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	Fighting words - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		Fighting words are written or spoken words, generally expressed to incite hatred or violence and to place the targets of the words in danger of harm.
		The fighting words doctrine, in United States constitutional law, is a limitation to freedom of speech as granted in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.
		It is not true that "fighting words" have at most a de minimis expressive content, or that their content is in all respects worthless and undeserving of constitutional protection;" sometimes they are quite expressive indeed.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Fighting_words (606 words)

	Fighting Words
		Assuming, arguendo, that all of the expression reached by the ordinance is proscribable under the fighting words doctrine, we nonetheless conclude that the ordinance is facially unconstitutional in that it prohibits otherwise permitted speech solely on the basis of the subjects the speech addresses.
		A cross erected by the Knight Riders of the Ku Klux Klan in a public park, bearing the words "John 3:16," is not fighting words....
		Fighting words is a small class of expressive conduct that is likely to provoke the average person to retaliate, and thereby cause a breach of the peace.
	jcomm.uoregon.edu /~tgleason/j385/Fighting_j385.html (624 words)

	Sticks and Stones
		In his words, " there is always hope when people are forced to listen to both sides; it is when they attend only to one that errors harden into prejudices, and truth itself ceases to have the effect of truth, by being exaggerated into falsehood" (139).
		These are words that the Court described as "those which by their very utterance [1] inflict injury of or [2] tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace" (The Fighting Words Doctrine).
		The second reason cited by Lawrence for justification of restricting fighting words is the preemptive effect insults have on further speech (240).
	members.tripod.com /Diogenes_jr/fightingwords.html (819 words)

	FIRE - Misconceptions About the Fighting Words Exception
		The "fighting words" exception to the freedom of speech is widely misunderstood and abused by college administrators.
		The fighting words doctrine, as originally announced in Chaplinsky, found that two types of speech were not protected—words that by their very utterance inflict injury, and speech that incites an immediate breach of the peace.
		Federal courts have refused to use the fighting words doctrine as a justification to uphold university speech codes that regulate offensive or indecent language.
	www.thefire.org /index.php/article/7296.html (849 words)

	Fighting Words
		Finally, the Court has held that fighting words must be "directed at the person of the hearer" 310 U.S. The Court implemented this narrow test for the many ‘fighting words' cases that followed.
		The definition of fighting words the Court uses is "conduct that inflicts injury or tends to incite violence" (Van Alstyne 259).
		Justice Scalia wrote that when fighting words are prohibited in a manner that some fighting words are permitted and some are not, the prohibition is not protected by the First Amendment.
	www.bsos.umd.edu /gvpt/gvpt339/fightingwords.html (5212 words)

	R. A. V. v. City of St. Paul, 505 U.S. 377 (1992)
		In other words, the exclusion of "fighting words" from the scope of the First Amendment simply means that, for purposes of that Amendment, the unprotected features of the words are, despite their verbal character, essentially a "nonspeech" element of communication.
		Fighting words are thus analogous to a noisy sound truck: Each is, as Justice Frankfurter recognized, a "mode of speech," Niemotko v.
		As explained earlier, see supra, at 8, the reason why fighting words are categorically excluded from the protection of the First Amendment is not that their content communicates any particular idea, but that their content embodies a particularly intolerable (and socially unnecessary) mode of expressing whatever idea the speaker wishes to convey.
	supct.law.cornell.edu /supct/html/90-7675.ZO.html (4903 words)

	What is the Fighting Words Doctrine?
		While not addressing whether Terminiello's speech constituted fighting words, the Court found that the breach of the peace statute in question was overbroad because it permitted convictions for both fighting words and constitutionally protected expression.
		The defendant was subsequently convicted of violating a statute that prohibited the use of "opprobrious words or abusive language, tending to cause a breach of the peace." Finding that the statute restricted speech beyond fighting words, the Court invalidated it as constitutionally overbroad.
		Notably, the Court in R.A.V. admitted that fighting words sometimes have value as speech, stating: It is not true that "fighting words" have at most a "di minimus" expressive content, or that their content is in all respects "worthless and undeserving of constitutional protection"; sometimes they are quite expressive indeed.
	www.talkaboutthemusic.com /group/alt.music.michael-jackson/messages/383739.html (955 words)

