free speech

EL CAJON PROPOSES RULES ON CITIZENS’ FREE SPEECH AT MEETINGS, DOCKLESS SCOOTER LIMITS AND FINING ILLEGAL POT SHOP OWNER

 

By Paul Kruze, Contributing Editor

January 7, 2019 (El Cajon)--The El Cajon City Council is set to get back to work headfirst after nearly four weeks of holiday vacation on Tuesday afternoon at 3 p.m. Among other items, Council will be addressing free speech by citizens at open comment session, blocking the development of a previously shuttered illegal marijuana dispensary, and regulating dockless vehicles within city limits.


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LAWSUIT CHALLENGES BAN ON ASSEMBLY HEARING VIDEOS IN POLITICAL ADS

 

 

Story and photo by Miriam Raftery

Photo: Assembly Chamber, State Capitol

May 30, 2016 (Sacramento) – California law prohibits the use of video from state Assembly hearings for political campaigns or commercial purposes, although these same videos can be used by news outlets. A candidate who runs Assembly video footage in an ad can be criminally charged—even if the video is of himself speaking on the Assembly floor.

Now a lawsuit has been filed against the state claiming that this law violates First Amendment free speech, Courthouse News reports.


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COUNTY SHELVES "FREE SPEECH" REGULATION EFFORTS

 

Photo: 1912 free speech rally in San Diego.

By Miriam Raftery

July 16, 2015 (San Diego) – Last month,  the county postponed action on a proposal to create “free speech zones” at the Waterfront Park after objections raised by the American Civil Liberties Union and local activists, as we reported. Now the County has shelved those plans indefinitely, ECM has learned.


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SUPERVISORS POSTPONE ACTION ON WATERFRONT PARK FREE SPEECH RULES UNTIL JULY

 

By Miriam Raftery and Janis Russell

“It is the basic tenet of all Americans to speak truth to power without restriction or regulation.” – David Patterson, U.S. veteran and Ramona resident (photo, left, by Janis Russell)

View video of complete hearing (item 7): http://sdcounty.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=9&clip_id=1682

 

June 10, 2015 (San Diego)- San Diego’s Board of Supervisors yesterday postponed action until July 21st on a controversial proposal to restrict protesters in the Waterfront Park outside the County Administration Building. The  County claims its goal is to protect free speech rights while also protecting rights of the growing number of others using the new waterfront park for activities such as weddings, picnics, concerts, yoga and children’s play.

Supervisors voted to delay action and ask staff to re-examine the proposal after the American Civil Liberties Union sent a letter calling the action “probably unconstitutional” as written, also noting that the City of San Diego has no permit requirements for free speech activities. Members of the public and Supervisor Dianne Jacob also voiced concerns about the proposed ordinance.


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SUPREME IRONY IN HIGH COURT’S RULING ON ABORTION PROTESTS

 

East County News Service

Photo: Anti-abortion protestors at a Mississippi abortion clinic

June 26, 2014 (Washington D.C.) – Today the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that a 35-foot buffer zone around abortion clinics in Massachusetts violate the free speech rights of protesters.  But ironically, the high court has its own, far wider 100-foot-wide buffer zone to keep protesters away from the Supreme Court.

Massachusetts passed its law to protect abortion workers and patients after a gunman killed two abortion clinic receptionists and wounded five others at two area clinics in 1994.    Violence against abortion providers has occurred elsewhere, notably the murder of Dr. George Tiller, a doctor who provided abortions in Wichita, Kansas.

Similar laws are on the books in other states, including California. But abortion opponents argued that such restrictions violated their First Amendment free speech rights.


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GROSSMONT BOARD RESOLVES TO RESTRICT MEMBERS’ RIGHTS; LEAVES QUESTION OF ALPINE HIGH SCHOOL UNANSWERED

 

By Sharon Penny

February 15, 2014 (El Cajon)--At the February 13 Grossmont Union High School District  (GUHSD) meeting, the Governing Board provided some recent positive outcomes in the district (see side story: Grossmont District Schools Shine Academically), but took a step back for democracy.

By a vote of 4-1, the Board adopted a resolution: “In Recognition of the Citizens’ Board Oversight Committee (CBOC) and Their Service to the Grossmont Union High School District.”  It  praises the District’s bond oversight committee-- but also aims to muzzle school board members from giving testimony to the oversight comittee.


