Not All Peaceful Protests Constitutionally Protected, Police Chief Says Ahead Of DNC
Not All Peaceful Protests Constitutionally Protected, Police Chief Says Ahead Of DNC
Peaceful protests can still be illegal if organizers trespass or block the public way, police Supt. Larry Snelling said. Activist groups planning to protest the DNC criticized his comments.
And he's entirely wrong, and as is generally the case, because he doesn't understand or is deliberately misrepresenting the concept of a "right."
Literally all peaceful protests are protected - that's exactly what it means when the Bill of Rights stipulates a RIGHT to assembly. The exact point of defining it as a right is to stipulate that it's inalienable - that we can legally assemble always, no matter what.
He's conflating a different aspect of the whole thing. Yes - trespassing, for instance, is a crime, and police are not only allowed to but duty-bound to respond to trespassing, and trespassers - even if they're protesting - are rightly subject to legal repercussions.
But that doesn't somehow make the protest itself illegal - it is and always remains legal, as is our right. Specific individuals guilty of trespass can be and presumably will be subject to arrest for their trespass, but the protest itself is and must remain legal. That is exactly what is meant by stipulating a RIGHT to assemble.
For whatever any of that's worth, since at this point not only police officers but even Supreme Court justices have no honesty or integrity and can and will simply ignore whatever they find inconvenient.
Your point about trespassing is an important consideration. The ever vanishing public spaces as corporations gobble up massive tracts of land, pose a major threat to our right to protest. Where will we protest when every inch of the city is privately owned?
Same places, just not legally.
Bad cop, no doughnut
Edit: typo