tailieunhanh - Gale Encyclopedia Of American Law 3Rd Edition Volume 5 P24

Gale Encyclopedia of American Law Volume 5 P24 fully illuminates today's leading cases, major statutes, legal terms and concepts, notable persons involved with the law, important documents and more. Legal issues are fully discussed in easy-to-understand language, including such high-profile topics as the Americans with Disabilities Act, capital punishment, domestic violence, gay and lesbian rights, physician-assisted suicide and thousands more. | 218 HATECRIME ILLUSTRATION BY GGS CREATIVE RESOURCES. REPRODUCED BY PERMISSION OF GALE A PART OF CENGAGE LEARNING. Hate Crime NUMBER OF BIAS-MOTIVATED CRIME INCIDENTS REPORTED IN 2007 source FBI Hate Crime Statistics 2007. set it on fire in the yard of an African American family in St. Paul. The teenagers were arrested and charged under St. Paul s Bias-Motivated Crime Ordinance Minn. Legis. Code . Under the ordinance a person who placed on public or private property a symbol object appellation characterization or graffiti including but not limited to a burning cross or Nazi swastika and who had reason to know that the display would arouse anger or alarm in others based on race color creed religion or gender was guilty of a misdemeanor. The trial court dismissed the charge on the grounds that it was overbroad and unconstitutionally content-based. Specifically the court ruled that the statute criminalized too much behavior and infringed on First Amendment rights of free speech. The city of St. Paul appealed to the Minnesota Supreme Court which reversed the trial court s ruling. The teenagers then appealed to the . Supreme Court. The high court was unanimous in striking down the St. Paul ordinance. However it was divided in its legal reasoning. According to the majority opinion the ordinance violated the First Amendment. Justice antonin scalia writing for the majority declared the statute unconstitutional because it prohibited otherwise permitted speech solely on the basis of the subjects the speech addresses. Scalia illustrated this point by noting that a government may proscribe libelous speech but that it may not proscribe only libelous speech that is critical of the government. The St. Paul ordinance violated this constitutional rule by proscribing only hate speech delivered through symbols. in a separate opinion the concurring justices argued that the majority opinion weakened previous First Amendment jurisprudence. Specifically the majority opinion .