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Cases for argument on Tuesday, May 2

Case 1: The Missoula Independent v. Axolotl

In January 1992, Missoula was the scene of a horrifying hate crime. A black man and a white woman were killed when their University District house burned to the ground. Their 4-year-old daughter, Angie, staying with cousins at a sleepover, survived them. The couple were well-liked professionals in the community. Neil Thomas was a physical therapist in a small practice near St. Patrick Hospital. Ginny Young was a planner who worked for the city and county of Missoula. In the mailbox attached to the front of the brick house a half-scorched note was found. It said, "…you roast to dea… you c…" The community reacted in outrage against this crime. Arson investigators were brought in from other cities to help the Missoula fire department’s own investigators focus on the perpetrators. As was typical, the investigators focused on two standard theories—that someone wanted to kill or harm the couple, or that they had set the fire themselves. No conclusion was ever reached, no one was ever arrested, and the case went cold.

Almost 13 years later, Hank Brodbeck, a fire investigator in Phoenix, came under suspicion in another case involving arson in a home occupied by a black family. After intense questioning, Brodbeck indicated to investigators that he had been in on a conspiracy to burn down the Thomas-Young home and to plant evidence in the case tying the arson to the couple. At the time, Brodbeck had been an arson investigator trainee in Missoula.

In early 2005, Brodbeck was extradited to Montana to face charges of conspiracy to murder. Another man who had ties to Brodbeck and to a white supremacy group in Noxon was also indicted on the conspiracy to murder charges. Brodbeck’s case was set for trial before Judge Bernard O. Axolotl (ACKS-a-lot-ul). The public defender asked Judge Axolotl to move the trial to another city, arguing that Brodbeck could not possibly receive a fair trial in Missoula. But the judge, noting the passage of time and the huge changes in the population of Missoula in the intervening years, declined to do so.

On station KAPO in Missoula, radio talk show host John Philip Suemi, whose show aired from 8-11 p.m., often had guests from The Young White Male Christian Association (YWMCA), the white supremacy group to whom Brodbeck had ties. Suemi followed the preparations for the Brodbeck murder conspiracy trial closely, commenting frequently on the "trumped-up charges" against Brodbeck and inviting listener comment. Suemi agreed on air with a caller who called Ethel Johnson, the veteran prosecuting attorney, "a classic bitch—a castrating, em-eff bitch if you catch my drift," and repeatedly called another prosecutor with a Latino surname "the wetback." He invited listeners to go to a blog run by a YWMCA member, where there was a link to the county website where all the assistant county attorneys were listed, along with their phone numbers. Johnson received an anonymous e-mail threatening "grave consequences" if she did not "drop the case and set our man free." In July 2005, just before the start of the trial, members of YWMCA gathered outside the county courthouse and marched around it, carrying signs saying " Brodbeck is Inocent" (sic) and "Free Hank."

As the YWMCA marched, Judge Axolotl was inside the courthouse hearing pretrial motions. The jury was not in the room. Judge Axolotl recommended to the county attorney that Suemi be prosecuted for tampering with the trial and making malicious threats of violence. Still steamed about Suemi, the judge remarked to the bailiff standing next to him, " I'm glad this goddamn Noxon Nazi is finally on trial." An open mike caused his remarks to be carried to the reporters and spectators in the packed courtroom. Then, realizing all had heard what he said, the judge admonished reporters, "Now, you folks in the press, be careful what you print. We don't want to prejudice any jury members, do we?"

In chambers, Judge Axolotl again apologized for his comment. Noting the "outrageous" behavior of Suemi and KAPO, he offered to close the first week of the trial to avoid any further possible prejudice. Brodbeck's public defender agreed. But the county attorney, Richard "Dusty" Rhoades, was hoping to advance his own chances of election to the district judgeship the following month. He called on Judge Axolotl to disqualify himself for showing bias in the case. Judge Axolotl refused to step aside, and closed the trial. In support of his closure, the judge issued the finding below.

Felicity Wilkerson, a reporter for the Missoula Independent, wrote a story quoting the judge's remark that she had heard in open court. She also noted the judge was up for re-election that November. From an interview later that day, she quoted Judge Axolotl as saying the remark didn't truly reflect his personal feeling; he was just annoyed at the demonstrators and inadvertently repeated a phrase that had been widely circulated in "bar talk" in Missoula at the time.