	R. A. V. v City of St. Paul
		As explained earlier, the reason why fighting words are categorically excluded from the protection of the First Amendment is not that their content communicates any particular idea, but that their content embodies a particularly intolerable (and socially unnecessary) mode of expressing whatever idea the speaker wishes to convey.
		Fighting words are not a means of exchanging views, rallying supporters, or registering a protest; they are directed against individuals to provoke violence or to inflict injury.
		By placing fighting words, which the Court has long held to be valueless, on at least equal constitutional footing with political discourse and other forms of speech that we have deemed to have the greatest social value, the majority devalues the latter category.
	www.law.umkc.edu /faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/rav.html (3420 words)

	S.C. Judicial Department - Opinion Number 3569
		Fighting words must be inherently likely to induce the ordinary person to react violently.
		Some of the factors to consider in determining if profanity constitutes fighting words are the presence of bystanders, the accompaniment of other aggressive behavior, and whether the words are repeatedly uttered.
		Applying the fighting words doctrine to the facts of this case, we agree with the magistrate and conclude Sarratt’s remarks, accompanied with the loud manner in which they were spoken, constituted fighting words.
	www.judicial.state.sc.us /opinions/displayOpinionPF.cfm?caseNo=3569 (1578 words)

	untitled (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-10)
		/4/ It is not true that "fighting words" have at most a "de minimis" expressive content, ibid., or that their content is in all respects "worthless and undeserving of constitutional protection," post, at 401; sometimes they are quite expressive indeed.
		But "fighting words" that do not themselves invoke race, color, creed, religion, or gender - aspersions upon a person's mother, for example - would seemingly be usable ad libitum in the placards of those arguing in favor of racial, color, etc., tolerance and equality, but could not be used by those speakers' opponents.
		Paul's brief asserts that a general "fighting words" law would not meet the city's needs, because only a content-specific measure can communicate to minority groups that the "group hatred" aspect of such speech "is not condoned by the majority." Brief for Respondent 25.
	www.umt.edu /phil/Faculty/Walton/ravvstp.htm (4018 words)

	City of Bismarck v. Schoppert, 469 N.W.2d 808 (ND 1991)
		The Court concluded that the statute reached words that conveyed disgrace or that insulted the listener, and that these words were not words "which by their very utterance.
		Justice Powell did, however, aptly synthesize "fighting words" doctrine when he noted that whether particular words are "fighting words" depends on the circumstances of their utterance and the fact that the words are spoken to police is a significant circumstance.
		Schoppert's words were not a clear invitation to fight and the testimony did not demonstrate that these words, spoken to this audience, had any tendency to cause an immediate breach of the peace.
	www.court.state.nd.us /court/opinions/900263.htm (3028 words)

	1996-001 \| 1/12/1996 \| Kansas Attorney General Opinion (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-10)
		Because the KU policy specifies "racial and ethnic epithets, slurs, and insults" as the type of speech covered by its fighting words ban, it is a content-based regulation and impermissible under R.A.V. This is true even though the language may be argued to be merely exemplary rather than part of the regulation itself.
		By contrast, the KU fighting words policy is clearly directed at speech rather than conduct and does not define this form of harassment narrowly enough to be viewed as "swept up incidentally within the reach of a statute directed at conduct.
		Thus while the fighting words prohibition standing on its own is content-neutral, its connection to the obviously content-based prohibition may render it an impermissible content-based policy.
	www.kscourts.org /ksag/opinions/1996/1996-001.htm (5915 words)

