The 1968 Democratic National Convention sparked a riot in Chicago

V1 : https://youtu.be/DmDm5iRFBE0?si=Wlrg-fABJ2azdDdi


V2 : https://youtu.be/ilXSAKpqFVI?si=w5CTeAgdW659vqYR


V3 : https://youtu.be/ooa7BIXijuM?si=FbRBVywcFSBYDAyG


1.) FIRST AMENDMENT: FREE SPEECH AND FLAG BURNING

The landmark Supreme Court case Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397 (1989), which deals with First Amendment protection of flag burning as symbolic speech.

When the Supreme Court ruled to allow American flag burning
June 21, 2023 by NCC Staff

On June 21, 1989, a deeply divided United States Supreme Court upheld the rights of protesters to burn the American flag in a landmark First Amendment decision.

Justice William Brennan wrote the majority decision, with Justices Anthony Kennedy, Thurgood Marshall, Harry Blackmun and Antonin Scalia joining the majority.  “Johnson was convicted for engaging in expressive conduct. The State’s interest in preventing breaches of the peace does not support his conviction because Johnson’s conduct did not threaten to disturb the peace,” said Brennan. “Nor does the State’s interest in preserving the flag as a symbol of nationhood and national unity justify his criminal conviction for engaging in political expression.”

Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing a concurrence, spelled out his reasoning succinctly.
“The hard fact is that sometimes we must make decisions we do not like. We make them because they are right, right in the sense that the law and the Constitution, as we see them, compel the result,” Kennedy said. “And so great is our commitment to the process that, except in the rare case, we do not pause to express distaste for the result, perhaps for fear of undermining a valued principle that dictates the decision. This is one of those rare cases.

The battle in the courts about American flag desecration goes back to 1907 when the Court in Halter v. Nebraska upheld a state law that prohibited two businessmen from selling beer that had flag labels on the bottles. In 1968, Congress approved the Federal Flag Desecration Law after a Vietnam War protest. The law made it illegal to “knowingly” cast “contempt” upon “any flag of the United States by publicly mutilating, defacing, defiling, burning or trampling upon it.”

The Court moved closer to the Johnson decision in 1974, when it held in Spence v. Washington that a person couldn’t be convicted for using tape to put a peace sign on an American flag. The decision made it clear that a majority of the Court saw the act as protected expression under the First Amendment.

In 1984, Gregory Lee Johnson burned a flag at the Republican National Convention in Dallas. Officials in Texas arrested Johnson and convicted him of breaking a Texas law that prohibited desecration of the flag; he was sentenced to one year in prison and ordered to pay a $2,000 fine. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth District of Texas at Dallas affirmed Johnson's conviction, but the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reversed, and the Supreme Court affirmed

In one of his last public events, Justice Scalia explained why he cast the deciding vote in the Johnson case, on the principal of a textual reading of the First Amendment. “

If it were up to me, I would put in jail every sandal-wearing, scruffy-bearded weirdo who burns the American flag,” Scalia said at a November 2015 event in Philadelphia. “But I am not king.”

SOURCE : https://constitutioncenter.org/amp/blog/when-the-supreme-court-ruled-to-allow-american-flag-burning


2.) Is It Illegal To Burn the American Flag?

Last updated November 14, 2023

Key Takeaways:

* The Supreme Court has ruled that burning the flag in protest is protected free speech.

* The Supreme Court decision struck down state flag desecration laws.

* You can burn your own flag to protest, though you may be prohibited from destroying someone else's property.

SOURCE : https://www.lawinfo.com/resources/criminal-defense/is-it-illegal-to-burn-the-american-flag.html#:~:text=The%20Supreme%20Court%20has%20ruled,down%20state%20flag%20desecration%20laws.

He wasn’t “forced” out. He made his own decision. He placed his country above himself, which nobody on the right will do

I hope the DNC convention doesn't devolve into this. The party seemingly feeds off the discord.