The First Amendment to our Constitution is pretty clear. Government can’t make laws abridging free speech. And this extended from Congress down through local government bodies. Orange County Supervisor Todd Spitzer has announced, in front of UC-Irvine, that he plans to develop policy that would cut county funding to any organization that bans the display of the US flag demonstrating he lacks a critical understanding of the ideals the flag represents and offers a chilling affect on free speech.
From Spitzer’s press conference, this story and video.
No other politician in OC is as good as sharing the coverage they get on social media as Spitzer is. He provided a link to the TV report on his Facebook page and the comments started to rill in. And this, being Orange County, were mostly favorable. But a critical comment from me, Lucy Dunn, and Cynthia Ward vanished. If Todd is managing his own Facebook account, that’s his right but it’s even more evidence that the guy just doesn’t get it when it comes to free speech. What does Spitzer have against the First Amendment?
It’s one thing to wrap yourself in the flag, trot out veterans who fought to protect our freedoms and rights, and use the power of your office to protect the flag…and it’s quite another to be completely clueless to not get that free speech means permitting speech you don’t like.
The ACLU agrees with us.
“Supervisor Spitzer’s resolution would unconstitutionally require organizations to relinquish their free speech rights in exchange for government contracts,” said Brendan Hamme, a staff attorney for the ACLU of Southern California’s Orange County Office and a First Amendment Expert. “The government cannot condition receipt of public benefits, including funding and contracts, on waivers of fundamental rights where there’s no relation between the right and the benefit. Spitzer’s resolution is an attempt to silence viewpoints with which he disagrees; it’s political grandstanding, not legal or sound public policy.”
Unconstitutional? And Spitzer wants to be our next DA?
We urge Supervisor Spitzer to read UCI Chancellor Howard Gillman’s editorial in a recent edition of the Daily Pilot.
From the editorial:
“Within hours of my statement, half the students who had originally voted in favor of the flag ban posted a public apology on the student government Facebook page, saying, “We meant no ill will towards our nation nor its flag, and our school truly does not deserve the image placed on it in the public sphere.” They also announced that they had no intention of overriding the veto.”
…
“The irony, of course, is that many of those who are attacking the university are expressing views that are contrary to the very commitment to freedom that the flag represents.
During World War II, in the midst of the country’s struggle against fascism, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that individuals could not be forced to salute the American flag.
Justice Robert Jackson, the former U.S. attorney general who would later oversee the prosecution of the Nuremberg defendants, explained that “we can have intellectual individualism and the rich cultural diversities that we owe to exceptional minds only at the price of occasional eccentricity and abnormal attitudes.” The case presented the court with the opportunity to compose one of the most famous and revered lines in the canon of American constitutional law:
“If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.”
Years later, in an opinion joined by one of the most conservative justices of the modern era, Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court declared that “the principles of freedom and inclusiveness that the flag best reflects” include “the conviction that our toleration of criticism … is a sign and source of our strength…. The way to preserve the flag’s special role is not to punish those who feel differently about these matters. It is to persuade them that they are wrong.”
The flag has never stopped flying at UCI. The student government has addressed the question of what happens in that small lobby area. And there will continue to be people — on college campuses and throughout the country — who resist calls to salute or respect the flag. This is a feature of university life and a measure of a free society. On behalf of the flag, we must stand up against those who will use harassment, intimidation and threats of violence against these expressions.”
The editorial was published March 16; Spitzer’s press conference was March 18. Todd loves the cameras. It’s unfortunate he doesn’t love the ideals that represent the flag or the letter of the law when it comes to the First Amendment.
I’m glad to see that Chancellor Gillman changing tone in the Daily Pilot release. As some members of our community noted, the flag-waving patriotism of the March 8th release was devoid of an accompanying respect for the student council members’ right to dissent. Theirs was a critique of our country for not living up to its values, and the vitriolic response to their stance on social media only proved them right, unfortunately.
As for Spitzer, it sounds like he should spend some time in a constitutional law class here at UCI.
Well, I never understood the flag ban thing and I use to be a Republican. I think there was something like that at the community Colleges about 5 years ago from what I read. They not only were banning the US flag but all country flags at the student council. Most of the folks most vocal about the flag ban were baby boomers and the silent generation. Some gen x and some younger but if you see the protest it was more middle aged people and seniors which are usually also the core group of the Tea party folks. The Teas party uprise lead to this about support of the flag but among far right there is also a succession movement from the US which is funny why people on the right get so upset about removing the US flag but they want the south to be a separate country or Texas to be a spearate county under the conferate or the Republic of Texas flags so why get so upset over the US flaf. Back in the 1960’s students burn the flag at Fullerton and UCI to protest the war.
This being Orange County as I said most of the pro-flag supporters were middle aged and Seniors many younger people in OC were less interested Now, I would believe that Cynthia Ward would have more common sense on the issue since she is also a social liberal on issues as well as a fiscal consevatie which is hard on OC because the party ups are control by the middle aged and senior right that got a good deal from prop 13 that is whey they complain about Orange County but don’t moved to Texas because their taxes are lower because of prop 13.
How ironic that those protesting a misunderstood and perhaps messily crafted UCI policy are now the ones trying to squash dissent. Funny how that always works…
It is an egregious abridgment of free speech to prohibit display of the flag.