But were not here to talk about that, were here to talk about something more interesting, and that is the First Amendment jurisprudence of the Roberts Court. More than any other Supreme Court justice in recent history, john roberts has played a defining role in shaping our free speech laws. Hes written more than twice as many majority opinions in this area than any of his colleagues, and theres a certain resolve there, at once philosophical and tactical. In 95 of the Free Expression cases decided in his 15year tenure, roberts has been in the majority. Td hes taken the lead opinion nearly 30 of the time. So theres Something Special about this area of cases, something that speaks to how john roberts sees the court. In the First Comprehensive report on the Roberts Courts free speech jurisprudence, ron collins and david hudson examine the 56 such causes handed down by the6 Roberts Court from 20052020. The authors eyeopening study provides a detailed look at the cases and the justices differing approaches. Here to tell us about the approach are the authors, ron collins, who among other things is a book editor at scotus blog, and david hudson who serves as a Justice Robert h. Jackson legal fellow for the foundation for individual rights in education and a First Amendment fellow for the Freedom Forum institute. David to explain their study. [booing] thank you. What a delight it is to be here. I very mucher appreciate hudson of providing this opportunity to talk about our report. I would also like to thank bob and dean for participating. Its an honor to have both views join us today. So thank you. A little footnote, im retired from the university of washington. I want to make sure that its in the record. When the next major biography and all subsequent biographies of john robbins are written, one thing is undoubtedly certain. His First Amendment jurisprudence. And i mean speech, press and assembly. This is an area of particular interest to him. And she called him, i am probably the most aggressive defender of the First Amendment. Some said John Roberson at 2019 interview with former attorney general Alberto Gonzales and out Belmont Law School dean, im probably the most aggressive defender of the First Amendment. Let me just go over and repeat because there is significant some of the numbers that have been mentioned to you. The majority 95 of the times in the 56th free speech opinion during his tenure. 95 of the time. That means that 90 scent of the time that john roberts is assigning the First Amendment. He signed the opinion to himself almost 30 of the time. Which itself isth remarkable. He has authored twice as many maturity opinions than any of his colleagues. Moreover, he has written more majority opinions, john roberts, just as one person has written more majority opinions when it comes to free speech than the total of justice combined. To take the four liberal justices, and if you combine all of their majority opinions, they are still fewer than john roberts. His total majority opinion number sustained as Justice Scalia, thomas and illegal. So if you can combine those majority opinions, there certainly no greater in number than that of a chief justice. And while Justice Kennedy has often been seen as the point man when it comes to First Amendment cases, during his tenure, john roberts has authored more than twice as many majorities than Justice Kennedy. So, how does this compare with the record . Well when the rehnquist affirmed free speech cases and 20 of the cases. 20 of the cases he participated in fee affirmed a freespeech claim. Were roberts has done so in over 55 of the cases that come before him. Notwithstanding, his importance in this area. Significantly i my colleague may want to touch on this, the t two most important opinionsob thus far from the Roberts Court of course our Citizens United decided to thousand ten by Justice Kennedy and the campaignfinance case. And read verses the town of gilbert decided to thousand 15. The content scrutiny analysis case. The two most important opinions and read versus the town of gilbert. They were not written by the chief justice. In terms of liberal during her entire tenure on court, Justice Kagan has written one majority opinion. Justice breyer is in dissent with a significant number. Because from the liberal vantage point, particularly when it comes to campaignfinance cases and using freespeech cases, by their measure what Roberts Court is doug quote weapon icing the First Amendment. And they take quite exception to the fact that the most winning cases is decided by the roberts course have been campaignfinance cases. In terms of original jurisprudence particularly given the enormous contributions to that by Justice Scalia. In his Justice Kagan said we are all originalists in one way or another today. That may be true, but is certainly not true when it comes to the Roberts Courts and its free speech jurisprudence. With the writings and discussion and known freespeech cases with Justice Scalia ever go into any discussion to extended discussionnd for jurisprudence, the petition clause derail. [inaudible] he did talk about the education clause with jurisprudence aside from that nothing. In terms of Justice Thomas concurrent in a student speech case and some discussion in a videogame brown versus Entertainment Merchants Association. Some pleaded discussion with the United States about tttentional stress. Hes not been this area very much pretty in the deniable case 2019 the New York Times was wrongly decided in the New York Times. We may have a lot of originalists on the court. But in terms of the free speech jurisprudence there is a glaring absence of any extended discussions. Finally, just want to mention a couple of things before hande it over to david. The First Amendment is more than what judges right and what professors pontificate about. It is what lawyers do. Its very important to keep