You're listening to Bloomberg Law. It was billed as a free speech rally in the heart of downtown Boston, with a list of controversial conservative and libertarian speakers, but the rally fizzled as some forty thousand counter demonstrators flooded the Boston Common and the surrounding area and effectively shouted down the group. The event was largely a peaceful one, putting it in contrast with the deadly demonstrations a week earlier
in Charlottesville, Virginia. Here's Boston Police Commissioner William Evans. We got the First Amendment people in, we got them out, and um, you know, and no one got hurt, no one got killed, and we don't really have a whole lot of property. In fact, we have no significant at all property damage to the city. So great day for the city, Evans said. Twenty seven people were arrested with us to talk about the events in Boston. Harvey Silverglade
he's a criminal defense and civil liberties litigator. He's of consul to the law firm Zalkin, Duncan and Bernstein working in Cambridge, Massachusetts. And Judy catoulis a professor at st Oli College Um, thanks to both of you for joining me. I want to start with what happened on the ground in Boston. Then maybe we can move into some of
the First Amendment implications. Harvey, who gets the credit in Boston for the relative limited amount of violence that took place on Saturday, Well, I guess the same people who get the credit for the fact that the event was a total failure. Um. This notion, uh, that there's a kind of an epidemic of false facts going on around Boston. If I could use that volatile phrase, the free speech rally was a total and complete failure, uh, Police Commissioner.
Ever since we got the man and we got them out, but one thing we didn't get. We didn't hear a single word from the speakers. How this can be built a free speech success is totally orwelling and totally beyond me. It was a real failure. Junior. How do you assess that that question who who gets credit and who gets blamed for how things went forward in Boston on Saturday? Well, I think that it's the city that gets the blame. There is no credit because this is a failure, but
they get the blame. The whole event was mishandled by the city. Um, it could have easily gone off without a hitch if the city only was a little bit smarter. Judy catulis from from your vantage point at saying all of college, Uh, what's your take on how the city
performed with with this demonstration. Well, I think most people approached the idea of a free speech march in the same way that they misunderstand what the a c l U does that they that they tended to see it as one that was a partisan view that took a partisan view, whereas I'm not knowing the specifics of the what who was planned to speak in Boston or anything like that. Um, the idea of civil liberties or protecting free speech is a very tricky matter because it isn't
a partisan issue, it's a democratic one. Well, Julie, let me just follow up on that. So, so, right after William Evans, the Boston Police Commissioner, talked about the success in limiting the violence and property damage. Uh, you know, he went on to say something along the lines that,
you know, bigotry has no place here in Boston. Um. Is that are you suggesting that a police commissioner should be remain neutral and not not express views on the underlying issues going on with the protest, Well, it depends on the issues that he's expressing opinions on. UH. Free speech as the A t L you would argue, belongs to all groups as long as there isn't violence or along is there falling within the parameters of the ways
that the United States defines free speech. But the police commissioner definitely has to make some judgments about whether what was planned falls into those parameters for defining free speech, Harvey, what would you have had the city do differently? Since you have criticized them? This event could not take place in an open space like the Boston Common The fact that tens of thousands of people showed up and they
were not peaceful, They were not calm and quiet. There was a mob that made it impossible for the event to go forward. Nobody could have heard a word that
would have been said. What the city should have done was insist that this event be held in an enclosed theater or at the amphitheater of some kind, where a limited number of people would be in the audience, where the police could have easily kept control in case somebody got out of control and where it could have been live streamed so that the whole world could have heard it.