Wilkerson and the Independent appealed Judge Axolotl's closure. The Montana Supreme Court affirmed the closure, but the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case and set the oral argument for May 2, 2006. Brodbeck agreed to waive his right to a speedy trial pending the appeal. Other major print and broadcast news media in the state have filed amicus curiae briefs in support of the Independent.

STATE OF MONTANA FOURTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT

State v. Brodbeck

ORDER

Although criminal trials in this state are presumptively open, the defendant's counsel in this case has submitted an affidavit that there is a substantial probability that harm may result to the defendant's constitutional rights if this trial remains open to the public. At least one radio station in this county has already poisoned the atmosphere of this trial. Moreover, the stigma of publicity attached to this defendant from public examination of his wrongful act may well outweigh the rehabilitative effect of any incarceration the court finds appropriate. Jurors may be subjected to intense personal scrutiny after the conclusion of this trial.

There is also the probability that harm may result to the minor child of the victims of the act for which this defendant may be tried as the result of undue publicity.

There are no reasonable alternatives to closure, in my estimation. However, only the first week of trial will be closed, enough to let passions simmer down. Therefore, in light of this finding, this trial shall be closed to the public until July 17, 2005.

July 10, 2005

Bernard O. Axolotl, Judge

Case 2. KAPO v. FCC

Citizens in Missoula and Hamilton filed a complaint against KAPO, arguing that the FCC's duty of regulating airwaves in the public interest mandated censure of the radio station and imposition of a forfeiture (a fine), if not revocation of its license, for its outrageous conduct in pressuring the prosecutors in the Brodbeck case. After investigation, the FCC staff recommends a $20,000 fine based on 1) the station's "apparent abandonment of its basic obligation to serve the community interest" and 2) a "blatant" violation of 18 USC 1464, the prohibition against broadcasting obscene, profane or indecent language. The FCC upheld the staff recommendation by a 4-1 vote, which decision was in turn upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case and arguments were set for May 2, 2006.

 

Group C represents the Independent in Case 1.

Groups E and G represent Judge Axolotl in Case 1.

Groups D and H represent KAPO in Case 2.

Group F represents the FCC in Case 2.

Briefs are due Tuesday, May 2 at the end of the argument.

Group A is the U.S. Supreme Court in Independent v. Axolotl.

Group B is the U.S. Supreme Court in KAPO v. FCC.

Opinions are due by 5 p.m., Tuesday, May 9. No exceptions.

 

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Cases for argument on Thursday, April 13

 

Gigi Armstrong, a junior in journalism at Montana College in Helena and a sports nut, is writing a piece “on spec” for a new online sports magazine, SportsBlog, whose server is actually in Canada and whose editor lives in Brazil. Armstrong is investigating possible basketball recruiting violations in the state and region.

Telling him that she’s a stringer for Sports Illustrated, she promises confidentiality to Kendall Roach, head coach of the basketball team at Montana College, a public four-year college, in exchange for information he says he has about recruiting practices in universities in Montana, Idaho and Washington. In truth, Armstrong has never been a stringer but once met a guy in a bar who said he was a stringer for S.I. and he told her all the usual lies.

Roach tells Armstrong many details about recruiting practices by competitors. When asked, Armstrong tells the SportsBlog editor her source’s name. He tells her to keep pursuing the story, which she’s glad to do, because she’s beginning to develop a crush on Coach Roach.

Coach Roach invites her over to talk at his house Tuesday, promising more “great stuff.” He tells Armstrong to go on through the house, saying that he’ll be in the back yard. Armstrong, who’s a little scatterbrained, goes Wednesday instead. She walks into Roach’s house and sees him in, shall we say, a compromising position with a player. She stumbles out of house, shocked, and tells a friend, who tells another friend and when the story gets to Athletic Director Ron Wright, he calls in Coach Roach. Roach denies everything, but before Wright launches a full-blown investigation, he decides to take one for the team and resign. He loses his $240,000 a year job—just as he was leading the team to the Big Dance.

After Roach’s firing, SportsBlog’s blockbuster expose on recruiting violations is published online and picked up nationwide on all sorts of news media. The story was written by a staff writer, using files from reporters and stringers including Armstrong.

