Law Dean Chemerinsky Says Yelling Hecklers Not Protected by First Amendment
A loud and disruptive protest during a speech last week at the University of California at Irvine has divided students and other observers. Some say members of the Muslim Student Union should be expelled for disrupting the speech by Israeli ambassador Michael Oren, while others say they should not be punished for the protest.
The dean of UC’s law school, one of the sponsors of the speech, is taking something of a middle ground. Writing in the Los Angeles Times, Dean Erwin Chemerinsky says the First Amendment does not protect the students, but they deserve punishment that falls short of expulsion.
The protesting students stood up one by one, shouted something critical, were greeted with applause, and were led out of the room by police, USA Today reports in its account of the incident. According to the story, most higher education leaders have no problem with vocal protests outside an event and quiet protests inside, but don’t tolerate interruptions of the speaker.
Chemerinsky agrees that students could have protested the speech in ways that didn’t interrupt it. “Freedom of speech never has been regarded as an absolute right to speak out at any time and in any manner,” he writes.
“The government, including public universities, always can impose time, place and manner restrictions on speech. A person who comes into my classroom and shouts so that I cannot teach surely can be punished without offending the First Amendment. Likewise, those who yelled to keep the ambassador from being heard were not engaged in constitutionally protected behavior.”
