Overview of the Concept of Freedom of Speech In the book Freedom for the Thought That We Hate: A Biography of the First Amendment, the author Anthony Lewis gives us lots of law cases following by the timeline to state how the First Amendment developed and what its meaning in both law and society is. By reading this book after listening to lectures about free speech and reading A Gift of Fire written by Sara Baase, the textbook for the lecture, I have learned more detailed about the history and definition development of the freedom of speech and hence came up some new thoughts towards my life. Brief History While ruling by the England colonist, people living in the North America had little freedom of speech and of thought. The King had two methods to repress the free speech and thought. One is the “publication licensing system”, which prevented people from publish any negative or disrespectful information about their governors; another is the “seditious libel law”, making the behavior mentioned above a crime (Lewis, P.2). During this time, people had little tolerance of dissent. About two hundred years later from establishing the license system, in 1735, printer Zenger was sued because he printed a newspaper which attacked the governor. His lawyer argued the criticisms were not libel, which successfully persuaded the jury to decide Zenger was not guilty. This case impressed the colonies a lot. Soon in the late eighteen century, it led the governors to be afraid of the outrage from people and more and more people used truth to against the law of seditious libel. Under these circumstances, people came up an idea impelling government to add the freedom of press into their laws. In the 1787 federal Constitution, there was no per... ... middle of paper ... ...osal was truly useful, they got nothing in the end. The First Amendment does provide us a constitutional protection of our rights to freedom of speech, of thought and of press and also reminds us that there are some restrictions of the freedom. We have both the rights and responsibility: the right is to enjoy the freedom; the responsibility is to respect others’ rights and protect our rights by speaking out our thoughts! Works Cited Baase, Sara. A Gift of Fire: Social, Legal, and Ethical Issues for Computing Technology. 4th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson, 2013. Print. Lewis, Anthony. Freedom for the Thought That We Hate: A Biography of the First Amendment. New York: Basic Books, 2007. Print. New Hampshire Revised Statutes Annotated, Title LXII: Criminal Code, Section 631:7. New Hampshire General Court, 1 July 1993. Web. 29 Apr. 2014.
Freedom of speech has been a controversial issue throughout the world. Our ability to say whatever we want is very important to us as individuals and communities. Although freedom of speech and expression may sometimes be offensive to other people, it is still everyone’s right to express his/her opinion under the American constitution which states that “congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or the press”. Although this amendment gave people the right express thier opinions, it still rests in one’s own hands as how far they will go to exercise that right of freedom of speech.
One key to the first amendment of the United states constitution is the right to free speech. Freedom of speech is what separates America than other countries around the world that forbid freedom of speech rights. Freedom of speech has been in our constitution since the year 1791. When James Madison “the father of the constitution” wrote the bill of rights he saw potential and that it would make the country more freedom filled than other countries. The land of the free is what the United States is nicknamed and it 's because of our rights to express ourselves as freely as we desire.
7.A Gift of Fire, A: Social, Legal, and Ethical Issues in Computing, by Sara Baase
After the Revolutionary War in America, many states recommend that free speech be put in the United States Constitution. Nevertheless, freedom of speech was written into the Bill of Rights and was ratified in 1791. A few years after the First Amendment was ratified, the government passed the Sedition Act of 1798. This was to help prevent resistance or rebellion against the government. It also made it illegal to print, write or say “any false, scandalous and malicious” things against the government.
...ara Baase. A Gift of Fire. Social, Legal, and Ethical Issues for Computers and the Internet. 2003. Pg 406.
The Amendment I of the Bill of Rights is often called “the freedom of speech.” It provides a multitude of freedoms: of religion, of speech, of the press, to peacefully assemble, to petition the government. Religious freedom is vitally important to this day because it eliminates the problem of religious conflicts. Historically, many people died for their beliefs because their government only allowed and permitted one religion. T...
According to “Freedom of Speech” by Gerald Leinwand, Abraham Lincoln once asked, “Must a government, of necessity, be too strong for the liberties of its people, or too weak to maintain its own existence (7)?” This question is particularly appropriate when considering what is perhaps the most sacred of all our Constitutionally guaranteed rights, freedom of expression. Lincoln knew well the potential dangers of expression, having steered the Union through the bitterly divisive Civil War, but he held the Constitution dear enough to protect its promises whenever possible (8).
The fundamental purpose of the first amendment was to guarantee the maintenance of an effective system of free speech and expression. This calls for an examination of the various elements which are necessary to support such a system in a modem democratic society. Some of these elements found early articulation in the classic theory of free expression, as it developed over the course of centuries; others are the outgrowth of contemporary conditions. More specifically, it is necessary to analyze what it is that the first amendment attempts to maintain: the function of freedom of expression in a democratic society; what the practical difficulties are in maintaining such a system: the dynamic forces at work in any governmental attempt to restrict or regulate expression; and the role of law and legal institutions in developing and supporting freedom of expression. These three elements are the basic components of any comprehensive theory of the first amendment viewed as a guarantee of a system of free expression.
Hentoff, Nat. Free Speech for Me – But Not for Thee. New York: HarperCollins, 1992. Print
The right to freedom of speech is a cornerstone of the bill of rights and the American system of government, but this freedom is not without limits.
The First Amendment is arguably one of the most important and influential amendments that sustains the idea of a free society. This amendment focuses on the idea of freedom of speech. Founding father, Benjamin Franklin, once said, “freedom of speech is a principal pillar of a free government: when this support is taken away, the constitution of a free society is dissolved”. It can be very easy for a person to disagree with another person and want to deny free speech. One prime example of the First Amendment protecting freedom of speech is in the Supreme Court case Tinker vs. Des Moines of 1969. This case ruled that students wearing black arm bands to protest the Vietnam War was considered symbolic speech and protected by the First Amendment.
The right of freedom of speech in the first Amendment is really interesting because even that people who liberty to say anything what they want, but it is still in limitation; for example, they cannot use fighting words, and incitement to imminent violent action, such as threats to kill an
Baase, Sara. A gift of fire: social, legal and ethical issues in computing. Upper Saddle River:
Freedom of speech is one of democracy’s pillars. Most democratic countries all over the world, also protect their citizens’ freedom of speech in their own ways. Should freedom of speech be restricted? Or does it only need to be protected? I personally believe that in a democratic country, freedom of speech should not be limited in any way. People should be free to express what they would like to express, if their freedom of speech has limitations, the power of the people might lose its power and the essence of democracy itself will vanish.
Freedom of speech cannot be considered an absolute freedom, and even society and the legal system recognize the boundaries or general situations where the speech should not be protected. Along with rights comes civil responsib...