A Lewis & Clark County grand jury is convened on the recruiting scandal on charges that include bribery, larceny and prostitution. Armstrong is called to tell what she knows, including names of her confidential sources. She refuses, citing the Montana shield law (MCA 26-2-901), the First Amendment and relevant cases. The judge threatens to hold her in contempt unless she testifies. The SportsBlog editor leans on her to testify, saying that he’s being pressured by his Canadian ISP to “do the right thing.” Armstrong disagrees, even when she gets an anonymous envelope containing $1,000 in cash—which she sees as a stupid attempt to bribe her. The judge holds Armstrong in contempt and hands her a 30-day jail sentence, which he suspends while she appeals to the state Supreme Court.

Oral arguments for the appeal are set for Thursday, April 13, 2006.

In the meantime, Armstrong has sued AD Wright and Montana College for release of investigatory and disciplinary records on Coach Roach. Armstrong says she wants to know the full story of why he resigned. Roach will no longer talk to her. Montana College and Wright cite Roach’s privacy rights in refusing to release any records relating to Roach. Armstrong sues. A trial court judge rules in favor of Montana College. Armstrong appeals to the Montana Supreme Court.

Oral arguments for the appeal are set for Thursday, April 13, 2006.

Representing Armstrong in District Court v. Armstrong: Groups E and H
Representing the judge: Group F
Montana Supreme Court in District Court v. Armstrong: Group C

Representing Armstrong in Armstrong v. Montana College and Wright: Group A
Representing Montana College and Wright: Groups B and G
Montana Supreme Court in Armstrong v. Montana College and Wright: Group D

All Briefs are due at class time on Thursday, April 13.
Opinions (groups C and D) are due at class time on Thursday, April 20.

 

 

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Cases for argument March 16, 2006

Vanessa Kingsley, an investigative reporter for the River City Reveille* in Missoula, attends a meeting of the state Board of Regents in Missoula. The agenda item she's particularly interested in is the appearance of President George Dennison, and Bob Rudinger, Vice-President for Administration and Finance, who have been summoned to explain yet another possible finance scandal at UM, this one involving the multi-million dollar contract with Coca-Cola. An unnamed university employee has accused two unnamed UM employees of accepting “large kickbacks,” evidently with enough proof to cause the Regents to question Dennison and Rudinger (who are not themselves suspects).

The regents grill these men about the contract and about how university finances are handled for more than an hour before breaking for lunch. The Regents close the afternoon hearing, citing “issues of personal privacy,” of certain employees. Kingsley's notebook is full from notes on the sometimes-heated discussion in the morning, but the most intriguing item is something that she heard during the lunch hour. She had gone over to the UC to grab a sandwich while the Regents dined in their meeting room in Main Hall. Hanging around the boardroom waiting for the lunch to conclude, she overheard behind the closed door a board member whose voice she recognized saying, "You know, there was obviously some hanky-panky going on. Looks to me like someone was on the take, except they’re no longer there. That's the person they need to go after!"

Kingsley's Reveille story the next morning recounts the Regents' meeting, and includes this paragraph:

"While the Regents, the Commissioner and the University itself were focused last year on an athletic budget that appeared to be out of control, they may also discover that certain individuals entrusted with public monies were also out of control. Indeed, there are some very clear indications that criminal conduct may have been involved, namely kickbacks from a large beverage company. Current and former UM employees will be questioned about the alleged kickbacks.”

While Kingsley is at her desk the next afternoon, a clerk brings her a manila envelope. Inside is a printout of an e-mail exchange between a manager in the UM finance office and Jerry Bancroft, the university’s well-known legal counsel. The message from the manager, dated the day before, says, "I don't know how much longer we can cover BT's tracks. We know he got all kinds of goodies from Coke. Look at that hummer he’s driving. You think someone on a university salary can afford that thing? Any good accountant is going to trap him at his tricks. 'Rich uncle' my ass. He thought he left in the nick of time, but I don't think so." The reply from Bancroft was, "IMHO, he always was a weasel."

Attached to the page is a sticky note saying, "Good story, Van. Thought you might be interested. I hacked this yesterday because I wanted to know what those bastards were saying among themselves. Mojo." Kingsley knows Mojo to be a former programmer and computer geek whose help she once sought in a story about local rotisserie baseball leagues on the Internet. She tries calling him on the cell number Mojo had given her at the time but the number has been disconnected.

In a follow-up story by Kingsley the next day, there is this paragraph:

“The university administration may be trying to cover up its knowledge of the kickbacks. E-mail messages between UM counsel Jerry Bancroft and a manager in the finance department, obtained by the Reveille, make this abundantly clear. Certain persons driving some very fancy wheels may have some explaining to do.”