important people like, people like james bock, are the ones who keep the First Amendment live in many respects might comes to their litigation and a new phase i think we see a lot more is kristen waggoner. You may know the name for cheap successfully argued the case. She has a petition between the army with washington involving samesex weddings. She also has another petition in a disclosure requirement t case. So keep your eyes on those lawyers when it comes to First Amendment in terms of the Supreme Court litigation. With that im happy to turn over to my colleague. Thanks ron. Thank you so much for the opportunity to participate in this project with you. Many thanks to cato. I want to talk about three things when it comes to Roberts Court in the First Amendment. Those are category contact and content. Those are all important a in First Amendment methodologies. The first point is category. E one way we determine whether speech is protected by the First Amendment is to determine if it falls into an unprotected category of speech. For example the u. S. Supreme court recognized the exception in 1957. Plate recognized the fighting words exception in 1942 in new hampshire. And it recognized incitement sediment law versus ohio 1969. And over time the United States Supreme Court has narrowed theses unprotected categories of speech. Omading to a society that protects more freedom of expression. One of the hallmarks of the Roberts Court has been its reluctance to recognize new unprotected categories of speech. And the Roberts Court has done this four times. In 2010 the United States versus stevens, United States Supreme Court refused to recognize the unprotected category of images of animal cruelty. In 2011, Entertainment Merchants Association versus brown, the u. S. Supreme court fused to recognize an exception for socalled violent video games. In 2012 on snyder versus phelps, the u. S. Supreme court, refused to recognize a new unprotected category for funeral protests by the Westborough Baptist church. And then in 2012 as well United States versus alvarez, the u. S. Supreme court t refused to recognize a new unprotected category for purely false speec speech. Now turning toe context, context also matters in First Amendment jurisprudence. Im referring to the status of the speaker. Its reality of modern First Amendment law that the government has greater power to restrict speech when it acts as educator, warden or commanderinchief. Stated another way, if you are a public employee, if you are a Public School student if you are a prisoner or if you are a member of the military you have less freespeech rights as you would in general society not on this front the Roberts Court has not been terribly protective of freespeech. For example in beard versus banks in 2006, the United States bring forth a narrow view of the First Amendment right of prison inmate. Something far less them Justice Marshall did. In 2006, the United States Supreme Court United States Supreme Court by five to four ruling world that when Public Employees speak pursuant to the official job duties the constitution does not insulate them from discipline. They do not have any First Amendment protection. Does not matter how important his speeches, it does not matter if the employee is a pure whistleblower. If the employees engage in official job duty speech. And 2007, the Roberts Court also by a five to four vote. Failed to recognize the freespeech rights of Public School students in a case called morris versus fredericks. Colloquially known as the bond for jesus case because Joseph Frederick and others upheld an eight by 14foot banner sink bog is for jesus there offcampus and were passing through juneau alaska. So on context again the Roberts Court is been quite differential to Public Schools to public employers. And certainly prisons. Regard to contents, the chief tool we havent jurisprudence as a socalled contentde discrimination principle. It is probably expressed most tellingly by marshall and Chicago Police department versus mostly in 1972 when he wrote above all else the First Amendment means the governmenten may not restrict speech because of its message, as ideasau, its subject matter or its content. And for better or worse the content discrimination principle is the chief tool is Justice Oconnor said in 1994. No better alternative has come to light. In 2015, the Roberts Court decided what is one of the most important First Amendment decisions in recent memory that is read versus the town of gilbert. The case involved in arizona ordinance that provided very different treatment. Whether a sign was an ideological sign, politicaldu side or a temporary durational sign. Both a Federal District court and the ninth u. S. Circuit aircourt of appeals ruled that this arizona sign ordinance was content neutral because the underlying purpose of the law was not to discriminate against content or viewpoint. Mike goes up to the United States Supreme Court however, the United States Supreme Court unanimously reversed. But they do so under very different rationale. And Justice Clarence thomas the author of the majority opinion. Justice Clarence Thomas said we have to take thatt crucial first step. If a law doesnt make distinction based on content, it is content based and as as such is subject to strict scrutiny. Justice kagan for example had a concurring opinion in which she essentially says that no, a lot of time something that may draw facial distinction does not have an underlying purpose of content discrimination. Thank you. Thank you david and ron, fascinating stuff but i will remind the audience that if you have questions you can either submit them on a webpage about is where god viewing this, or through our facebook and twitter and youtube lap form using the. With that i will turn it over. So i just want to thank the Cato Institute for letting me be here today. My focus as a scholar