Profanity fine leads to planned protest

By William R. Toler

WARNING: In the spirit of free speech, this post is completely uncensored.

A recent decision by a Massachusetts town to fine foul language has spurred a massive, planned showing of civil disobedience.

Liberty activist Adam Kokesh announced on his online show “ADAM VS THE MAN” that he would be hosting the event Free FUCKING Speech Demonstration in Middleborough, MA. The profanity party is scheduled to take place at the Middleborough Town Hall June 25. The same town hall where residents voted 183-50 to impose a $20 fine on cussing in public, according to the AP .

License to blog?

By William R. Toler

I love North Carolina. It’s a beautiful state, from the miles of beaches on the Atlantic Coast to the hazy hills of the southern Appalachians. But sometimes the idoacy the “powers that be” make me sad to be Tarheel born and bred.

A blogger could be facing jail time. His crime: wrting about the Paleo Diet.

After Steve Cooksey was hospitalized with diabetes in 2009, he decided to fight his ailment by changing his diet, the Carolina Journal reports. After experiencing positive results from the low-carb, high-protein regimen, Cooksey decided to start a blog.

Depsite having a disclaimer at the bottom of his blog stating, “I am not a doctor, dietitian nor nutritionist… in fact I have no medical training of any kind,” Cooksey received a letter from the North Carolina Board of Dietetics/Nutrition.

Isn’t that nice? We have a Nanny State agency to “protect the health, safety, and welfare of the citizens of North Carolina from harmful nutrition practice by providing for the licensure and regulation of persons engaged in the practice of dietetics/nutrition and by establishing educational standards for those persons.” How did we survive before 1992?

NC city plans to limit speech

By William R. Toler

As pointed out in this blog before, the threat of tyranny comes not only from the overreaching federal government, but also from local elected officials on a power trip.

A city council in the Triad is considering altering a public assembly ordinance that would further limit free speech, according to the Winston-Salem Journal.

In an apparent response to the Occupy movement, some council members in Winston-Salem, one the state’s largest cities, thought it would be a good idea to change an ordinace which would among other things “temporarily” make City Hall non-public property, and prohibit open-air meetings.

Community colleges earn failing grades on free speech

By Corey Friedman

College is supposed to be a marketplace of ideas — a place where students examine a range of diverse viewpoints, champion some and challenge others. At some North Carolina schools, however, robust debate is off the syllabus and questioning authority is out of the question.

Just up the road in Hickory, Catawba Valley Community College suspended student Marc Bechtol for two semesters after he criticized the college’s partnership with a debit card company on the college Facebook page. Bechtol accused the college and its partner financial institution of selling student information to banks, and he suggested a tongue-in-cheek method of retaliation: Registering a college email address with pornographic websites to trigger a flood of spam emails.

It’s clear from the full text of Bechtol’s post that the proposal was made in jest. But CVCC administrators didn’t appreciate his sense of humor. They pulled him out of class on Oct. 4. Without a hearing, Bechtol was banned from the campus for two semesters for violating a college policy that bars anything the administration believes “may be contrary to the best interest of the CVCC community.”

Rosary ban tied to ‘safety’

By William R. Toler

A 12-year-old girl could be a gang member according to a Nebraska school system.

Sixth-grader Elizabeth Carey has been banned from expressing her faith by Fremont Public Schools. The forbidden gang symbol: rosary beads.

“The principal said I couldn’t wear my necklace at all because gangsters were wearing it,” she told KETV-7.

Fremont Public Schools adopted the policy last year, according to the station. Steve Sexton, the superintendent for the system, used the tired old line that the policy is for “student safety.”

“We had information from law enforcement that there were documented instances of gang activity in the area and we had information that states that the rosary was being used as a symbol of gang affiliation,” Sexton said.

Local Catholics are understandably upset.

Six years gone and the dream lives on

It’s now been six years since the first issue of the Independent Register rolled off the presses and was distributed across CravenCounty.

A dream of three budding journalists fulfilled after three days of writing, editing and designing. The product of blood, sweat, tears and ink.

Sadly the life of the alternative newspaper was to be short. Five months to be exact. Nine issues in (mostly) glorious black and white.

But in 2008, new life was breathed into the dream when the current blog which you are reading was launched.