In an editorial, the Reveille takes the university to task for its sloppy finances and notes:

“Who knew our public universities would not only start to price themselves out of the ballpark for many Montanans, but compound the problem with ham-handed money management—and possibly even worse, as a breeding ground for greed and avarice, allowing those who pass through to plunder and profit…”

In the months prior to the kickback allegations, three employees had left the UM finance department: William Taylor, the department's business manager, who received the University's staff member of the year award in 2004, is the president of the national Public University Business Managers Assn. (PUBMA) and is now business manager for Southgate Mall (he drives a 2005 Porsche 911 Carrera S Cabriolet); Robert T. Guest, who worked as an accountant in Rudinger’s office and now works as a CPA for a firm in town (he drives a 2006 Lexus) and Ben Thatcher, former UM director of marketing and promotion, who now manages Coca-Cola’s Inland Empire sales district and drives a 2006 Toyota Land Cruiser.

County attorney Fred Van Valkenburg calls in Taylor, Thatcher and Guest for questioning, a fact which does not escape Kingsley's eagle eye. Kingsley writes a brief item about the interviews after confirming with the men that they had been questioned.

Van Valkenburg won’t comment. The investigation drags on. He never files charges against anyone, because he is unable to find enough evidence of any kickbacks. The whistleblower’s “proof” turns out to be more assumptions and theories than facts. Nonetheless, Taylor believes that Kingsley and the Reveille have defamed him. He files a libel suit in state court against Kingsley and the Reveille.

Then Jerry Bancroft, the UM counsel, files an invasion of privacy suit against Kingsley and the Reveille. After depositions and interrogatories have concluded, counsel for the defendants files motions for summary judgment in both cases, being heard by Judge O.W. Holmes. They argue that, even if the facts are taken in the light most favorable to the plaintiffs, the plaintiffs have no case. The hearing on the motions for summary judgment is set for Thursday, March 16.

Case 1: Taylor v. Reveille and Kingsley (libel)

Representing William Taylor: Group D

Representing the Reveille: Group C

Representing Kingsley: Group G

Case 2: Bancroft v. Reveille and Kingsley (invasion of privacy)

Representing Jerry Bancroft: Groups B and H

Representing the Reveille and Kingsley: Group A

Because of the complexity of the issues, Judge O.W. Holmes has asked some knowledgeable media law students at the School of Journalism to help him sort out the issues, and each write a Memorandum of Opinion (like a draft opinion).

Writing memos for the judge in the libel case: Group F

Writing memos for the judge in the privacy case: Group E

Briefs for groups A, B, C, D, G and H are due at class time on March 16.

Memos to the judge (Groups E and F) are due at class time on Thursday, March 23.

* Reveille is pronounced REV- ah - lee

 

 

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Cases for argument on February 28, 2006

I. Al-Amein vs. United States.

Dani Al-Amein, 43, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of California at Berkeley, has been an outspoken supporter of Palestine for the past dozen years—so outspoken that he has become a highly controversial figure. Born in Lebanon of Palestinian parents, Dani was sent to the U.S. in 1979 to get a good education. He received a Ph.D. in electrical engineering at Wayne State University in Detroit in 1988, was hired as a lecturer by UC Berkeley the following year, and became a naturalized American citizen in 1990.

Al-Amein was considered a rising star in his field, but the problems of his native land began to attract more and more of his attention. With several other Palestinians in the Bay Area, Al-Amein set up organizations to raise money for Palestinian orphans and to sponsor scholarships for Palestinian students. They held conferences featuring Islamic speakers -- including some with radical connections and terrorist agendas. One was Omar Abdul Rahman, the so-called "blind sheik," later convicted in a 1993 plot to bomb New York City tunnels and the United Nations.

Al-Amein himself became more radical during the first Palestinian intifada in 1988-92. At Islamic conferences in American cities during the early 1990s, Al-Amein said, among other things: "We assemble today to stand up and pay our respects to the march of the martyrs . . . and to the river of blood that gushes forth and does not extinguish. From butchery to butchery and from martyrdom to martyrdom, from jihad to jihad . . . this is the sweetness of Islam, and the taste of faith." Clad in the flowing robes of an imam, stabbing a finger angrily toward his audience, he shouted in Arabic: "Let us damn America, let us damn Israel. Let us damn their allies until death." In another speech, he said, "The Koran is our constitution. Victory to Islam, death to Israel! Revolution! Revolution! Until victory!"

