Cross burnings OK in general, outlawed if targeting people

Cross burnings OK in general, outlawed if targeting people

 

A state may outlaw cross burnings designed to intimidate people targeted by such acts but not across burnings in general the U.S. Supreme Court ruled April 7.
The justices decided a Virginia law barring cross burning “with the intent of intimidating any person or group” is not unconstitutional, thereby disagreeing with a ruling by the state’s Supreme Court. The high court, however, said the burning of a cross also could mean a person is expressing “core political speech.”

Alabama has no law against cross burnings. Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor wrote for the court, “The First Amendment permits Virginia to outlaw cross burnings done with the intent to intimidate because burning a cross is a particularly virulent form of intimidation.

“Instead of prohibiting all intimidating messages, Virginia may choose to regulate this subset of intimidating messages in light of cross burning’s long and pernicious history as a signal of impending violence,” she wrote.

“The protections afforded by the First Amendment…are not absolute, and we have long recognized that the government may regulate certain categories of expression consistent with the Constitution,” O’Connor wrote.

“The Supreme Court dealt as judiciously as possible with a very difficult issue,” said Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. “We all want to maximize freedom of speech protections, but clearly there are limitations at the far edges of free speech.”

Virginia Attorney General Jerry Kilgore hailed the opinion, calling it a “great day” for the state. “Our law involves two important freedoms- freedom of speech and freedom from fear,” he said in a written statement. “Our statute preserves the first and secures the second.”

(BP)