First off, I am a borderline absolutist when it comes to the first amendment and have read William Douglas's opinions on the matter extensively. I, myself, have been known to make pretty unpopular statements, but I have never incited my fellow citizens to unlawful actions.
Such is not the case of Lynchburg tea party organizer Mike Troxel. He fails what is referred to as the Brandenburg test.
Clarence Brandenburg was an ignorant and hateful man who lead the rural Ohio KKK in the 1960s. He even invited a tv reporter down to see a KKK rally where they said their usual "hang the people they didn't like" speech, a hate speech basically.
So he got convicted under the Red Scare Law of 1919, when those evil commies where gonna overthrow our government by making speeches. Seriously, look it up.
So it gets trotted up to the Supreme Court, because Brandenberg said his freedom of speech was impeded upon because he was making "abstract" calls to use force. The Supreme Court sided with Brandenberg throwing out his previous convictions.
So instead of the "imminent lawless action" test for free speech that had been the law of the land, a new test was enacted:
Brandenburg test
http://topics.law.cornell.edu/...
Standard established in Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 US 444 (1969), to determine when inflammatory speech intending to advocate illegal action can be restricted. The standard developed determined that speech advocating the use of force or crime could only be proscribed where two conditions were satisfied: (1) the advocacy is "directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action," and (2) the advocacy is also "likely to incite or produce such action."
So we have the teabaggerists in Virginia, let's see if they pass the test:
- They posted the address, the wrong one no less, as a direction for imminent lawless action and produced language to incite other citizens to commit lawless action.
Check.
- This was not likely to produce such action, it DID produce such actions.
Check.
In short, the actions by Mike Troxel, as the facts are present at the moment, passes the Brandenberg Test and should be charged with incitement.
Maybe Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli can get on this instead of filing frivalous lawsuits against health care reform. You know, Rule of Law over Rule of Political Passion.
Because yes, Virginia, there is an incitement clause, and maybe we all need a real Fitzmas to make the citizens believe again.