What happens if the first amendment is repealed?
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  What happens if the first amendment is repealed?
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Author Topic: What happens if the first amendment is repealed?  (Read 1822 times)
Lief 🗽
Lief
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« on: January 21, 2010, 03:43:43 PM »

Say the House and Senate and the States all vote to repeal the first amendment for some reason. Do we then lose any free speech, free assembly, etc. protections? Or are laws restricting these things still "unconstitutional", as they are our "inalienable rights" and all the first amendment does is make it absolutely clear that the government cannot trample them?
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Franzl
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« Reply #1 on: January 21, 2010, 03:54:59 PM »

Say the House and Senate and the States all vote to repeal the first amendment for some reason. Do we then lose any free speech, free assembly, etc. protections? Or are laws restricting these things still "unconstitutional", as they are our "inalienable rights" and all the first amendment does is make it absolutely clear that the government cannot trample them?

I would think that the Court could very well interpret that there would no longer be a right to free speech.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
Ernest
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« Reply #2 on: January 21, 2010, 08:07:29 PM »

If the ninth amendment is not also repealed, I can't see where there should be much difference.  However, if the first were repealed, courts might not be willing to offend the tyranny of the majority to do so.
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Vepres
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« Reply #3 on: January 21, 2010, 08:42:51 PM »

It is a clear message that the government cannot interfere with free expression.
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Torie
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« Reply #4 on: January 26, 2010, 11:36:54 PM »

Say the House and Senate and the States all vote to repeal the first amendment for some reason. Do we then lose any free speech, free assembly, etc. protections? Or are laws restricting these things still "unconstitutional", as they are our "inalienable rights" and all the first amendment does is make it absolutely clear that the government cannot trample them?

No, one provision is not supreme to another, and a specific provision cannot be erased based on more general language, particularly if the more specific provision is adopted later. That would in essence prevent the people from amending the Constitution if SCOTUS does not like it, which would really be akin to judicial tyranny. If the First Amendment is repealed however, I will decamp to Australia or England. I mean it.
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Senator Robert A. Taft
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« Reply #5 on: February 07, 2010, 11:36:43 PM »

Without the First Amendment, America would cease to be America.
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k-onmmunist
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« Reply #6 on: February 08, 2010, 06:29:39 AM »

Then the federal government would be allowed to clamp down on free speech.
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John Dibble
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« Reply #7 on: February 08, 2010, 11:54:07 AM »

I'd probably be looking for a new country to live in, provided people would still be allowed to leave the country at that point.
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Lief 🗽
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« Reply #8 on: February 10, 2010, 08:02:34 PM »

So if the consensus is that we would no longer have a right to free speech and etc, is the Ninth Amendment then useless? Because I would think the basic rights enumerated in the First Amendment are some of the most basic "retained by the people."
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Vepres
Junior Chimp
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« Reply #9 on: February 10, 2010, 09:39:08 PM »

So if the consensus is that we would no longer have a right to free speech and etc, is the Ninth Amendment then useless? Because I would think the basic rights enumerated in the First Amendment are some of the most basic "retained by the people."

There is other stuff, too, I'd imagine. The ninth is there just to make sure the government knows its place, and to affirm the people's sovereignty. I doubt it was written with anything specific in mind.
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ARescan
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« Reply #10 on: February 10, 2010, 10:49:27 PM »

Without the First Amendment, America would cease to be America.
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Beet
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« Reply #11 on: February 10, 2010, 11:43:22 PM »

There are different ways to attack an amendment other than outright repeal. I doubt the ritualistic act of repeal could ever fly in America, but the passage of additional amendments, or the rendering of the First Amendment useless through various mechanisms, could occur. There is also the danger that the First Amendment comes to be seen as nothing but a tool of the rich, of oligarchs, a corrupting force. That has not occurred; and there is a good chance it will never occur but it is one of the possible threats to it.
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