In explanation, Al-Amein said "Death to Israel" really meant "death to occupation" and "death to oppression," but not death to individual Jews, although he added that Israel is a "racist, apartheid state" that "has no moral or legal right to exist." On terrorism, he was quoted in one newspaper interview as saying, "I do not support that. I said that over and over again . . .. Morally, religiously, Islam is against the killing of any civilian, of any mother, of any father, of any ethnicity, and I do not support, you know, Palestinians being killed by the Israeli army."

Still, Al-Amein’s statements were enough to cause the FBI to raid the professor's home and office, seeking evidence that he did more than just speak out, that he in fact raised money as a front man for terrorist groups -- specifically, the Pan-Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Hamas -- that unleashed suicide bombers against Israelis. The FBI seized hundreds of documents and videos connected to Al-Amein’s organizations. The feds followed money trails and tapped phones. A federal grand jury, however, failed to return an indictment against him. Nonetheless, Al-Amein shut down his charitable organizations after President Clinton issued an executive order prohibiting the kinds of financial transactions the professor appears to have been conducting.

Six years later, after September 11, 2001, the government began to take another look at Al-Amein and his activities. Further investigation uncovered evidence that convinced a second grand jury to indict Al-Amein and five others in February 2002. The 30-count indictment charged Al-Amein with supporting, financing and relaying messages for the PIJ, designated by the United States as a terrorist organization. The PIJ, it noted, has been blamed for the deaths of more than 100 people in and around Israel, including 2 U.S. citizens in 1996 and 1999. The group's purpose, prosecutors allege, is to destroy Israel and end all Western influence in the region. Al-Amein transferred money from his bank account to pay families of Palestinian suicide bombers, the indictment charged.

Said Attorney General John Ashcroft, "Our message to them and to others like them is clear: We make no distinction between those who carry out terrorist attacks and those who knowingly finance, manage or supervise terrorist organizations."

At trial in the summer of 2002, the question was whether this harmless looking, bald, middle-aged academic, the father of seven children, was a financier, organizer and messenger for a dangerous terrorist organization. At trial, Al-Amein not only denied these charges, but also raised a First Amendment defense, that his words and actions on behalf of Palestine were essentially acts of expression and association, protected by the First Amendment. Nothing he said or did, Al-Amein’s lawyers argued, rose to the Brandenburg standard.

On Sept 11, 2002, a jury in federal district court in Oakland, Calif., found Al-Amein and the other defendants guilty of 19 of the 30 counts in the indictment. The judge sentenced Al-Amein to 20 years in prison. On appeal, however, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in December 2004 reversed Al-Amein’s conviction, declaring that the First Amendment protected his speech and financing activities. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to take the case, and set arguments for February 28, 2006.

Groups A and C: Your job is to represent Dani Al-Amein.
Group B: Your job is to represent the United States.
Your individual briefs are due at the time of the arguments on February 28.
See “Guideline for Briefs” below.

II. Masada Times v. United States

The Masada Times, a weekly newspaper published in Brooklyn with a circulation of 65,000 copies, has been the international voice of ultra-right-wing Israelis since it was founded by Rabbi Meir Kahane in 1980. Kahane, who later became a member of the Israeli Parliament, called for the "extermination" of non-Jews in Israel and the occupied territories. In 1995, a member of Kahane’s Kach party assassinated former Israel prime minister Yitzhak Rabin for signing the Oslo Accords with the Palestine Liberation Organisation. Kahane himself was assassinated in 2000 in Israel in a drive-by shooting. Since the beginning of the intifada five years ago, extremists affiliated with Kach have killed and injured hundreds of Palestinian civilians. Kach had been declared a "terrorist group" by both Israel and the United States.

Deeply alarmed by the election of Hamas in recent Palestinian elections, which it calls “a terrorist organization with the blood of Jews all over it,” and by the continuing development of nuclear power in Iran, which it calls “a direct threat to the future of Israel,” the Masada Times announces that it will publish a cartoon story—a 96-panel strip in the style of a graphic novel—purporting to tell the “true story” of Israel’s and the United States’ secret bio-chemical weapons development. The cartoon story, drawn by an Egyptian artist, has been floating around the Internet, linked to by blogs, but has never been printed before.

