Regardless of whether you think Mumia Abu-Jamal to be a cop killer or political prisoner of a racist legal system, his voice continued to ring out, first from death row and later from his life-cell after his sentence was reduced to slow-death, on social and political issues. It’s a voice that has something to say, and a voice that others want to hear.
So the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania decided that Mumia must be silenced. From the AP:
Ignoring the chants of protesters on the block where a police officer was killed and the cause célèbre of Mumia Abu-Jamal was born, Gov. Tom Corbett signed into law Tuesday a measure he said would curb the “obscene celebrity” cultivated by convicts at the expense of victims.
When there is no rational basis in law for government action, it’s wrapped in the rhetoric of emotion with a pretty pink bow, using phrases artfully designed to evoke enough sorrow and misery to cloud our judgment and blind our eyes. Whether this reflects advocates and politicians getting shiftier, the public getting lazier and stupider, or both isn’t clear. What is clear is that it works.
The law allows prosecutors or crime victims to seek an injunction when an offender’s conduct “perpetuates the continuing effect of the crime,” including causing a temporary or permanent state of “mental anguish.”
No doubt it pains the widow of Police Officer Daniel Faulkner, the man Mumia is convicted of killing, that he breathes air, even the fetid stuff they allow for prisoners. But his speaking out, his having a following of supporters, his expression of ideas that move others, breaks her heart. How dare this man who killed her husband be heard.
Whether this perpetuates the crime by reminding the widow of her lost husband, or just angers her that this man who she wanted to see dead still breaths, is a matter of debate. But there really isn’t much question that his celebrity must cause her mental anguish. Hell, his continued existence causes her mental anguish.
And yet, no matter how carefully they word this law, it amounts to one thing: Silence Mumia.
There is, of course, no leeway in the First Amendment that allows for the silencing of people because their expression causes mental anguish to others. This is becoming the ubiquitous justification for a slew of proposed new crimes, ranging from anti-bullying to anti-revenge porn, and was swiftly embraced here by a unanimous state legislature. Interest groups deliberately close their eyes to the fact that silencing expression that hurts their feelings permeates such laws, focusing instead on their own sad anecdotes as if they weren’t exactly the same thing, just applied to different causes.
“This unrepentant cop killer has tested the limits of decency,” Corbett said from a portable stage, flanked by uniformed officers and photographs of Faulkner. “Gullible activists and celebrities have continued to feed this killer’s ego.”
Maybe Corbett is right that those who put Mumia on a pedestal are gullible activists and celebrities. Maybe the uniformed officers flanking the governor are right to be offended, even outraged, at how this cop-killer is exalted. But so what? The solution to speech that offends is speech that corrects the offense, not laws that silence.
Before signing the bill, Corbett and Faulkner’s widow, Maureen, visited a plaque on the Locust Street sidewalk where he was killed. Corbett, a Republican former attorney general facing a tough re-election fight, noted the serenity of the street near the heart of the city – far different, Maureen Faulkner told him, from the night her husband died.
She lingered for a moment after Corbett stepped away and placed two fingers on the corner of the memorial.
“We’re not limiting one’s free speech. That is not what this bill is about,” [victim’s advocate, Jennifer] Storm said. “We are seeking to give victims a voice, a tool and a right to fight sick, senseless acts of crime.”
A touching moment, expressed in poignant prose in a news article by an AP reporter who regrets not having written any made-for-TV movie scripts for Lifetime. But the story repeats a fundamentally flawed premise. No matter how long on adjectives the excuse may be, this law is directed solely to limiting free speech, to silencing Mumia.
But even if you can’t bring yourself to caring enough about Mumia’s First Amendment rights, remember that nowhere in the law does it say, “and this only applies to Mumua Abu-Jamal.” This law will serve to enjoin the wrongfully convicted who seeks exoneration by giving an interview to the media, who writes a book about his travails in the system, who reminds his purported victim that he challenges the mental anguish that comes of the reminder that he’s still alive even though she wishes him dead.
And for those who aren’t as inclined toward visceral reactions when thought is required, even the guilty have thoughts to express, thoughts that add to the public discourse. While certain rights are lost to conviction, the right to free speech is not among them. And it should not be, as they too add to our knowledge and understanding of life.
But offer a sad anecdote, tie it to an unpopular person and wrap it up in a pretty pink bow of weepy rhetoric, and it will tug at the heartstrings of those who feel the pain. There is no doubt whatsoever that this law is a flagrant First Amendment violation, is utterly unconstitutional, and yet Governor Corbett and his legislative back-up band sing its praises. Because they want to silence Mumia. And any other Mumia who might have something to say.
H/T Spencer Neal
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My gentle mother tried to teach me that ignorance of a fact was not always a fault, but that being loudly and proudly stupid in the face of reason and evidence was always a sin.
“Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you — where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?” A Man for All a Seasons, Robert Bolt.
Brad Frye, Houston
> “Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you — where would you hide,
> Roper, the laws all being flat?” A Man for All a Seasons
My long time friend and attorney once used this in an appellate brief; when the other guys griped his client was nothing more than a scoundrel. [True, but…] He won. Since then, I’ve seen many case where I thought counsel should have done the same.
We don’t have a Bill of Rights to protect popular people|speech, rather the opposite.
I would bet that your friend didn’t win because of the quote.