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POLITICAL REFLECTIONS: TERRORISTS' VETO II - HERE WE GO AGAIN

By Mark Gabrish Conlan

September 21, 2012 (San Diego)--I probably could have gone through my life blissfully unaware of the existence of a scrap of film called Innocence of Muslims — a.k.a. Innocence of Bin Laden, a.k.a. Desert Warriors — if the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens, and three other U.S. Embassy staff members hadn’t been killed in an attack allegedly inspired by a YouTube trailer for this movie. It’s a film almost no one has seen — and that includes the attackers in Libya and the mobs who stormed the U.S. Embassy in Egypt — but that hasn’t stopped either the protesters against the film or the mystery people who made it, who appear to be  members of the Copts, an Egyptian Christian sect who lost their protector when Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was driven from power and now fear both official discrimination and private retribution.


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BLM'S INVASION OF PRIVACY SUPPRESSES FREE SPEECH, GROUP WARNS

 
BLM places "outrageous conditions on public comment" by releasing personal contact information online
 
June 2, 2012 (San Francisco) -- Protect Mustangs, a Bay Area-based preservation group, asks the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to revise its conditions for receiving written comment. The BLM now requires personal identifying information that BLM says it cannot safeguard, the group cautions.
 
What started as an issue jeopardizing public process for people who want helicopters roundups to stop has mushroomed into a free speech issue for all Americans.

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MARRIAGE EQUALITY PROTEST CASE TO BEGIN MONDAY IN SAN DIEGO

 

April 30, 2012 (San Diego) — Marriage equality activists charged with misdemeanors from an August 19, 2010 protest will be in court Monday morning. The “Equality Nine” are nine protesters who were arrested during a peaceful “sit-in” for marriage equality. Jury selection begins in their case Monday, April 30 at 10 a.m. before Judge Joan P. Weber in San Diego County Superior Court, 220 West Broadway, in downtown San Diego.

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LA MESA MAN AT CENTER OF FIRST AMENDMENT FIRESTORM

 

D.A. declines to prosecute felony conspiracy charge for protest at Mayor’s speech, following public pressure

By Miriam Raftery

January 29, 2012 (La Mesa) – First Amendment advocates expressed shock when San Diego Police arrested La Mesa resident Mike Garcia and three others on felony conspiracy charges--a tactic customarily reserved for grave offenses such as organized crime activities and drug trafficking.

Their purported crime? Interrupting Mayor Sanders’ state of the city speech with a brief “Mic-Check” protest over a free speech issue. 


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EAST COUNTY RESIDENTS SPEAK OUT ON OCCUPY ARRESTS, CLAIM CHILLING EFFECT ON FREE SPEECH

 
By Miriam Raftery

 
January 11, 2012 (San Diego)—An East County comedian finds the latest rounds of arrests at the Occupy San Diego protest site to be no laughing matter.  “I’m afraid to go down there. We have become a police state,” said comic Diane Jean. 

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A CENTURY OF FIGHTING FOR FREE SPEECH IN SAN DIEGO


By Nadin Abbott
Photos by Tom Abbott

 
January 6, 2012 (San Diego)--100 years after a Free Speech movement was born in San Diego to protect citizens’ right to protest, the movement has come full circle…..
 

Few San Diegans today are aware of numerous free speech fights across America a century ago—or that “dwarfing them all was the San Diego episode,” according to the San Diego Journal of History’s fascinating account at http://www.sandiegohistory.org/journal/73winter/speech.htm. Fearing mob violence from the Industrial Workers of the World amid a growing U.S. labor movement and actions by anarchists, City leaders in 1912 outlawed public speaking in a five-square block area of then-downtown centered at Fifth and E streets. Thousands of defiant people turned out in protest of the ban and numerous arrests ensued, clogging jails and courts. Fire hoses, horsewhips and clubs were used by police; vigilantes joined police, even kidnapping a newspaper publisher as riots and deaths ensued in a conflict that lasted six months.


To this day, however, San Diego has never restored the people’s free speech rights.

 
Today, Occupy San Diego members came to City Hall to present a ballot proposal that would amend the encroachment code.

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SENATOR KEHOE’S BILL TO PROTECT TENANTS' FREE SPEECH RIGHTS HEADS TO GOVERNOR

September 1, 2011 – Sen. Christine Kehoe’s (D-San Diego) legislation to allow renters to display political signs in their apartments and homes passed the Assembly today with bipartisan support and now heads to Gov. Jerry Brown for consideration.

 


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