Dear News writer -

Re: your item today in Mercury News "Avis may take free speech ruling higher."  Some workplace employees have a right to repeatedly slur others?

It's time to stop calling interpersonal conduct free speech, whether in the workplace or elsewhere.  Conduct between and among citizens (lateral relationships) is not dealt with in our Constitution, this subject being left to the inherited common law and our judiciary branch.  To invoke the First Amendment as having application is in total error.

There is no "right" or "freedom"  in our Constitution to conduct oneself as one pleases in relation to others.  NO ONE CAN SHOW ORIGINAL INTENT IN THIS REGARD.   If you doubt this, check it out with Professor Jack Rakove of Stanford U or read his new book Original Meanings. 

"The freedom of speech" historically meant freedom from government (or higher authority) regulation, and pertains to democratic process in decision making; more exactly to parliamentary proceedings, where each participant is equal, where the proceedings are fair  -  and where the act of speaking is abridged the moment the meeting is gaveled to order.

Alexander Meiklejohn, the noted free speech champion, lectured on this for years.  You ought to look him up (I have studied him in great depth).  He said repeatedly that speaking is subject to regulation "the same as shooting a gun." 

Louis Worth Jones.
 

Subj: Your Aug. 6 editorial "The Price of Free Speech"
Date: 08/07/99
To: [email protected]
 

Dear Editors of the Mercury News -

You deplore "putting government in the role of policing speech" but you are really talking about conduct between persons in the workplace.

It's time to realize that the free speech clause has nothing whatever to do with this situation.  Speaking to or about another involves conduct, whether in the workplace or in the forum, and is subject to regulation.

If we are truly concerned about conduct which demeans another, we might look to the Declaration of Independence.  It plainly says every person is entitled to a government which guarantees the equal right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

It is gratifying, however, to see you acknowledging that no one has an unqualified right to say what one pleases.  Free speech is not free speaking.  The word speech in colonial America meant willing conversation, as in the common phrase "I wish to have speech with you."

The speech that is absolutely free ("Congress shall make no law...) is democratic parliamentary procedure such as typified in legislatures, town meetings and hearing rooms across the country.  It is a collective right of a free people to assemble peacefully and discuss government policies over which they have ultimate authority.

Respectfully,
Louis Worth Jones
 
 
 

1999