User:Schoe043/sandbox/articleedits

Potential Sources

Delgado, Richard, and Jean Stefancic. Must We Defend Nazis?: Hate Speech, Pornography, and the New First Amendment. New York: NYU Press, 1997.

Downs, Donald Alexander. Nazis in Skokie: Freedom, Community, and the First Amendment. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1985.

Hamlin, David. The Nazi/Skokie Conflict: A Civil Liberties Battle. Boston: Beacon Press, 1980.

Neier, Aryeh. Defending My Enemy: American Nazis, the Skokie Case, and the Risks of Freedom. 1st ed. New York: E.P. Dutton, 1979.

Strum, Philippa. When the Nazis Came to Skokie: Freedom for Speech We Hate. [Lawrence, Kan.]: University Press of Kansas, 1999.

November 6 Edits

Original Lead: National Socialist Party of America v. Village of Skokie, 432 U.S. 43 (1977),arising out of what is sometimes referred to as the Skokie Affair,is a United States Supreme Court case dealing with freedom of speech and freedom of assembly. Related court decisions are captioned Collin v. Smithand Smith v. Collin.Although summarily decided on procedural grounds, the necessary implication of the Supreme Court's 1977 NSPA decision — not directly stated in the unsigned, 5-4 per curiamopinion itself— is that a group's request to engage in a parade or demonstration involving public display of the Nazi swastika is a symbolic form of free speech that is at least presumptively entitled to First Amendmentprotections. In other words, the Court's decision implies that First Amendment protection would not be denied to use of the swastika as a form of "fighting words". Three of the four dissenters stated their agreement with the majority's position that First Amendment protections were applicable to the NSPA's challenge to the Illinois injunction. (Only Justice Whitedid not join that statement.) By requiring the state court to consider the neo-Nazis' appeal without delay, the U.S. Supreme Court decision opened the door to allowing the National Socialist Party of America to march.

• Plan: Look at Strum, Downs, and Delgado's arguments about the opinion and its implications of the case as well as what the dissenters said. Reword third sentence to make more concise.
• Link NSPA

Edits:

Original Background: In 1977, Frank Collin, the leader of National Socialist Party of America, announced the party's intention to march through Skokie, Illinois. Skokie was home to a significant number of Jewish people, many of them survivors of the Holocaust. Originally, the NSPA had planned a political rally in Marquette Park in Chicago; however the Chicago authorities blocked these plans by requiring the NSPA to post a public safety insurance bond and by banning political demonstrations in Marquette Park.

On behalf of the NSPA, the ACLU challenged the injunction issued by the Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois, that prohibited marchers at the proposed Skokie rally from wearing Nazi uniforms or displaying swastikas. The ACLU was represented by civil rights attorneys David Goldberger (later a professor at Ohio State's law school) and Burton Joseph. The challengers argued that the injunction violated the First Amendment rights of the marchers to express themselves.

• Plan: Give more details about what happened. Already edited the sentence about the demographics of Skokie. Want to clarify timeline about Marquette park. Will also provide more details about events leading up to the first injunction filed by the Village of Skokie.

Edits: Before the Skokie Affair, Frank Collin and his Neo-Nazi group, the NSPA, would regularly hold demonstrations in Marquette Park, where the NSPA was headquartered. However, the Chicago authorities would eventually blocked these demonstrations by requiring the NSPA to post a public safety insurance bond and by banning political demonstrations in Marquette Park. While Collin did file a lawsuit for a violation against his first amendment rights, he realized that this case would get tied up in the courts for far longer than he was willing to wait to begin marching again. In October 1976, Collin sent out letters to the park districts of the North Shore suburbs of Chicago, requesting permits for the NSPA to hold a white power demonstration. Skokie Park District was the only district to reply, stating that Collin would need to post a $350,000 insurance bond to hold the rally on in front of the Skokie Village Hall. Before sending this reply, Skokie Park District, realizing they had no mechanism to stop Collin, had passed a resolution to raise the amount of money needed to hold such a demonstration, rendering it financially impossible for the NSPA to be able to hold the event. Skokie was home to a significant number of Jewish people, many of them survivors of the Holocaust. Collin used this resolution as an opportunity to claim infringement upon his First Amendment rights and now wanted to protest in Skokie for the NSPA's right to free speech. On March 20, 1977, Collin sent a letter to the Chief of Police and Park District, stating the NSPA's intentions to protest for their right to free speech on May 1. In the letters, he stated that about 30-50 members planned to demonstrate outside of the Village Hall on Sunday, May 1 from about 3-3:30 p.m. They wanted to hold up "signs proclaiming, "White Free Speech," "Free Speech for White Americans," and "Free Speech for the White Man.""

At first, the Skokie mayor and Village Council intended to allow the NSPA to demonstrate and their tactic was to ignore them to give them as little publicity as possible. The Jewish community found this unacceptable and held meetings throughout the month of April to discuss the matter. They came to the consensus that the NSPA, whose uniform was modeled after the Nazi uniform, but with added swastikas, could not come to Skokie. The mayor and the Village Council heard their concerns and on April 27, 1977, ordered Village attonrey, Harvey Schwartz, to file an injunction.