Hudson says ‘Let the Students Speak’

By William R. Toler

Over the past year I’ve added a number of books to my personal library that compose what I’ve dubbed my “Liberty Shelf.”

Included on the shelf are four books each by Judge Andrew Napolitano and Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX). Also on the shelf are seven books focusing on First Amendment issues. The newest addition is a topic that I have a fond interest in.

Let the Students Speak is a history of the fight for student speech in public schools. The author, David L. Hudson, Jr. is quite the authority on the subject. He’s a scholar with the First Amendment Center and teaches law and Vanderbilt University. The Independent Register often refers to Hudson for local speech issues.

In the book, Hudson chronicles not only well-known cases (such as Tinker v. Des Moines or “Bong Hits 4 Jesus“) but a bevy of smaller cases. Those cases run the gamut of speech and expression, including speech outside of school.

Free speech has stood the test of time

By Corey Friedman

It was unprecedented. It was visionary. And 224 years later, its guarantees of personal freedom are still seen as radical throughout much of the world.

On Sept. 17, 1787, statesmen signed the United States Constitution, the blueprint for the new American democracy. The Bill of Rights was written to safeguard the individual liberties won in the war for independence and to build a bulwark against the expansion of government power.

The First Amendment ensures that Americans can speak and express themselves freely without fear of punishment. It guarantees that newspapers, periodicals, pamphlets and petitions can be printed and distributed. It gives citizens the right to practice the religion of their choice — or no religion at all — in the time and manner of their choosing. It allows citizens to assemble in groups, hold meetings and bring their grievances to the government.

Most Americans exercise their First Amendment rights in one form or another every day. But sadly, tens of millions aren’t aware of the full scope of their expressive freedoms. Thirty percent of adult Americans can’t list any of the five First Amendment rights, according to a 2011 survey sponsored by the First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn.

Sixty-two percent of survey respondents identified free speech as part of the First Amendment, but just 19 percent named the freedom of religion and 3 percent named the right to petition, State of the First Amendment data shows.

Man sentenced for pamphleteering

By William R. Toler

A Florida man will be spending some time in jail for activity that is usually allowed outside a courthouse.

Mark Schmidter passes out jury nullification brochures. (Courtesy Florida FIJA)

Mark Schmidter was found guilty of “indirect criminal contempt” Tuesday for passing out pamphlets in Orlando during the Casey Anthony trial, according to the Sentinel.

The pamphlets he was handing out described jury nullification, the power of a jury to return “a verdict of ‘Not Guilty’ despite its belief that the defendant is guilty of the violation charged.”

According to the Sentienel, Chief Judge Belvin Perry signed an order early this year banning the distribution of nullification pamphlets that were “meant to influence jurors.” In May, the same judge issued an order that set up “free speech zones” outside the couthouse in preparation for the outrage involved with the Casey Anthony trial.

The judge accused Schmidter of violating his orders and doled out two sentences: 141 days for the first offense and 151 days for the second. In addition, he was belted with a $250 fine for each charge.

The Orlando paper reports that someone else had tested the pamphleteering order with no consequences so Schmidter decided to do the same. He also said he didn’t believe he violated the “speech zone” order . “I said this must not apply to me because I’m not talking about any [particular] case,” he said.

Schmidter and his lawyer, Adam Sudbury, accuse the judge’s order of being too broad and “patently unreasonable.

Local governments run amok

By William R. Toler

The uprising of political activity by conservatives often focuses on the overreach of the federal government. However, local governments can be just as opressive…as the following stories will demonstrate.

Growing pains

A woman in Oak Park, Mich. was facing a 93-day stint in jail and a misdemeanor charge for having a vegetable garden. The story went viral and after a week of complaints from folks all around the country, the city dropped the charges against Julie Bass.

The city’s planner, Kevin Rulkowski, told WJBK-TV, “That’s not what we want to see in a front yard,” referring to Bass’ garden, which consisted of several planter boxes in her front yard. The code Bass was accused of violating reads that front yards should have “sutiable, live, plant material.”

Bass believes, as do many other Americans, that her garden meets that standard. “It’s definitely live. It’s definitely plant. It’s definitely material. We think it’s suitable,” she said.