	[No title]
		Fighting words are thus analogous to a noisy sound truck: Each is, as Justice Frankfurter recognized, a "mode of speech," both can be used to convey an idea; but neither has, in and of itself, a claim upon the First Amendment.
		But "fighting words" that do not themselves invoke race, color, creed, religion, or gender--aspersions upon a person's mother, for example--would seemingly be usable ad libitum in the placards of those arguing in favor of racial, color, etc. tolerance and equality, but could not be used by that speaker's opponents.
		What makes the anger, fear, sense of dishonor, etc. produced by violation of this ordinance distinct from the anger, fear, sense of dishonor, etc. produced by other fighting words is [393] nothing other than the fact that it is caused by a distinctive idea, conveyed by a distinctive message.
	www.philosophy.ubc.ca /faculty/bittner/content/phil338A/cross.doc (767 words)

	FindLaw's Writ - Colb: The Israeli Supreme Court Denies Women The Right to Pray at the Western Wall
		Feminist authors have argued persuasively that the fighting words doctrine focuses on the wrong party in attributing responsibility for outbreaks of violence.
		To attach the label "fighting words" is, at least to some extent, to mitigate the seriousness of the violence that may follow such speech, on the theory that the speaker "asked for" or provoked the aggression.
		At best, this reality suggests that the fighting words doctrine is built around a masculine conception of speakers and listeners that disregards female modes of interaction and accommodates a stereotypically male way of responding to provocation.
	writ.news.findlaw.com /colb/20030423.html (1507 words)

	firstamendmentcenter.org: Arts & First Amendment in Speech - Topic
		These include the lewd and obscene, the profane, the libelous, and the insulting or “fighting” words — those which by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.
		He reasoned that “the proscription of the use of ‘opprobrious language,’ embraces words that do not ‘by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.’ ” Brennan ruled that the Louisiana Supreme Court had failed to confine the statute to just fighting words.
		Brennan determined that the law was not narrowly tailored to prohibit disorderly conduct or fighting words.
	www.firstamendmentcenter.org /Speech/arts/topic.aspx?topic=fighting_words (2624 words)

	deseretnews.com \| 'Fighting words' may not apply to crowds
		Fighting words, the Salt Lake City Council found out this week, don't apply to the masses.
		Instead, the so-called fighting words doctrine, established by the U.S. Supreme Court and other federal courts, applies only to individuals, or, at most, small groups of no more than four, city attorneys told the council this week.
		But Ferguson and Rutan insist there is clearly defined case law stating that fighting words cannot be directed at groups and conceded the ordinance change was minor in application.
	deseretnews.com /dn/view/0,1249,595048213,00.html (530 words)

	Untitled Document
		The two-track doctrine was more fully developed in 1972 when, in a pair of closely related decisions announced on the same day, the Court clearly distinguished content-based from content-neutral regulations, reaffirmed the track one standard, and clarified the track two standard.
		These doctrines acknowledge that there are some regulations that could not pass the two-track standards but may nonetheless be justified because the government has unique interests in regulating these types of expression, based on the content of the speech or the setting in which the expression occurs.
		Cohen wore a jacket bearing the words "Fuck the Draft" in a corridor of the L.A. County courthouse.
	faculty.gvsu.edu /richardm/html/307speec.htm (1489 words)

	Downtown ‘fighting words’ are spelled out (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-10)
		For instance, a Wisconsin court ruled that protesters who formed a semicircle near a woman and shouted for six minutes that she was “a whore, harlot and Jezebel” were using “fighting words,” which are not constitutionally protected.
		Fighting words are defined as personal insults directed at individuals that are likely to create a violent reaction and play no role in the expression of ideas.
		And she noted that the fighting words doctrine is difficult to interpret.
	www.religionnewsblog.com /5996/downtown-fighting-words-are-spelled-out (810 words)

	Fighting Words
		Street's conviction might have been solely based on his words, we are still bound to reverse if the conviction could have been based both upon his words and his act." Such a ruling was dictated, the Court reasoned, to prevent the punishment of constitutionally protected speech.
		In reaching its conclusion, the majority reaffirmed the notion that words may not be banned simply because of their offensive or vulgar nature.
		"It is not true that "fighting words" have at most a "di minimus" expressive content, or that their content is in all respects "worthless and undeserving of constitutional protection"; sometimes they are quite expressive indeed.
	www.freedomforum.org /packages/first/fightingwords/casesummaries.htm (1604 words)