has been on the media both old media, Mainstream Media and new media. My remarks today are focused on the Roberts Court and what it is had to say about the media. In the last 15 years, since roberts has been justice theres been a digital revolution. The newspaper industry has been very hard hit by the revolution and today there are 47 fewer newspaper reporters and editors photographers than we had in 2015. Meanwhile the tech giant access to most of the content we receive. And so one might think that in the light of this digital revolution that Roberts Court wouldve taken new and old cases to clarify freedom of the press. What is the meaning of the freedom of the press today and how does this relate to free speech rights. In fact, what we have is the story of the dog that did not bark. Prior court had taken a lot of cases of interest to the media. They have limited to those corporate defamation is always a big case. Ed is a type of case the media are always greatly interested in. But in the last 15 years, the u. S. Supreme court really is not done anything in the area of defamation. But the media are most interested in. The Supreme Court of the opportunity to tell us whether the ftc can regulate broadcast decency still under the first to mimic . Because of person face in this the scarcity of the airwaves. This has been challenged today when often times the consumer cannot tell whats broadcast over the airway what is cable what theyre getting through the internet because it came from the same platform. Broadcast media calls out for potentially a new approach. But neatly sidestepped that issue audit narrow issue of statutory obstruction. So we do not know if the First Amendment still can treat broadcasters differently in terms of allowing some content regulation that we did not allow another media. The Supreme Court case is going to be quite about broadcast media. That case is the National Association of broadcasters National Association of broadcasters versus radio project. That case will address was known as crossownership rules that prohibits from ownership of media in the same market. It is designed to make sure theres diversity of different voices and viewpoints in the marketplace ideas by issue. But that is just about it in terms of old media cases. And then in terms of new media cases, you do have a case, brown versus entertainment merchants which deal with an attempt restrict them from the hands of minors. In the Supreme Court in that case, basically did not accept fear mongering about new media and the dangers of news media taking over the minds of our youth. The Supreme Court said there is no evidence that interactive violent video games areti any different than beatty thats come before. If california cannot restrict them from minors the other cases of new media are not very instructive. Which is true and useful. But theres no telling what that might mean for future cases involving new media. And in another case involving threats made over facebook, threats made over sociall media, again the Supreme Court sidestepped the opportunity to tell us the fact that a threat occurred on social media, change the First Amendment analysis in any significant way. And so at every turn had to either avoid it or sidestep the opportunity to tell us Something Interesting about old media rights and new media rights in the last 15 years. Now what is the Court Interested in . Obviously as we said previously, the court is very interested in First Amendment cases. Theyre just not interested in media law cases. So they are very interested in free speech cases as they affect the electoral process. In this case is hi to set out very concretely a few key principles. They set out concretely that government limits on political spending our limit on political speech. Perhaps most famously in Citizens United. As a whole line or stream ofat cases with the principal that limits on political speech. The other principal comes the absolutely clear in the decision is that the government may not impose limits on speech in order to level the Playing Field between the speech of rich import speakers. Again these are the principles the Roberts Court seems most interested and prayed that very little to do with theas media. Luckily they are from other cases that do establish precedents that do benefit old and new one of the principles the robert course has upheld as protection for unpopular speakers. Free speech protection to funeral protesters about it on popular speakers you could possibly imagine. Then theyre giving broad protection to people who lie about receiving a constitutional medal of honor. So it really is speech that does not call out to us that it strikes us of having much value. The court has said those type of unpopular speakers in speech deserve broad protection. That suggests that calls we are getting now for regulation of fake news for example, are going to fall on deaf ears in the Supreme Court. There rightly going to trust each of us to decide what is true and what media we consume. So the laws a fair in the marketplace of ideas First Amendment jurisprudence is very strong. That stands to benefit the a medi media. The other thing the court has done is a broad definition thats a matter of public concern. So for example in the funeral protest cases, they believe that the speakers are protesting the funerals of servicemen were actuallynv conveying a message of public concern about the link between military policy and the governments toleration of homosexuality. That is a quite broad definition of public concern. That is being the kind of definition thats going to benefit all speakers but also media speakers. And then, in other principal thats going to benefit the media, is the refusal to curtail First Amendment rights of new media speakers. Based on fear of new technology. We already talked about brown versus entertainment case where they are not afraid