Re:  Murder of Dr. Slepian, abortion doctor

Given the current interpretation of free speech rights there will surely be more such murders, following the rhetoric of the top ACLU leader in his book several years ago.

He wrote that any citizen has a constitutional right to publicly call for the killing of a specific individual, absent any monetary inducement.

The present utterances of the pro-life movement are the same as that of the English king who cried out, “Is there no one who will rid me of this troublesome priest?”

What is called for is not censorship but, rather, stiff civil penalties for those who by their words imply harm to others.  Incidentally, the First Amendment did not nullify the Golden Rule.

Louis Worth Jones
 

February 2l,  l997

Editor
San Francisco Chronicle
90l Mission
San Francisco, CA  94l03

Dear Editor and Fellow Citizen: 

On February l9, l997, the U.S. Supreme Court  ruled regarding the conduct of protesters around family planning clinics, and  I see that the Chronicle editorially approves (Feb. 2l).

The ruling falsely invokes the First Amendment’s free speech clause.  While everyone has the right - and civic duty - to speak out  publicly regarding government matters and perceived injustice, the First Amendment does not abrogate rules of civil discourse.  It does not license unseemly person-to-person conduct.  It has nothing to do with such conduct and NO ONE CAN SHOW ORIGINAL INTENT IN THIS REGARD.

The ruling, please note, bars  pushing and shoving but also says that other conduct is protected, no matter how intrusive, insulting, peace-threatening, harassing or disrespectful it is.   In reality there is no “right” anywhere to beat another individual’s eardrums or inconsiderately and insensitively imbed “messages” into another’s brain cells. 

No one has a right even to the individual attention of another.  Ordinary civility demands that one first ask and obtain consent.

The ruling would abolish the concept that we Americans enjoy constitutional rights and liberties equally.  It disregards government’s obligation to afford equal protection of the laws.  It repeals the Golden Rule of human conduct and disputes Articles l9 and 29 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights regarding expressions of opinion.

The free speech clause pertains to parliamentary deliberative process, a collective and not an individual right.  Its model is the traditional town hall meeting, where speaking is regulated in order that speech, in the collective sense,  can take  place 

ACLU  pioneer Alexander Meiklejohn said speaking is subject to regulation
“the same as shooting a gun.” 

The first thing the nation’s founders did when meeting to write a constitution was to forbid “indecorous” speaking.  Had they proclaimed a freedom of speaking they would have been considered idiots.

Respectfully, 

Louis Worth Jones 
 
 

1997, 1998