I find it illogical that an injunction against someone’s right to free speech gives the other person a “greater voice”. You must have two voices for there to be legitimate discourse. This was said by Jennifer Storm, State of PA Victims Rights Advocate who makes $113,272. “We are seeking to give victims a voice, a tool and a right to fight sick, senseless acts of crime.” —– How does quelling one person’s voice give a “greater” voice to another? How does such a law fight crime. How does a women with such little logic and understanding of the law, get a job of this nature; three to four times higher than the average wage.
I don’t even know what really happened in this case but that is moot because this law is so unconstitutional that it is mind blowing and it was a unanimous decision by the Pennsylvania Legislature. This is just one in a long line of blatant constitutional abrogations that have further deteriorated our rule of law. Sadly our Constitutional Republic has been overthrown by ignorance and arrogance from within. Pennsylvania tax payers get to pay their hard earned money to people like Jennifer Storm whose agenda is obviously not one of protecting the rights of “all” people. Just remember that all social policy is initiated by one special interest group for their benefit and the expense of everyone else. Sometimes it just takes some time before the absolute truth get out. PA, ya’ll also need to throw out your entire Legislature. The morons have infiltrated your government and are grating themselves great benefits at your expense.
You were doing okay until your second paragraph rant. Inductive reasoning is neither persuasive nor rational. Don’t do it.
We need to scrap the “presumption of constitutionality” from which courts are supposed to start their analysis of whether a law is constitutional. Given the number of blatantly unconstitutional laws which are passed–and the number of legislators (at all levels) quoted as saying they don’t know or care whether a law is constitutional–I see no justification for such a presumption.
So what is “the number of blatantly unconstitutional law which are passed–and the number of legislators (at all levels) quoted as saying they don’t know or care whether a law is constitutional–”? This is not the place for such mindless vagaries.
“We’re not limiting one’s free speech. That is not what this bill is about,” [victim’s advocate, Jennifer] Storm said. “We are seeking to give victims a voice, a tool and a right to fight sick, senseless acts of crime.”
Sanctimony in the name of generalized “victims” is one of the more suspect rhetorical devices to me. The actual victim of Mumia’s crime is dead, but this law creates a new class of “victim” like the other types of laws you refer to. Also, how is this not a violation of prior restraint rules? Isn’t that what injunctions against speech necessarily are i.e. prior restraints on speech?
the issue I’m struggling with is how does the fact that a person is incarcerated change the free speech equation, if at all. I just don’t know the answer or if the Supreme Court has faced this issue. In this particular case, I believe Mr. Mumia gave a college commencement through a video feed. So did the State have to allow this? I don’t think they did. At the same time, I don’t think the State can ban Mr. Mumia from writing a letter to be read at the commencement.
I believe the commencement speech was pre-recorded, and played at graduation. There is nothing about being convicted or incarcerated that alters the free speech equation at all. And that’s what’s burning their butts.
Butthurt Nation.
Prisoners do have First Amendment speech rights (just like they have First Amendment free exercise of religion rights), but SCOTUS has somewhat limited those rights in light of the unique status of prisoners.
Free speech rights were recognized in Procunier v. Martinez, 416 U.S. 396 (1974). From the syllabus: “The censorship of direct personal correspondence involves incidental restrictions on the right to free speech of both prisoners and their correspondents and is justified if the following criteria are met: (1) it must further one or more of the important and substantial governmental interests of security, order, and the rehabilitation of inmates, and (2) it must be no greater than is necessary to further the legitimate governmental interest involved.” I think the new Pennsylvania law fails this standard, for the simple reason that it allows inmate speech to be enjoined without regard to this standard. Also, I’m not up on my ex post facto law, but this is proposing a new punishment after the fact.
Incidentally, the court later reaffirmed that Martinez still applied to outgoing prisoner communications — such as Mumia’s here — but that incoming communications would be subject to a more deferential “reasonableness” standard in light of the need of prison officials to keep the prison under control. Thornburgh v. Abbott, 490 U.S. 401 (1989).
It would have saved me a lot of words if you just wrote “yup. But who doesn’t appreciate a law student note.
The Framing of Mumia Abu-Jamal, by J. Patrick O’Connor, Lawrence Hill Books, 2008. We went to the book reading, bought the book, got it signed, read the book, and the rest is history. This book is utterly convincing.
O’Connor does a blow-by-blow analysis, with diagrams, etc. His conclusions are incontrovertible in my mind:
I agree with the supporters and activists that Mumia is totally innocent.
Get ahold of the book, read it carefully, and then we can talk. Otherwise the witch-hunters and mob mentality morons can go to hell. And if that includes the legislators of the PA commonwealth and its governor, well then so be it.
And there is a prominent Democratic player here who was a prosecutor in the case (I believe), then a mayor of FilthyDelphia, then governor, and finally Democratic National Chairman during the Billary co-presidential era. Pop Quiz: What is his name?
All of which has nothing to do with the subject of this post. Nothing.
Yea, I knew that was coming. Please accept my formal, but not necessarily sincere, apologies!
I posted it anyway. A little appreciation, please.
To be fair all around, when you read both posts in sequence a lot of the words do sound alike. So, there is that.
Priorities. What’s more important to society -works like MLK’s “Letter from Birmingham City Jail”, Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience” and Mandela’s “Conversations with Myself”- or a widow’s feelings?
Excellent examples. I wonder if Corbett will be the first to burn the books.
Gov Corbett lost his job tonight.
I’d like to think your post had something to do with that 😉
It couldn’t have happened to a
bigger assnicer guy.