November 28, 2023

In the News

Reason (Volokh Conspiracy): Journal of Free Speech Law: "'Dangerous to the Liberties of a Free People': Secret Societies and the Right to Assemble," by Nathan Ristuccia

By Eugene Volokh

.....This just-published article is here; the Abstract:

Americans in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries often feared that secret assembly threatened republican government. Oath-bound secret societies were allegedly elitist cabals that would establish an imperium in imperio oppressive to ordinary citizens. Yet despite this hostility, many early Americans also insisted that freedom of assembly included the right to gather anonymously. According to this view, laws could not prohibit or excessively burden secrecy. This article, therefore, examines the discourse around secret societies both at America's founding and at the time the Four­teenth Amendment was ratified. It demonstrates that—although there were voices on both sides of the debate—the weight of the evidence indicates that the First Amendment's Assembly Clause originally protected the right to assemble in secret.

American Family News: Federal judge recognizes free speech in academic arena

By Bronson Woodruff 

.....In June, Professor Daymon Johnson from Bakersfield Community College filed a lawsuit claiming that his colleague, Matthew Garrett, was dismissed for expressing his political beliefs. 

Now, U.S. Magistrate Judge Christopher Baker has deemed the "anti-racist" regulations imposed on more than 54,000 California community college professors to potentially conflict with the First Amendment. There is a temporary halt on their enforcement.

Free Expression

New York Magazine (Intelligencer): Just Stop Making Official Statements About the News

By Jonathan Chait

.....But a significant proportion of the domestic strife we are currently experiencing is completely avoidable. It is a product of the newfound expectation that institutions will issue statements about national and world events. The solution is to simply stop making such statements.

Reason (Volokh Conspiracy): Want Freedom to Criticize China, Palestine, Mexico, etc.? Protect Criticism of Israel

By Eugene Volokh

.....These attempts to suppress criticism of Israel—through proposed campus speech codes, threat of firing, and the like—strike me as dangerous both to American freedom and to American security. I generally support Israel, and think it's quite legitimate (indeed, necessary) for it to destroy Hamas, even if that means the deaths of the people whom Hamas uses as human shields; that is the nature of war, especially war against an enemy that deliberately fights from civilian areas…

But I think it's vital for Americans to be able to freely discuss the actions of foreign governments (as well as, of course, of our own) and decide whom indeed they should side with. That is true when Americans criticize the Palestinian governments (Hamas or PLO), the Communist Chinese government, the Israeli government, or any other country's government.

The States

Politico (New Jersey Playbook): Shocker: Group that backed alleged phantom candidates funded by South Jersey Democrats

By Matt Friedman

.....Last night we finally got a look at the finances of “Jersey Freedom,” the independent expenditure committee that disclosed its existence late in the campaign with mailers and TV ads boosting “conservative” alleged phantom candidates and an unwitting Libertarian candidate to siphon votes from actual Republican candidates in two South Jersey districts...

It was pretty obvious based on circumstantial evidence that Jersey Freedom was a South Jersey Democratic venture. Now it’s official. Jersey Freedom — whose bank account was frozen by a judge after Republicans filed suit — also released a statement shortly after filing its disclosure form with ELEC, though no one put their name on it. It says the group fully complied with the law in disclosing its existence in October and only disclosing its funding source 20 days after the election. .

“Jersey Freedom has fully complied with the recently enacted Elections Transparency Act, authored by Senator Nick Scutari and signed into law by Governor Phil Murphy on April 3, 2023.,” reads the beginning of the statement.

Wait a second. If that’s the case, does this mean the Elections Transparency Act didn’t actually make elections more transparent?

Washington Post: In Alabama, another small-town paper hit in ‘open season’ on free press

By Paul Farhi

.....It took a couple of weeks to confirm, but Fletcher soon broke the news in the weekly Atmore News that officials were probing the Escambia County Board of Education’s handling of federal covid-19 relief funds. What happened next, though, lifted Fletcher’s story far beyond this town nestled amid cotton fields north of the Florida panhandle.

Days later, the local district attorney ordered the arrest of Fletcher and his boss, Sherry Digmon, the News’ publisher and co-owner. He charged both with violating a state law that prohibits the disclosure of grand-jury information — a felony punishable by up to three years in prison.

People United for Privacy: Commenters Express Concern and Confusion Over Arizona’s Prop 211

By Brian Hawkins

.....The Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission (CCEC) has spent the autumn enacting regulations enforcing Proposition 211, an intrusive donor disclosure regime approved via ballot initiative last November. In public comments to the Commission, People United for Privacy (PUFP) warned that the complex statute is a compliance nightmare for nonprofits that discuss public policy in Arizona. In response, PUFP urged the Commission to delay issuing rules until the courts have settled ongoing litigation challenging the law. Unfortunately, the Commission did not heed this advice and proceeded to issue byzantine rules. The public comment period has revealed that the statute and subsequent rules pose significant burdens for nonprofits across the spectrum attempting to comply with the expansive law.

Delaware News Journal: Why Delaware elections commissioners rarely enforce campaign finance laws

By Amanda Fries

.....Delaware elections officials have the authority to investigate campaign finance violations, but that oversight has never been used.

The state Department of Elections said that it has “no records” of probes conducted using the most basic power given to Delaware election commissioners: investigating “information coming to the attention of the commissioner that, if true, would constitute” a violation of campaign finance laws.