of violent video games. Indeed Justice Scalia and what i believe was a lovely political. [inaudible] compares the violent video games to grimms a fairytale. Itand so children can stand a bit of violence. They have ever since grimm retail. Not that said, even other free speech precedents from Roberts Court is down to the benefit of media. I have to point out there is alarming and the cases that suggest the Roberts Court unlike its predecessors really doesnt believe that media have a special role in our democracy. They are Citizens United, as an elitist the political power and influence disproportionate to court as being answerable to their corporate overlords. There were no more deserving of special protection than any other corporation is. In other words, we need corporations and walmart are the same in the Roberts Court sigh. Compound that with Justice Thomases skepticism whether the media needs special against defamation he has expressed that created an alarming Playing Field for many actors might want to litigate cases on up to the Supreme Court. The other peace of media. Im sorry were going to have to were going to come back to him this. Thank you and thank you cato for help as me to it participate in this event. I am particularly happy of giving my commentary on rod and davids paper. For an important time. Ur Roberts Court has some the beginning generate quite a bit of comment its First Amendment jurisprudence. I think appropriately so. This report has hard numbers which you can evaluate that. I have to say for those of us who knew John Roberson private practice we do not see itt coming. Not that we doubted it might have it that he might show a special interest in the First Amendment. But as a private practiceti lawyer is not the sort of thing worked in several First Amendments cases with partners including many play the role of chief justice in helping me prepare for oral argument anyone who spires to be on the court someday. They did not go out of their way to express their personal views on the First Amendment. Proportionally been the beneficiary of that since he has been on the court. There been a number of commentators like gore hooper described as a strongest first moment court in history. Obvious and not everybody agrees and it reflects the polaroid nature of our times. You can sort of look at the areas in which there have been cases from First Amendment rights were commentators haveoe disagreed. Some reflect that political clarity. We mention a few of them earlier on with a Campaign Speech was very strong First Amendment things wanted to establish first moment litigators in many other contexts. The Government Employees speech, cases that are somewhat more ambiguous in that regard. Might spark that disagreement. The criticism of the robert court in that regard was result oriented. Typically people who complain about a court being result oriented they reach the wrong result so does not beg the question of who is being result oriented. In prominent Supreme Court watcher who is no better had criticized the Roberts Court person met cases saying that record and mimic cases in those cases that are coat friend your unemployment and will get to those in a minute. They can then mask its real agenda of subverting the Campaign Finance and things like that. Because those cases described fringe are unimportant cases. It could be the Roberts Court strongest legacy in the First Amendment era. Both ron and david talked about this cases which the court refused new categories of unprotected speech. Cases like categories including obscenity defamation, speech that invokes criminal activity, child pornography. It was defined and limited to which the court has said its not going to create new categories. Thats particularly remarkable those are the cases in which he would not immediately think of the speech is beencu particularly important. Liar about being a metal ofvi honor, video games, the baptist church, you know, videos all of those seem tol be areass going to elevate the public. And yet those are the cases hearing to an reaffirming First Amendment principles of both more difficult and most important if you hear to the principles in those cases they will send the test of time. Its those cases in which those in the First Amendment Advocacy Community have the concerns going and that the court may not uphold the first mimic claim. Seemingly unimportant. They do have their good points. With burton law school is criticize the courts record. Think he has done so points to other cases. In being able to prohibit support to other organizations listed as cherished organizations of theat governors discretion. Which involves student speech, public employment, also falls in this category. We have probable cause toth arrest someone cuts off their ability to bring a First Amendment retaliation claim for those are all areas that the Roberts Court night might have areas where there could be improvement on the court. By and large, when you compare that too the Overall Record of the court, i think its a very strong one. Speaking by the way and smoked criticism of the report and this is something ron and i talked about in the past. He there are just five exceptions in the category of the First Amendment, there 48 exceptions. I think you get that expanded number only iff you count every crime that could be committed by use of words as a separate exception. I think they all fall under the umbrella of carmichael activity. Like blackmail or some other prime. Like trafficking and prostitution. All of those areas or if you wrap if the speech and action are combined in a single element, then you can create that exception. But they are not all separate exceptions. And finally overall i agree with the Premise Group that it is a very strong court on First Amendment reason, the First Amendment law. I think there are certain lapses beyond those certain cases i mention