Blog Post #3 The Right to Dissent

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”. The right to dissent and the right to disagree with the government is a fundamental right as a citizen of the United States. Similarly to the Electoral College, the First Amendment is in place to protect the view of every American; no matter how small the minority.

Of all eight values of free expression, I believe that Protecting Dissent is the most important. While the other seven are certainly important, I believe that being able to criticize the government for just about anything it does is the most important of all. Without the ability to criticize there can be no changing the trajectory of how the governed are governed. Without the ability to criticize would our president and elected officials be any different than those of 1776? The challenges we face today in regard to Free Speech and the protection of dissent are different than they were over two hundred years ago, yet they remain the same in that there should never be a point in time when the government is protected from dissent.

“[W]e consider this case against the background of a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials.” -Justice William Brennan. This came from New York Times Company v. Sullivan and leads me to believe that the government has forgotten about it. Particularly the line, "vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials.", has me wondering whether the government remembers this case.

People can be held liable for questioning the election. People can be charged criminally for questioning the election. People can be charged and held liable for dissenting with the government. It wasn't always like this though. This new phenomenon of having the government come after you for disagreeing with it is both dangerous and anti-democratic.

The right to dissent, whether it be with unpleasantly sharp attacks is a fundamental right we hold as citizens. As our country has aged, the ways in which we communicate have expanded. As our options for communication have expanded, so have the ways in which the First Amendment has become applicable. For instance, more people get their news from social media than the newspaper now.

The right to dissent does not only apply to literal speech or physical writings. It includes any form of speech intended to criticize. With new mediums of communication and uncharted legal waters, the government tries to limit what our rights should protect us from. More recently the case of Missouri v. Biden found that the Biden administration had made inappropriate communications with tech companies, which led to them censoring private citizens. The ruling led to
limiting the government from censoring online speech.

In conclusion, the right to be able to tell the government that what they're doing is wrong is a crucial part of the First Amendment. Without it, we wouldn't be free. The ability to say, "No I do not agree" is why The United States of America exists at all. If we give the government an inch in the fight for our rights they will take a mile every time. The right to dissent, the freedom to dissent is what makes us Americans.