The Volokh Conspiracy

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Today in Supreme Court History

Today in Supreme Court History: March 21, 1989

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3/21/1989: Texas v. Johnson is argued.

 

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Josh Blackman is a constitutional law professor at the South Texas College of Law Houston, an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute, and the President of the Harlan Institute. Follow him @JoshMBlackman.

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  1. captcrisis

    A notable example of Republican cynicism and hypocrisy, wave-the-flag scoundrelism, fortunately struck down, here and in Eichman. (So . . . did Tribe set this whole thing up?)

  2. Dr. Ed

    The interesting question is if this would apply to burning the Gay Pride flag? In theory it should — but reality is that it would be considered a “hate crime” and hence it wouldn’t.

    How about burning the flag of the People’s Republic of China (i.e. the Chinese flag)? That’d probably be considered a “hate crime” as well.

    Well, then, couldn’t one then argue that burning the US Flag is equally a hate crime? Explain to a Martian the objective differences between Johnson’s hatred of Reagan and A’s hatred of Gays and/or B’s hatred of the ChiComs. Other than our content-based views, there really isn’t one (and Reagan was shot, so there’s your “potential of violence” argument).

    1. Dr. Ed

      An interesting “Only In Amherst” incident to illustrate my point.

      The Puerto Rican flag was being flown on the Amherst (MA) Town Common in recognization of some Puerto Rican festival week.

      A do-good leftist somehow (a) confused it with the Texas flag (it’s not even the same shape) and (b) presumed that it had been put up to honor then President GW Bush (43).

      So like any good leftist, she took it upon herself to remove it — only to later learn of her mistake. And all was forgiven because her intent was to remove the TX flag, even though it actually was the PR one.

      In other words, it was perfectly acceptable for her to steal the TX flag, but not the PR one — and I ask whatever happened to the concept of “content neutrality”???

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