U.S. Supreme Court Upholds Flag Burning as Protest
Having devoted a good portion of my youth to a First Amendment defense of flag desecration (Ohio vs. Liska, 1970), I read with mixed emotions of the Supreme Court’s decision in Texas vs. Johnson.
While I agree with Justice Anthony M. Kennedy’s labeling the outcome and, presumably, defendant Johnson’s act, as “distasteful,” I applaud his being compelled by the “pure command of the Constitution” to uphold the defendant’s right of free expression.
Having once been stripped of that right (the Court of Appeals reversed the lower court’s decision in my case), it makes one more tolerant of disagreeable expression.
A. JAMES LISKA
Agoura
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