It's simple: Let the Bill of Rights rule
Years ago, a committee of lawyers from the Los Angeles County Bar Association gathered to discuss the issue of a "fair trial." Invited to the discussion were various leaders of the newspaper industry in Los Angeles County. The lawyers were in search of support of their idea to regulate the reporting on criminal defendants.
The meeting opened with the host's declaration that the legal process in place in the 1960s was not fulfilling the right to a fair trial. Pretrial news coverage and trial reporting was to blame, so said the attorney attendees. What was needed, they said, was judicial control over news coverage.
Since the inception of this country, everyone had a right to a public trial by a jury of their peers. The word "fair" did not appear, or at least it did not appear as late as the 1960s.
The first news person to speak was a marvelous lady, the first female city editor of a major metropolitan newspaper, the Los Angeles Herald-Express. Agness Underwood looked at the lawyers, and said:
"Everything that needs to be said about freedom of the press was said in the Bill of Rights." And she added that the attendees "really have nothing to discuss." America could use a president with such brevity and understanding.
The media at that time took the position censoring coverage would create secret trials, a clear repudiation of the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Well, of course, lawyers run the justice system, and so ultimately the "fair trial" argument took hold, and with it, blanket censorship that repudiates the public's right to a speedy and public trial. Before you argue that point, consider what is happening in a New York courtroom today to a former president and candidate for president in 2024.
Not only is Donald Trump robbed of his ability to campaign for public office, he is subject to total censorship when it comes to arguing his case. The prosecutors may hold press events and say what they wish, but Trump cannot respond, let alone mount a defense; hence he is denied a legal trial in New York. This is an ultimate example of that "fair trial" proposal aired in Los Angeles decades ago. It also is an excellent example of the kind of public lynching the "fair trial lawyers" said they were against.
There is an underlying issue involving the recently House-passed Antisemitism Awareness Act. Once Congress passes a law, the enforcement or application of that law is assigned to a Cabinet officer. With that potential law, and all other laws, are words empowering the secretary to adopt "such administrative rules and regulations necessary to carry out the purposes of this act."
In this case, this would be the Department of Education. The rules and regulations are published in the Federal Register and then put into practice. The goal is censorship, and anti-Semitism is the excuse. That requires the bureaucracy to determine what is, and what is not, anti-Semitic.
There are a number of political leaders who advocate eliminating the Department of Education, not giving it censorship rights over what people says about religions and religious people.
And there you have it. More rules about "disinformation" and "misinformation," which more often than not protect the bureaucracy and keep the citizens confused or in the dark.
The Bill of Rights got it right. The public does need to hear the anti-Semitism, identify the perpetrators and shun them. Hearing stupid people say stupid things is part of the public's overall education about those who seek public office.
The college crowd has made their views known, and perhaps a result of that there will be changes to the admission standards and the way colleges operate. Would the intellectual property thief who ran Harvard have been forced to resign without some attendant publicity?
Do we really want to spend our political lives existing with the mushrooms?
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