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Comment by pdx | Hacker News Reader

   > It's also extremely pertinent that the warrant is being 
   > executed against an organization exercising political 
   > speech.

Why? If you hurt me (many innocent people were hurt), but you do it because you feel "political", it's OK?

Isn't the law supposed to be blind, or do political groups have a "get out of jail free" card?

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> Isn't the law supposed to be blind, or do political groups have a "get out of jail free" card?

Yes, core political speech is Constitutionally protected [1]. You can charge people being violent while protecting their rights to say stupid things.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_in_the_Unite...

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. This is not legal advice.

Free speech protection in American law is with its limits. Speech itself isn't protected if it is directed to incite or produce imminent lawless action. See Brandenburg v. Ohio.

> Speech itself isn't protected if it is directed to incite or produce imminent lawless action. See Brandenburg v. Ohio

Correct, but for that argument to hold within the context of this case (EDIT: warrant) we would need the government to show that most people who visited this site did so with the intent to incite imminent lawless action. (Note, too, that Brandenburg v. Ohio specifically struck down a law banning the mere advocacy of violence.)

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. This is not legal advice.

   > Correct, but for that argument to hold within the 
   > context of this case we would need the government to 
   > show that most people who visited this site did so with 
   > the intent to incite imminent lawless action.

Of course that's not true. For the government to prosecute all of those visitors requires additional proof, to be sure. However, for the government to gather evidence on a subset of those visitors who have already been arrested and are being charged with politically inspired violence, is perfectly appropriate.

> for the government to gather evidence on a subset of those visitors who have already been arrested and are being charged with politically inspired violence, is perfectly appropriate

If this warrant were replaced with demands for visitation logs from specific IP addresses or relating to certain people, it would be far less controversial.

Imminent lawless action would be an impossible standard, and if that's your standard, then accepting harsh KKK political speech should be within your realm. Maybe they step out of line sometimes, but they know how to play the Westboro Baptist game. There's so much hate speech that can't be obviously said to incite violence.

Also, at the heart of banning bad speech is the fear that your fellow countrymen are too weak and stupid to deal with political, racial, sexual, or just scientific thought in general, and you fear the democratic reigns in their hands.

Many countries have different rules (and even sentences limits or additional rights for political prisoners) for politically motivated acts. It's because these are vital to democracy.

But I agree with you and hold a more cynical view that it's because laws are made by politicians.

The express purpose of Free Speech provisions is to prevent the government from persecuting citizens engaged in political speech that the government happens to dislike.

But how does one draw the line between political speech and inciting violence? What if it was an ISIS propaganda speech instead?

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