Customer Reviews

From the Palmer Raids to the Patriot Act: A History of the Fight for Free Speech in America

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Considering that most treatments of the subject are dry tomes, this is an account of the long efforts by many Americans to secure our Constitutional rights to free speech and free published accounts of ideas in the press.

A real advantage of this book is its use of stories behind the legal cases that make it lively and engaging to read. At the same time, it is solid in its research and presentation of the legal merits of the cases.

A great presentation of the subject for most readers.

This is a wide-ranging and fairly comprehensive book about challenges to free speech in the United States. It is primarily a narrative and tries to make all the players come alive, and has only a little bit of analysis. It covers not only government attempts to limit speech but also boycotts and picketing of bookstores (usually ineffective) and pressure on advertisers to withdraw sponsorship of ill-regarded programs (usually effective).

It omits a few areas that have been important. There is a mention of Banned Books Week but no discussion of book banning in schools and libraries. The 1989 Supreme Court decision in Texas v. Johnson that ruled that flag burning is protected political symbolic speech is alluded to (but not named) in a discussion of Justice Anthony Kennedy.

The book's biggest weakness is that it doesn't look at all into the reasoning used in the Supreme Court cases. This justices' written opinions are usually much more important in determining the course of the law than is the way the decision went. Most of the important free speech issues have gone before the Supreme Court.

My favorite quote in the book is from Judge Murray I. Gurfein, regarding the New York Time's publication of the Pentagon Papers: "A cantankerous press, an obstinate press, a ubiquitous press must be suffered by those in authority in order to preserve the even greater values of freedom of expression and the right of the people to know." Amen.

If you're eyes weren't open before this book will set you straight about the need to fight for your democratic right at every turn. We take for granted the liberties we enjoy currently. This book is an account of what it took people of this century to ensure those rights.

Thanks Chris.