Michael Wayne Godwin Quotes

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.

If there is a bedrock principle of the First Amendment, it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.

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.

It just seems to be a human trait to want to protect the speech of people with whom we agree. For the First Amendment, that is not good enough. So it is really important that we protect First Amendment rights of people no matter what side of the line they are on.

Most of us will agree that the right to say anything anywhere, no matter what the consequences, is carrying the right to free expression a bit too far. We run into controversy, however, when we try to draw the line between protected free expression and the kind of expression that should be prohibited because of the potential harm that it can do.

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

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

The First Amendment is often inconvenient. But that is beside the point. Inconvenience does not absolve the government of its obligation to tolerate speech.

There is no asterisk in the Constitution that says 'except for hate 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.

Individuals have a right to freedom of 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.

I would bet there is no place in the United States where the First Amendment would survive intact.

We don't have the freedom of speech to talk about the weather. We have the first amendment so we can say some very controversial things.

I try to do that in this book without preaching - to try to do as you just said that you really have to defend the First Amendment rights of everybody.

The Supreme Court has held that code is speech. And it doesn't matter that it's done on a computer or done face to face or done in a newspaper, reporting the facts of the world is protected speech.

Do we really want the FCC to conduct investigations and issue warnings to radio talk show hosts nationwide who simply discuss the important issues of our time? The Constitution says 'freedom of speech,' not 'freedom of government-approved fair speech in rationed amounts.'

Free speech is meant to protect unpopular speech. Popular speech, by definition, needs no protection.

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.

Advocates of 'free speech' often repeat the mantra that the best response to bad speech is more and better speech, not the suppression of the bad stuff.

Freedom of speech is freedom to offend.

[E]rroneous statement … must be protected if the freedoms of expression are to be given the breathing space that they need ... to survive.

Prior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and least tolerable infringement on First Amendment Rights.

Authoritative interpretations of the First Amendment guarantees have consistently refused to recognize an exception for any test of truth — whether administered by judges, juries, or administrative officials — and especially one that puts the burden of proving truth on the speaker.

Political speech is indispensable to decision-making in a democracy, and this is no less true because the speech comes from a corporation. By taking the right to speak from some and giving it to others, the Government deprives the disadvantaged person or class of the right to use speech to strive to establish worth, standing, and respect for the speaker’s voice. The Government may not by these means deprive the public of the right and privilege to determine for itself what speech and speakers are worthy of consideration. The First Amendment protects speech and speaker, and the ideas that flow from each.