Quote:
Originally Posted by RoxyRollah
Listen I've always been told your rights do not extsend to you yelling fire in a crowded theatre. I mean there are really only a few rights we actually have, the rest can be circumvented by a clever attorney.
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Fun fact: the "yelling fire in a crowded theater" thing is used to explain the reasoning behind the Supreme Court's "clear and present danger" ruling on the
Schenck v. United States case... BUT, that case had nothing to do with yelling fire in a crowded theater. It was about some guy handing out flyers protesting the draft in WWI, and the Supreme Court ruled that doing so created a "clear and present danger" to national security.
Over the next few decades, the Supreme Court would become even more repressive about this -- generally in times of war, or the Red Scare -- but all of this (including
Schenck) has been overturned in the last few decades. So "yelling fire in a crowded theater" isn't even a legal thing anymore, and was also clearly a case of the US government trampling on First Amendment rights when it suited the Supreme Court's agenda.
Schenck v. United States