I went to some palestine protests a while back, and was talking to my brother about the organizing, when revealed something I found pretty shocking, we (the protesters) had acquired a permit to hold the protest. Apparently this is standard policy across the US.
More recently, my University is also having protests, and in their policy, they also require explicit approval for what they call “expressive activity”. I’m pretty sure not having a permit has been used as an excuse to arrest students in some other campuses.
My question is as the title, doesn’t this fundamentally contradict the US’s ideals of free speech? What kind of right needs an extra permit to exercise it?
When I was talking to my brother, he also expressed a couple more points:
- The city will pretty much grant all permits, so it’s more of a polite agreement in most cases
- If we can get a permit (which we did) why shouldn’t we?
I’m assuming this is because of legal reasons, they pretty much have to grant all permits.
Except I think this makes it all worse. If the government grants almost all permits, then the few rare times it doesn’t:
- The protest is instantly de-legitimized due to not having a permit
- There’s little legal precedent for the protesters to challenge this
And then of course there’s the usual slippery slope argument. You’re giving the government a tool they could expand later to oppress you further. Maybe they start with the groups most people don’t like and go up from there.
As more of conceptual response of why this is generally practiced and legal under our system of governance: an individual’s freedom of speech is not the express demand that everyone else must or need listen to said speech.
EVERYTHING you do in the USA is illegal. This is not hyperbole.
Any right you think you have is stripped by another law also on the books. You are always and forever in breach of the law. This allows you those with no education and power like police and DAs to pick and choose who and what to prosecute. If everyone is in breach, it doesn’t make it legal. It just makes it a game of “don’t piss off your oppressor”. This is the same game used in North Korea. Same in the USSR. Same in many fascist nations with an illusion of democracy.
Two important concepts:
- The First Amendment allows government to impose “time, place, and manner” restrictions on protected speech. So if you give a speech protected by the First Amendment, the government can still regulate your use of sound amplification, including things like regulating noise levels at night or in residential areas. If you assemble in an assembly protected by the First Amendment, the government may still enforce fire code restrictions like occupancy limits in a building or weight limits on a platform, or even permitting requirements for all of the above.
- The First Amendment also distinguishes between public forum, limited public forums, and nonpublic forums. The government must allow people to use things like theaters and stages for First Amendment speech and expression, but doesn’t have to do things like let protestors onto restricted military bases to protest.
Permitting is one way to regulate time, place, and manner. Also, it’s a way to prevent double booking. A city-run community theater might allow for one church to hold services on Sunday, and a first come first serve policy might cause the city to deny access to another church that wants to use the exact same place at the exact same time.
So a specific lawn on a public university campus might require permitting in a way that complies with the First Amendment, if the permitting is used to:
- Prevent overcrowding beyond safe limits
- Prevent excessive wear and tear on the grass/landscaping
- Prevent multiple groups holding incompatible activities in the same space
- Prevent interference with actual governmental functions (e.g., not disrupting classes being held)
- Keep the First Amendment protected activity within the actual zones where that is permitted
People can and do engage in First Amendment protected activity outside of those lines, of course. Sometimes the point of a protest is to break the law: civil rights sit ins, marches on specific streets, etc. But the organizers and the governmental authority generally need to work at defining those lines clearly, so that any decision to break the law is conscious and planned.
Yeah, I’m with most everyone else here. I manage the scheduling on a small college campus, and the students are welcome to protest or bring awareness to whatever they like, but they can’t be interrupting classes or other planned activities.
I’m not gonna say things are in a good place in the USA re protesting and speech.
But the permit is to assemble, and essentially temporarily hold a public space. Not to speak. You as an individual can go to a city park right now and start discussing any topic you like.
I’m not advocating anything here, just describing the permit.
