The Skokie Stand-off: Free Speech vs. Personal Dignity

We know the First Amendment protects hate speech. But has it always done so? And how have civil rights groups responded when their members are the target of hate speech?

University of Iowa Law Professor Samantha Barbas is the author of a new law review article, “How American Civil Rights Groups Defeated Hate Speech Laws.”

Timestamps: 

00:00 Intro

04:04 “The Birth of a Nation” movie controversy

12:44 Henry Ford’s anti-Semitic “Dearborn Independent”

22:41 American Jewish Committee’s “quarantining” solution

28:41 ACLU’s Eleanor Holmes Norton defending a racist in court

33:42 Racist Senate candidate J.B. Stoner

37:28 Neo-Nazis and Skokie

47:20 Why are college students afraid of saying “the wrong thing?”

52:31 Barbas’ favorite free speech literature

53:15 Barbas’ free speech hero

Read the transcript here: https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/so-speak-podcast-transcript-civil-rights-hate-speech-and-first-amendment. 

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Show notes:

• Morris Ernst, free speech renegade (Barbas’ previous So to Speak appearance, July 29, 2021)

• Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969) via FIRE