Colgate University’s Center for Freedom and Western Civilization hosted Jonathan Turley on April 22 for a discussion on freedom of speech in the United States.
Turley is the J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Professor of public interest law at George Washington University and legal analyst for Fox News. An expert witness before Congress and a prolific writer, his columns appear in newspapers like the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, and he has published in law journals at Duke, Harvard, Georgetown, and more.
Turley’s book, The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage, attempts to define free speech and asks why the nation still struggles to exercise it. According to Turley, the book was “30 years in the making” and the first of a planned two-part series, the second of which will explore whether U.S. democracy can survive in the 21st century.
Turley takes the viewpoint that free speech is a natural right, and he draws on a variety of disciplines — from art to biology — to support the stance that “we can’t be fully human” without free speech. He also pointed out certain historical figures whom he believes embody free speech. For example, suffragist and communist Charlotte Anita Whitney — someone Turley applauds for being “one of those glorious, unreasonable people who refused to shut up” — was arrested during the Red Scare and charged with syndicalism. “These people are heroes,” says Turley. “The ones we arrested.”
What sets the United States apart from other nations, according to Turley, is its commitment to free speech, dating back to the Revolutionary War. Turley calls the First Amendment “the most revolutionary thing we ever produced in this country.” But right now, America is trapped in an age defined by rage, Turley says. “This is not our first, and it will not be our last. Rage is all around us. It comes from both sides, conservative and liberal.”
Turley defines rage as “something of a license to say and do things that you would not ordinarily do. It’s addictive. It’s contagious. If you agree with someone, their rage seems righteous, and if you don’t, it’s dangerous.”
When the government attempts to regulate rage, Turley says, it threatens the principles upon which the nation is founded.
“In history, the greatest danger is not the speech itself. It’s when rage rhetoric becomes state rage — when the government uses the rage in speech to limit it, curtail it, and arrest people who use it,” Turley says. “We’re not defined by the rage. We’re defined by free speech, by the hope that with the help of free speech, we might be able to overcome the things we hate most about each other.”