Speaker 1: More than three and a half million people took to
Speaker 1: the streets in Washington, d C. In all fifty states
Speaker 1: on Saturday to protest peacefully in the Women's Marches, marching
Speaker 1: and demonstrating our rights that have been exercised in this country,
Speaker 1: to protest civil rights violations, the Vietnam War, LGBT rights.
Speaker 1: The list goes on, but now Republican lawmakers in five
Speaker 1: states have introduced bills to criminalize peaceful protests. They ranged
Speaker 1: from a villa in Minnesota to increase fines for freeway
Speaker 1: protests up to three thousand dollars in a year in jail,
Speaker 1: to a villain North Dakota that would not penalize a
Speaker 1: driver who negligently runs over and kills protesters on highways.
Speaker 1: Our guest is Timothy Zike, professor at William and Mary
Speaker 1: Law School and author of Speech out of Doors Preserving
Speaker 1: First Amendment Liberties in Public Places. Timothy, these target non
Speaker 1: violent protests and sound like violations of the First Amendment.
Speaker 1: Are they well? Some of them could be um, some
Speaker 1: of the laws might be deemed disproportionate to the government's interests,
Speaker 1: and things like UM, the free flow of traffic on
Speaker 1: highways UH and public safety and order. In those sorts
Speaker 1: of things, there's a requirement that when you regulate speed,
Speaker 1: especially in traditional public forum which are things like public
Speaker 1: streets and public parks and sidewalks, that you do so
Speaker 1: with some measure of care. So some of these measures
Speaker 1: could violate the First Amendment through that sort of analysis.
Speaker 1: Others seems to single out particular types of protests, for example,
Speaker 1: union protests, and the Supreme Court has been very clear, uh, indeed,
Speaker 1: with respect to laws that do exactly that, that the
Speaker 1: government doesn't have the power it cannot under the First
Speaker 1: Amendment single out particular speakers or messages under the First
Speaker 1: and Endment. So it's possible that at least some of
Speaker 1: these measures would violate current First Amendment free speech and
Speaker 1: assembly standards. Timmy, even if they do, uh potentially violate
Speaker 1: the First Amendment, and even if they would get struck down, Uh,
Speaker 1: are there concerns that you have about them that they
Speaker 1: would chill speech if they did go uh into effect. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think even if they they didn't violate First Amendment doctrine,
Speaker 1: they seem to be inconsistent with what you might say
Speaker 1: is the spirit of the First Amendment freedom of speech
Speaker 1: and free assembly in the places that I mentioned, uh,
Speaker 1: in the sense that they seem to be designed to
Speaker 1: chill or suppress UM protests. Now, on the flip side
Speaker 1: of that, we have to acknowledge there is no First
Speaker 1: Amendment right to block traffic. There's no First Amendment right,
Speaker 1: uh to engage in this sort of disruptive behavior that
Speaker 1: some of the protesters have engaged in. So you have
Speaker 1: to give the state its due in the sense that
Speaker 1: it's allowed to um, you know, pass laws to maintain
Speaker 1: public order and safety. But the concern is that many
Speaker 1: of these laws, most of the facts, seem to go
Speaker 1: beyond that their existing laws that, for example, punished that
Speaker 1: that sort of civil disobedience, but these laws seek to increase.
Speaker 1: Find for example, the ten thousand dollars to make the
Speaker 1: offensive felony as opposed to misdemeanor. And think about the
Speaker 1: disportmate impact that those sorts of laws have on students
Speaker 1: on the poor, who may not be able to afford
Speaker 1: that kind of judgment, and then for whom civil disobedience
Speaker 1: becomes um costly uh in the sense of fines and
Speaker 1: potential imprisonment, And the calculus changes quite a bit in
Speaker 1: that sense, Tim very surprising is the bill in North
Speaker 1: Dakota that would not penalize a driver who negligently runs
Speaker 1: over and kills protesters on highways. No, they shouldn't be
Speaker 1: blocking the highway, let's say. But that seems to take
Speaker 1: this out of the hands of the police and the courts. Well,
Speaker 1: I'm surprised by that when I hadn't I hadn't seen
Speaker 1: that before brought to my attention, and I have to say,
Speaker 1: it completely flips around the understanding again under the First Amendment,
Speaker 1: that protesters are entitled to use these traditional public forums
Speaker 1: for protests and civil disobedience and communicating in all sorts
Speaker 1: of manners, and to make it dangerous for them, and
Speaker 1: the sense that you provide an immunity to a driver
Speaker 1: who negligently runs over a protester. Um. I don't want
Speaker 1: to say it encourages reckless behavior, but it might. And
Speaker 1: it certainly is wildly inconsistent with the tradition we've had
Speaker 1: in this country of allowing protesters, even when they're disruptive,
Speaker 1: to have their say, to engage in assembly, to engage
Speaker 1: in mass protests in public streets. Tim there's also some
Speaker 1: legislation in Minnesota involving uh, penalties for obstructing the legal process.
Speaker 1: Are you familiar with that, and if you can, you
Speaker 1: explain what that means. Well, I'm not sure exactly what
Speaker 1: it means. There might be part of the problem could
Speaker 1: be there could be a vagueness problem with laws and
Speaker 1: ordinances of that sort. A person who is subject to
Speaker 1: the law has to know in plain English what the
Speaker 1: law forbid um. If it is the case that that
Speaker 1: is um some sort of public order offense, that a
Speaker 1: protester who doesn't immediately cooperate in some way, who stands
Speaker 1: in this place as opposed to another, and is arrested
Speaker 1: on that basis, then the concern with laws like that
Speaker 1: and all sorts of public order laws is the massive
Speaker 1: discretion that those laws placed in the hands of officers
Speaker 1: who can arrest for what would seem manly be very
Speaker 1: minor offenses and again subject protesters and assemblers to um
Speaker 1: some very strict penalties. Jim, we will have to leave
Speaker 1: it there for now. That's Tim Zike, professor at William
Speaker 1: and Mary Law School,