Now, with the Thought Control Bill and Bush’s authority to identify anyone as a traitor and have them imprisoned, you’d better be careful about what you say.

lestupid, freedom of expression(free speech) is a wholly American right. With the exception of the Dutch no, and I repeat NO, European society embraced it until the 20th century. And it was not given to the citizens at large even then. Tight restrictions were and are in place upon the ability of citizens to express their political and religious opinions.

Both the writs of 1689 and 1789 you cite were tightly bound by the authority of the Crown to imprison, for any reason whatsoever, any subject of the Realm.

The fact that people in Europe discussed freedom of expression for several hundred years without achieving it(with the exception of the Dutch)is sad on its very face. And that socialist asses such as you work to silence people in America is even sadder.

Because truth matters

Not to mention, the case of John Zenger that I mentioned occurred in 1735, long before the U.S. even achieved independence.

Publishers could enjoy freedom from prior restraint here in America that they could not enjoy even in England. So it has remained to this day.

The Bill of Rights in England (1689) and the Declaration of the Rights of Man (1789) both predate the US Constitution.

Islamic culture is incompatible with Canada’s liberalized, Western civilization. They insist such a notion is untrue and, in effect, want opinions like that banned from publication.

In other words, “we’re not against free speech and anyone who says we are should be thrown in jail!”

That quote alone should get the case thrown out.

Only Americans, the inventors of free speech, understand it and cherish it.

Your understanding of history is woefully lacking. America did not invent free speech.

I have to agree with the premise of this thread. As a younger man, I was very international — Europe, Canada, Caribbean and the Far East. Before going overseas, I envisioned a life as an Ex-pat (expatriot: e.g. American living overseas and moving through foreign countries easily with a broad knowledge of foreign languages and cultures). Perhaps taking a German or other European wife.

A stiff dose of reality put a kay-bosh on those plans, but good. Overseas, particularly in Europe, you have freedom to be depraved, but you have no freedoms where it really counts — protecting your religion, your country, your culture, your language and yes even your life and your property.

Without those, any concept of Freedom is illusory. Other countries, by and large, are Statist, and the differences lie merely in the degree.

Sadly, the US is becoming Statist as well and not one of our sacred Rights enshrined in the Bill of Rights has not been severely hampered to the point of Freedom disappearing in the US itself.

Still, we have more freedoms where it counts than just about any other country I can think of.

That’s why I’ve settled in to my CCW state and am content not to travel overseas or even through Socialist-held US territories (NY, NY, DC, CA, MA …etc..)

Perhaps I have become lazy, enjoying the freedoms of the Shire and not venturing to keep up the fight without.

Lestat: I am open to correction, but I think you will not find Free Speech as declared in our Bill of Rights to be predated by anything very close to it in principle. Some freedom of expression has existed, with severe limits and in looking at your references, perhaps you might educate me, but I don’t see anything very close to our form of Free Speech in my quick perusal of these documents.

Further, in real life practice in England in the Sixteenth Century no such thing as Free Political Speech existed.

American most surely did invent free speech. The first judgment against prior restraint ever occurred in New York, in the Zenger case, for example.

Okay Lestat, who did invent free speech then? If my understanding of history is so ‘woeful’ please enlighten me.

You haven’t offered an alternative, because you don’t have one, actually, but it will be fun to watch you try.

The “Thought Control Bill”???
Whatever are you talking about now? If you’re referring to the so-called “Fairness Doctrine”, that is a leftie affair.