that i think are worth pointing out. One is how the Roberts Court has treated the concept of strict First Amendment scrutiny. For the longest time it was thought that if a law was being subjected to strict scrutiny than its going to be struck down. That it strict in principle, fatal in fact. They have been diminished somewhat under the Roberts Court of opinion. So under holder humanitarian law clinic the court did find that it was a content based restriction and under district scrutiny nonetheless held it. I think and process of watering on the concept of strict scrutiny. It did the same thing in williams with all restrictions on the ability to engage in Campaign Advertising fight candidates for judiciary in florida. There are areas where i think the court could have taken a stronger First Amendment position. And finally, the last point is that there are areas that the court has not taken cases where think it might well have entertained petitions pursuit that were filed. Those include generally and student speech, student speech rights compelled commercial speech, and of course there have been a no cases in a long time for rights in general. Overall, i think the court hasou been very strong in first f amendment. For the rest of the discussion. Let them respond to it they just heard. They have a to a study to my First Amendments collar on a rehnquist court. He looked at think 1994 to 2002 when theres not any turnover. But the courts composition and found the top three justices on these issues work kennedy, thomas and souter. Middle, right, left. Ill throw that in. We have a lot of questions for i arty know we are not going to be able to get to the mall, thank you very much. More questions, feel three to submit them bird otherwise our website is find ron and david before he opened up to the crowd questions. Just a quick point, Justice Souter during his tenure on the Roberts Court, is not a single majority opinion. So big difference in court. Just a couple of things. When your time of the First Amendment with new technology think its very important the audience ought to take note of it is the justice a concurrence with the brown versusus entertainment merchant, joined by the chief justice. Let me just read two sentencesk from that. Its very important to Justice Khalil concurring joined by chief Justice Robert and consider the application of unchanging constitutional principles to new and rapidly evolving technology, this court, should proceed with caution permission make every effort to understand the new technology. We should not hastily dismiss the judgment of legislators who may be in a better position than we are to assist the implications of the new Technology Pair think thats very important. The other thing i would add to the court this term when i let dick talk about the once. Cases involving president trum trumps tweets in a public forum. That cases currently before the court and we will see what they do with it. With that ill turn it over to david if he has anything he would like to add. Yes. I want to agree with bob, there are certain areas the Roberts Court simply is not addressed. Howink one of those is does reed pursue the town of Gilbert Square with both the commercial speech doctrine and the secondary effects doctrine. The commercial speech doctrine the Supreme Court created a pure advertising second class treatment and versa memo offered whats interesting about this, Justice Clarence thomas in 1996 naidu not see philosophical or historical justification for recording commercial speech less protection or truthful the noncommercial speech. The thomas wrote the majority opinion the main opinion and read. But yet there still some ssdissidents tween the commercial speech doctrine read. If you read the reed decision strictly there shouldd not be a commercial speech exception. As bob knows all too aware of the secondary doctrine is the legal fiction that the Court Created an first introduced in 1976 and elevated 1986 to allow for the flagrant suppression of sexually oriented expression that is non obscene. In essentially under the secondary effects doctrine that allows courts to treat passionately content based on sexually oriented speech to content neutral. Read in the secondary effects doctrines are in r my opinion irreconcilable tension. But so far the lower courts are saying reed does not impact the secondary effects doctrine. The last point, i agree with both that the Roberts Court has been very strong with regard to Campaign Finance. And the reality is that much campaignfinance reform legislation are direct restrictions on pure political speech. I also agree with bob that there are a lot of versa moment principles in these cases that can be used in a wide variety of other freespeech contents. I applaud the roberts course for strong protection of political speech in that area. Great. Lesko to audience questions. One is from Philip Goldstein who writes of the court has kicked the can in the Masterpiece Cake shop versuspi colorado civil rights commission. You mention Chris Wagoner who argued that. Know we dont want to get into the free exercise issues, but as we all recognize the case is stronger if you can bring it under freedom of speech rather than at least Employment Division versus smith, that does not give you as good a judicial remedy for non purpose religious intrusion. So how do you see the court ultimately ruling on whether one can be punished for refusing to create a work of art to celebrate samesex marriage or other potential conflict between the First Amendment antidiscrimination law. Also throw in a case on thet daca this year bolton versus the city of philadelphia which involves the city disqualifying Catholic Social Services from foster an Adoption Program because it will not send kids to same couples. Theres a small freespeech aspect to it. It might in a blowing up into something bigger having to certify