	FindLaw: U.S. Constitution: First Amendment: Annotations pg. 18 of 21
		This amounted to ''special prohibitions on those speakers who express views on disfavored subjects.'' 84 The fact that government may proscribe areas of speech such as obscenity, defamation, or fighting words does not mean that these areas ''may be made the vehicles for content discrimination unrelated to their distinctly proscribable content.
		New Hampshire, 95 the Court unanimously sustained a conviction under a statute proscribing ''any offensive, derisive, or annoying word'' addressed to any person in a public place under the state court's interpretation of the statute as being limited to ''fighting words''-- i.e., to ''words.
		Therefore, the city's bias-motivated crime ordinance, interpreted as banning the use of fighting words known to offend on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, or gender, but not on such other possible bases as political affiliation, union membership, or homosexuality, was invalidated for its content discrimination.
	caselaw.lp.findlaw.com /data/constitution/amendment01/18.html (6381 words)

	Legal Affairs - "Fighting Words"
		The Chaplinsky Court defined fighting words as those that "men of common intelligence would understand would be words likely to cause an average addressee to fight." In a culture based on honor, there was a consensus about the meaning and impact of fighting words.
		Aware of the archaic quality of the fighting-words doctrine, several modern commentators have proposed abandoning its focus on imminent violence and resurrecting its prohibition on words that "by their very utterance inflict injury." The inherent indignity of certain racist and sexist epithets, they suggest, is enough to exclude them from protection by the First Amendment.
		Because of their roots in dueling culture, fighting words must be uttered face to face—and even a face-to-camera insult like the one Al-Arian expressed is more likely to provoke a call to the FBI than a left hook.
	www.legalaffairs.org /issues/May-June-2002/scene_rosen_mayjun2002.html (1737 words)

	[No title] (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-10)
		These include the lewd and obscene, the profane, the libelous, and the insulting or "fighting' ' words--those which by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.
		Thus, the Chaplinsly Court set out a two-part definition for fighting words: (1) words which by their very utterance inflict injury and (2) words which by their very utterance tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.
		The two parts of the fighting words definition correspond to different concerns regarding reactions to offensive expressions.
	www.mit.edu /activities/safe/legal/chaplinsky-v-new-hampshire (415 words)

	[No title]
		I believe the current definition of fighting words is 1) the language must be delivered one-to-one, and 2) must be such as to evoke an immediate breach of peace (as opposed to simply offending the listener).
		California_, 1971 the Supreme Court restated the description of fighting words as "those personally abusive epithets which, when addressed to the ordinary citizen, are, as a matter of common knowledge, inherently likely to provoke violent action.
		The ability of government, consistent with the Constitution, to shut off discourse solely to protect others from hearing it is, in other words, dependent upon the showing that substantial privacy interest are being invaded in an essentially intolerable manner.
	www.eff.org /Censorship/Academic_edu/CAF/law/chaplinsky-v-new-hampshire (876 words)

	[No title]
		These include the lewd and obscene, the profane, the libelous, and the insulting or "fighting" words -- those which by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.
		Defendant contends, however, that the "fighting words" doctrine has less force when the person to whom the words are addressed is a peace officer engaged in official duties.
		In my view, the "fighting words" doctrine has become an archaic relic, which found its genesis in more chauvinistic times when it was considered bad form for a man to back down from a fight.
	www.ucs.louisiana.edu /~ras2777/civlib/read.html (2541 words)

	The Vermont Connection : University of Vermont (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-10)
		Because the criteria are difficult to prove, applying the fighting words doctrine to a particular case is challenging.
		The fighting words doctrine does not take into account the unique experiences of women and people of color, including different reactions to violence and hate speech.
		Many hate speech code opponents also reject the fighting words doctrine, stating that individuals must be held accountable for their own actions; they argue speech should never be allowed to incite violence.
	www.uvm.edu /~vtconn/?Page=v20/garrett.html (3363 words)

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