Ken Hamblin Quotes

We are the only country that allows and protects hate speech.

The First Amendment defends all forms of speech including hate speech, which is why groups like Ku Klux Klan are allowed to utter their poisonous remarks.

Under the privilege of the 1st Amendment many, many ridiculous things are said.

Hate speech and freedom of speech are two different things.

The First Amendment allows Nazis and white extremists to do what they are going to do, and it allows for black extremists and all other types of extremists to do what they are going to do. I understand that, and I'm not opposed to that.

While we as members of the Coalition strongly support free speech, it is not unlimited free speech. People aren't free to vilify others on the basis of race or religion.

We want to protect freedom of speech, but it is not unlimited freedom of speech. There has always been rules around defamation, slander and libel, and in Victoria, we have effective rules on racial and religious vilification.

The best way to deal with the neo-Nazi movements is not to overreact and curtail their free speech rights which would make you no better than they are.

We had a responsibility to represent all people whose 1st Amendment rights were at risk

I’ll defend your right to be a bigot.

As a young constitutional lawyer, I was put to the first amendment test when I was called on to defend racists and neo-Nazis. I really had no choice. Surely now we know that none of us do. Free speech is unequivocal, unpolitical, and indivisible.

Hate speech can't be a part of free speech.

While I unconditionally support the First Amendment, inciting violence against others due to their political affiliation is not constitutionally protected speech.

Nowhere does our Constitution say we cannot say something about another's religion. Nowhere does our Constitution say we cannot say anything that offends someone.

We have ways to protect the public when free speech crosses over in hate speech.

Our First Amendment expresses a far different calculus for regulating speech than for regulating nonexpressive conduct and that is as it should be. The right to swing your fist should end at the tip of my nose, but your right to express your ideas should not necessarily end at the lobes of my ears.

That's in the First Amendment?

Certainly one cannot ban cross burning in the sanctity of his bedroom.

The growing tide of anti-Semitism shocks the conscious of everyone who values freedom, and the ugly, hateful acts particularly stain the character of democracies where liberty and religious freedom are supposed to be respected.

I think free speech is probably the coolest thing we have in this country, and again, you can label it hate speech and dismiss it, and then you're allowed to censor it.

Religious liberty doesn't include encouraging a fellow American to engage in violent jihad and kill an American here. That is not protected free speech. That is not protected religious belief.

When I began we did not really have a lot of First Amendment law. It is really surprising to think of it this way, but a lot of the law - most of the law that relates to the First Amendment freedom of the press in America - is really within living memory.

Freedom of speech and thought matters, especially when it is speech and thought with which we disagree. The moment the majority decides to destroy people for engaging in thought it dislikes, thought crime becomes a reality.

I don't believe in this idea of, 'That's hate speech, stop it.'

In commendably seeking to protect freedom of speech, we must not lower our defences against the evil of racial and religious intolerance.