conditions and things like that parts of the intersection of the First Amendment. Just two quick comments. With smith the school he opinion i think its limited. I would not put too much stock in that opinion. Secondly just speaking generally we are going to be facing in the days to come is a conflict between claims of conscience claims of equality that comes to yea rights. And in that respect the First Amendment as the religion clauses will find themselves in combat with equality principles. Anyone else want to address that . Civic you know i filed the first minute Lawyers Association and filed for cato. I was disappointed to see the court decide the case on the grounds of religious discrimination. I thought theres a case to be made for that, i wanted to see the court from a broader principle. That symbolic speech is protected by the first amendmen amendment. Those principles i think are broader and going off on the religious discrimination ground grounds. I think theres a danger in recognizing discriminatory acts simply by saying they are religious acts. Creates a license for l discrimination. As in the recent case of the court rejected, the court decided not to take involving a kentucky county clerk who refused to give out marriage licenses, that was not an example of someone with religious discrimination but simply a Government Employee declining to do her job. So again, it would have preferred to see the court take the issue head on. Sue back alright lets lets move to a question by ken months who says that he has grown very worried about the difficulty the tab from distinguishing facts or opinions in the news. A lack of common understanding of what is true is verynt dangerous. To what degree do you think First Amendment protections or the roberts jurisprudence has been abused by journalists or news consumers today . Steven well, that is the concern about fake news. Lies. [inaudible] the argument that the media gets too much protection. If you really look at what is going on on the ground however, you have a series of powerful people suing the media. Its notui necessarily because they are going to win. But theyre going to inflate serious litigation cross on the media for criticizing them all for getting involved. I guess i would say, i would be concerned in assuming a change in First Amendment law is the answer to the fake news problem. Just to make short for short answer to that question. Sure. Your muted again bob. [inaudible] now you are reviewed. [laughter] okay well actually there is a followup in a different question by dan who is quoting this on facebook the Trump Justice Department and democrats tried to force a company like facebook to limit speech under the threat of antitrust. Talk about those kinds of threats to either the First Amendment or speech rights. Thats about just getting to. But the concern is a public cant distinguish between fact and opinion, i dont think the solution is to get a government solution was going to apply to the medium. I say the medium has to sort this out. We have to force them to be responsible. Use that law or some other law. Both liberals and conservatives have been guilty of trying to target the messenger. And then imposed restrictions simply because they think the public is not able to distinguish true fact and opinion. Lets see, we have a question from nina who asks, under brandenburg about the incitement of violence, one of the exceptions to First Amendment protections, could the president be successfully prosecuted first exciting imminent lawless action . Setting aside thest justice law practice against sitting president s . We met there already was a case brought in Federal District court in kentucky when then candidate trump was at a rally and there were some people that were coming to protest candidate trump. He allegedly said get them out of here, get them out of here. They were then forcibly removed. Within the president also said dont hurt them, dont hurtt them. And essentially that is not excitement that is not fit inin the narrow brandenburg exception which was also further narrowed in indiana so Robert Oneill used to say it is the exception. The First Amendment also protects donald trump and he has benefited greatly from the doctrine of hyperbole. And Start Holding political officials liable under incitement. Its purely partisan is not consonant but establishes precedents. Sure. To add to that theres an eminence requirement for incitement additionally not met by social media pray this enough lag time that people are supposed to think twice and restrain their own actions. If they respond violently its on them not on the speaker. I want to raise a question that i think is important that questioners have not come up in the audience. You do, and your report in the introduction to it mention how the political salience of freespeech claims has shifted over the years were in the 60s and 70s it would be liberals or progressives pushing the envelope with speech that was sometimes deemed subversive or antisocial. Now it seems like its conservative and libertarians and that thank you very much, who are trying to push the court into a more speech protected area. Can you comment on that . And is that on roberts being the justice and being more conservative than previous justices would have been . Or other developments in society . Perhaps the greatest threat to our First Amendment freedom is when they are perceived through the lens of our own ideology. The First Amendment does not protect the things that offend us the whats the purpose . I think to see these free speech of battles was becoming increasingly difficult to do. To decide in any variety of cases. I think it really underminesne the whole purpose of the First Amendment. The other thing i wanted to mention in terms of facts versus opinion, if you think that the situation is pretty bad in 2020, i urge you to go back and take a look