a law that establishes a religion, stops the freedom of speech, stops people from practicing their religion, stops the press from printing what they want, and stops people from exercising their right to assemble peacefully or demonstrating against the government.

Text of the First Amendment

The text of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution is the following:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

What Does the First Amendment Mean?

There are many key phrases in the first Amendment. Here are some explanations on what exactly they mean.

Freedom of religion: The First Amendment of the United States Constitution prevents the government from setting up or establishing an official religion of the country. American Citizens have the freedom to attend a church, mosque, synagogue, temple, or other house of worship of their choice. They can also choose to not be involved in any religion as well. Because of the First Amendment, we can practice our religion however we want to.

Freedom of speech: The First Amendment of the United States Constitution stops the government from making any laws that may stop us from saying what we feel or think. The American people have the right to share their opinions with other people or criticize the government.

Freedom of the press: Freedom of the press means we have the right to get information from many different sources of information. The government does not have the power to control what is broadcasted on radio or TV, what is printed in books or newspapers, or what is offered online. American citizens can request time on TV to respond to any views that they disagree with. They can also write letters to newspapers, which might be printed for others readers to see. Americans can also pass out leaflets that state their opinions. They may also their own online web pages that have their opinions.

Freedom of assembly: American citizens have the right to come together in private and public gatherings. Citizens can join groups for religious, social, recreational, or political reasons. By organizing in order to act on a common idea and accomplish a common goal, American citizens can more easily spread their ideas to others.

Right to petition: The right to petition the government means that American citizens can ask for adjustments or changes in the government. Citizens can do this by collecting signatures for petitions and sending them to elected representatives. They can also call, e-mail, or write to their elected representatives as well. Another way they can petition the government is by creating support groups that try to cause change by lobbying the government.

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First Amendment - Kids | Laws.com