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92\ friday, April 4, 1986
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
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FRANKI,Drit.
Spe•thl:io iThe Jewish News. ) '
Philadelphia — The failure- of
the, American systeM of gov.ern4
tent to deal effectively iwith.the
rise of violence and terrorism hasp •
Many signs, Actuallf, it isn't, so i
much' the; system as )it is .those
Lawyers who interpret :it ,and :
twist it out of shape. ,.
The American Civil. Liberties
Union (ACLU); an organization
which a few decades ago 'was in ;
the forefront of defending the
rights of beset minorities; has now
with its ideological dogmas be-
come one of the chief impediments
to sensible solutions to real prob-
lems. Item: because of a rash of
violence in Detroit high schools,
the authorities introduced elec-
tric screening devices to detect
hidden weapons. The ACLU is
carrying a case to overthrow the
school authorities' rule. A few
years ago no one had a "right" to
go to school at all: it was a
privilege, appreciated by those
who wanted an education. Today
it has become not just a right, in
the mindless dogmas of the
ideologues it is accompanied by
the right to attend armed to injure
others!
The Skokie episode, in which
the,ACLU defended the "right" of
disloyal Americans to invade the
privacy and threaten the security
of loyal citizens, still haunts us.
Frank Collins and the American
Nazis intimidated a commitnity,
including many survivors, and
Were assisted in thwarting the in-
telligent intervention of the city
authorities by the ACLII.,,Collins
triumphantly got away with dec-
laring that "the unfortunate
thing is not that there were six
million Jews who died. The unfor-
tunate thing is that there were so
many Jewish survivors." •
The first reports on the Skokie
incident, apart from the (justifi-
ably) outraged comments of a few
Jewish commentators and a few
Others who remembered that the
purpose of "free speech" is to build
up a wise public opinion, repeated
the Mindless dogmatism of those
who have made "free speech" a
cover for intimidation, pornog-
raphy and exhibitionsim. Thus
the first book on the incident, en-
titled The Nazi-Skokie Conflict: A
Civil Liberties. Battle (Beacon
Press, 1980), simply :repeated
time-worn phrases and heralded
the "victory" of First Amendment
rights: Happily, a genuine
think-piece has at last appeared:
Nazis in Skokie: Freedom, Com-
munity, and the First Amend-
ment, by Donald A. Downs (Uni-
versity of Notre Dame Press),
which is worthy of reading and
reflection by American citizens.
The first thing that needs to be
Said again is that the purpose of
"free speech," and the intention
that was in the minds of the
Founding Fathers in making it
One of the cornerstones of the Fed-
eral Constitution, is to protect the
public debate which alone makes
intelligent public policy possible.
The founders of the American Re
public knew a great deal about the
many instruments of repression,
and they knew that bad govern-
ments use these instruments to
prevent fu ftdex ,and,3 informed •
decision-MO*413y an intelligent
citizenry:. So they did
they
could to make freedom,of
free speedh, free'press;freedebiof
assembly and freedom of iiegiffin
for redress of 'grievances , secure
against arbitrary rulers. It would
not have occurred to them that
"free speech,"for example, means
anything more or less than what
the commonsense meaning of the
words convey. And it certainly
would not have occurred to them
that anyone would suppose "free
speech" could be justified that had
another, destructive purpose in-
stead of open-faced and honorable
participation in public debate.
But the dogmatists have made
it otherwise. Working on the Lan-
guage of the Constitution over the
decades, they have made "free
; I
Free speech was
intended to protect
the public debate
which makes
intelligent , public
policy possible.
speech" 'the right to' , intimidate
loyal citizenfAand to inhibit their
free speeeh;'of course!). •
The new book, by Donald A.
Downs, (hies fienae thinking about
the comple !Probleins that have
arisen in a world which has since
the 19th CeiitUry seen two World •
Wars, two totalitarian regimes,
two massive genocidal programs
by these regimes, two ideologies
that have replaced traditional
Judeo-Chrietian ' value-systems,
and two fir programs of in-
filtration iad terrorism to un-
dermind ("de4tibilize") demOcra- '
tic societies. The most useful con-
tributich is perhaps the concept of
"assaultive speech."
"Assaultive speech" intelli-
gently defines What Coiling and
his Nazis were engaged in. The
ACLU dogniatists have developed
the idea thativearing a uniform is
"symbolic speech," and therefore
comes under the extended protec-
tion of the 'First Amendment.
Prof. Downs' concept is actually a
realistic description of what hap-
pened and will happen again un-
less loyal and thinking citizens
rise up against mindless dogma
and insist that "free speech"
means exactly *hat "free speech"
meant to the Founding Fathers
and means to us.
Prof. DoWns proposes that
"sPeech in'the public forum"
should be liable to legal limits
-"when such expression is ac-
companied by the advocacy of
death or violence" against a
targetted group. Precisely! One of
the objective 'marks of terrorist
movements is the open advocacy
of violence toward a targetted
group.
One of the lessons of the
Holocaust is surely the standing
reminder that "freedom" must be
balanced with "responsibility."