There was such a simple solution. The police instead enabled a pre riot condition to evolve and then got every took every shut down the whole event, took the speakers away before they could say word one, and then proclaimed the success for free speech in Boston. It's nut. Our guests are Judy Coutlass, a professor at Saying all Off College, and Harvey Silverglades, Cambridge, Massachusetts, criminal defense and self civil
liberties litigator. UM. Judy, some of the comments I read from the counter demonstrators essentially said this that what was going to go on at this this rally was hate speech and it might even be a call to violence, and therefore we were justified in in shouting them down and preventing them from saying what they planned to say. Do you agree with that? Um? No, I don't. Actually I think that, um, free speech entitles people to other ways of communicating that I can understand where there were
somewhat extenuating circumstances in Boston. UM. Had I been in Boston, I might well have shown up at that counter rally. But um, just in the abstract sense, I think that it's problematic when one group of people shouts down and shuts down another groups right to free speech. Harvey, what do you think about that that question of of uh this potentially being a call to violence? Um? At some point, UM, isn't there a right to prevent a group from speaking
if what they are espousing UH could be dangerous? Well, the the ridiculous analysis that we're hearing um, and that is inherent in the question that you asked me, is simply this, how do we know that speeches hate speech until we've had an opportunity to hear it. Nobody heard what these people have to say, And in fact, from all we know, this was a very eclective group from all over the political spectrum. But there is no reason at all to think that hate speech was going to
be um, you know, spoken at this rally. But second of all, hate speech is constitutionally protected. If we had a First Amendment that only protected love speech, we wouldn't have liberty at all. So this crowd that chucked down this free speech rally violated the constitutional rights of the speakers and violated the constitutional rights of people who wanted
to listen. I wanted to listen, Judy, I want to ask you about the a c l U, which recently said that it won't while it has represented white supremacists UH and people across the ideological spectrum, that it won't represent people who are carrying semi automatic UH military style weapons. Is this a change in the way the a c l U has approached this issue or or is this a policy they've always had that we just didn't know about.
I think it's a change in other kinds of laws. UM. Certainly, one of the rights guaranteed in the First Amendment is the right right to assemble peacefully. The fact that so many states have now enacted laws where you can carry guns in public or concealed weapons in public UM means that the a c l U is going to have a trickier job, or any agency is going to have a trickier job deciding how to interpret whether or not a crowd is armed or dangerous or threatening or is
about to result in violence. It's it's just a something outside of the a cl you've control that I think is possibly an unexpected consequence of some of the laws that have been passed in states regarding guns. Also, technological development, Harvey what do we do about these two rights? Um? It is in a lot of states perfectly legal, legal
for people to walk around with weapons being displayed. Um. And uh, we have seen in the case of Charlottesville that sometimes out accompanies people who are trying to speak as well, and and that maybe having those weapons changes how free other people feel to to speak there in opposition, what do we do about those two to competing rights?
The first Amendment in the second Amendment? Well, first of all, these are two amendments that are very clearly set forth in the Bill of Rights, and I think the a C O. You is trying to balance the two of them. I happen to think that it's made a mistake, but it's not a mistake from bad faith. I think it's it's an error in judgment. And I think eventually the a c U and actually change its mind and come back to its original position and that they will protect
free speech in a rally even where people are armed. Um. But I can't believe. I can't. I can't. I can forgive the a c O. You for being quite shocked by the events in Charlotte's Bille, and it's caused a lot of people to stop and think and to question things they've been believing and been doing. And so I think the A c O. You can be forgiven if it turns out this was a mistake. Judy, where do
you think this, this whole debate is going. Are you concerned that we are are we getting into uh an escalation of of rhetoric and violence that is going to be harmful to to our conversation, or or is Boston evidence that maybe we're we're moving in a more peaceful direction. Um. I worry a lot about the present political climate and the way that either side intern for it said, UM
that I worry that people who have minority views. Probably I would like to hope about America as a white nation or as one that isn't welcoming of various groups, that that these people are. I would like to think that they are a minority, but they feel like they've been boldened by events recently and by um Donald Trump
and the White House. At the same time, I think that as a younger generation steps in to respond to them, sometimes they use different tactics that have evolved since the sixties when there was so much protest in the United States that that circumstances have changed. That technology has changed. It's easier to gather a crowd very quickly through social media, and so the same expectations about civil liberties and civil
rights and communication with people with whom you disagree. I think all of that is just changing very, very rapidly. We're going to have to leave it there. I want to thank Judy Cotulas and Harvey silver Glade for talking to us about the events in Boston this weekend. That's it for this edition of Bloomberg Law, and we'll be back tomorrow.