at the election of 1800 and the path with circular and broadsides there are now being fitted for the certainly rival anything we see today. You can actually google a video visualization of those pampers if they were a tvca campaign from 1800. I can affirm indeed, ron, that rhetoric is bad or worse than anything we see today. Heres a question from charles. Does the First Amendment continue to provide the originally intended or at least public meeting, that kind of h originalist part how has the Roberts Court affected these protections, Citizens United . The fact that what they knew they were doug was creating against censorship. I dont think they were trying to explore what First Amendment values were going to be promote promoted. I dont know if theyre going to try and affirm the constitutional protection ever value into insert there. I think what they knew is tierney destroys freedom. What they were trying to do with the amendment was to simply provide a guarantee that there would not be officially sanctioned censorship. When it comes to recognizing First Amendment values were developed through First Amendment jurisprudence in the h century nelson 21st were you have different examples of censorship. That then become court cases. And through that we have come to see what the first moment protects. I think the one constant that goes back to the founding document is that it is prohibition of censorship. Okay a question from sara, how does the Roberts Court view extending First Amendment protections to nongovernment institutions . For example organizations given some sort off government, that is kind of wideranging part you can do with it with you will i suppose. Anyone have anything on that . I guess no one wants to speak on that one. One thing is in the howling cas case. The court did strictly apply the doctrine for those. So least the five justices of the Roberts Court the state action doctrine is central, still a central animated feature of modern constitutional law. Well see more of that in the trump versus night versus the Institute Case that if they take the case they wills have to address that issue. Just to be clear, that is the case about donald trump blocking people on his own twitter feed. And whether that is a state action. There been similar cases regarding other politicians on other social media that sort of social media interaction. Any thoughts on those kind of cases . I started writing about social media blocking 2011 before trump was ever on the scene. What was actually going to transpire. The argument is when you open up the comment section, the president sweep at the comment section, that you cant suppress your critics. That you cherry pick whatt people say within that space. Its a physical form that the government opens up or citizens to come in and speak. I would expect the court to uphold the principles there within the public forum. The only thing that gives me pause is anyone elses help to speak in any way sympathetic their speech needs to be subsidized or protected in any way by third parties. Our rights. I think we have run out of time. Bob go ahead. A lot of confusion in this area because the term public form which denotes public action for the court recently did that in North Carolina with the talk about the internet generally as being recognized public form. Not in the sense it is a government provided form so it does not mean the government can them deputize facebook or google to adopt government policies. As much as it would like to. But when politicians use social media, and tried to censor it then it becomes courts can Say Something about under the First Amendment. Sue becker rightly run out of timer for theun question. Our thanks to everyone for that. Although i would, i cannot resist using a moderators prerogative before closing and thanks to everyone for watching. Sorry we did not get all of your questions. Whats interesting about this report is now the median votes and has been for a couple of years in general. Not just on First Amendment cases if he was not citizensnt united for example. I want to give ron the last word and plug were his report is going to be published. What can we expect the Roberts Court in the next 15 years . Well, far be it for me to it look into a crystal ball. We have four First Amendment opinions by judge baratz. Basically what we know is she is devoted still in, she participated in cases involving Government Employees, speech, government Prisoner Communications and executive. [inaudible] she was part off the panel in an opinion by judge wood that upheld the executive orders. But we dont really know enoughti about her. And thank you, thanks to my colleagues bob in larissa for their participation today proved really appreciate it. Im happy to say the Brooklyn Law School host ace emporium. [inaudible] still very much in the works. Thanks again to all of a you with the really greatly appreciated. Sue met great. There are other additional materials that are available on catos website for thisn event. With that, thanks to all of our panelists and the authors of this fine study. We are adjourned. Book tv on cspan2 top nonfiction books and authors. you are watching cspan2 your unfiltered view of government created by americas Cable Television company as a Public Service and brought to you today by your television provider. Coming up tonight on cspan2 the Montana Senate debate between incumbent republican steve daines and democratic challeng challenger, governor steve bullock. Heritage foundation discussion on the election and mail in voting followed by a panel on american democracy after the november election and hosted by the Carnegie Endowment for peace. Thirtyseven seats up for election this year and democrats have to get four seats to gain control of the sun appeared one of the competitive races is in montana where incumbent republican steve daines is facing a current governor,