The Masada Times urges the Israeli government to “unleash atomic and bio-chemical weapons on those who would destroy it before it is too late.” The Times says the cartoon story will offer “irrefutable evidence that Israel has bio-chemical weapons ready to deploy” and that “such weapons were developed from research conducted in the United States…” and that “the only thing holding Israel back from deploying these weapons to defend itself is the weak backbones of its current so-called leaders.”

The United States applies for a temporary restraining order against the Masada Times, arguing that the national security interests of the United States would be "fatally compromised" and that the nation would suffer immediate, direct and irreparable harm if such a story were to be published. The government argues that the common law of prior restraint, with precedents such as Near v. Minnesota, the Pentagon Papers case and the Progressive case, demonstrate that national security interests can trump the right of the press.

A federal judge in Brooklyn issues a temporary restraining order (TRO) and then a preliminary injunction on Feb. 14; a federal appeals court affirms the actions on Feb. 18 and the U.S. Supreme Court agrees to hear the case on February 28, 2006.

Group E: Your job is to represent The Masada Times.
Groups D and F: Your job is to represent the United States.
Your briefs are due at the time of the arguments on February 28.
Group G will be the Supreme Court for the incitement case.
Group H will be the Supreme Court for the prior restraint case.
Your individual opinions on your respective cases will be due on Tuesday, March 7, at class time.
See Guideline for Briefs below. An opinion is very similar in structure.

 

 

 

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DEBATE

Tuesday, Feb. 7,  2006

 

When Ryan Lake converted to Islam as a senior in high school in Boulder, Mont., in 1999, his parents accompanied him to a mosque in Denver and his principal gave him a diversity award and praised his peaceful nature at the school’s graduation ceremony. Lake decided to attend the University of Montana, starting in the fall of 2001. As a sophomore majoring in computer science, he witnessed the fall of the Twin Towers on Sept. 11, 2001, then suddenly left campus before Christmas. In January 2002 he surfaced in Pakistan under the name Abdullah Abdid and soon thereafter began to publish a blog. Among the statements he published between 2001 and 2005, (some his, some others’) on his website were these:

 

“But who is Osama bin Laden really? Let me rephrase that. What is Osama bin Laden? He's America's family secret. He is the American president's dark doppelganger. The savage twin of all that purports to be beautiful and civilised. He has been sculpted from the spare rib of a world laid to waste by America's foreign policy: its gunboat diplomacy, its nuclear arsenal, its vulgarly stated policy of full-spectrum dominance', its chilling disregard for non-American lives, its barbarous military interventions, its support for despotic and dictatorial regimes, its merciless economic agenda that has munched through the economies of poor countries like a cloud of locusts. Its marauding multinationals who are taking over the air we breathe, the ground we stand on, the water we drink, the thoughts we think.”

“The September 11 attacks were a monstrous calling card from a world gone horribly wrong. The message may have been written by Bin Laden (who knows?) and delivered by his couriers, but it could well have been signed by the ghosts of the victims of America's old wars. The millions killed in Korea, Vietnam and Cambodia, the 17,500 killed when Israel backed by the US invaded Lebanon in 1982, the 200,000 Iraqis killed in Operation Desert Storm, the thousands of Palestinians who have died fighting Israel's occupation of the West Bank. And the millions who died, in Yugoslavia, Somalia, Haiti, Chile, Nicaragua, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Panama, at the hands of all the terrorists, dictators and genocidists whom the American government supported, trained, bankrolled and supplied with arms. And this is far from being a comprehensive list.”

 “Professor Ward Churchill is one of my few American heroes. In a 2002 essay, "Some  People Push Back: On the Justice of Roosting Chickens,"  Churchill expressed his opinion that Al Qaeda was “pushing back” against  decades of American aggression and genocide, that workers in the Twin Towers were not entirely innocent because many of them, whom he called “little Eichmanns, ”worked for the banking industry that had helped finance economic sanctions against Saddam Hussein that resulted in the deaths of thousands of Iraqi children. Among other things that he expressed in his remarkable essay, Churchill said that the attacks on Sept. 11 were "a natural and inevitable consequence of what happens as a result of business as usual in the United States.” [Churchill was the chairman of the Ethnic Studies Department at the University of Colorado. His resignation in January 2005 from his job as department chair was connected to the flap raised by his writings after Sept. 11, 2001].

 

“When the U.S. government targets civilians with the intention of pressuring their governments, yes, it is engaging in terrorism. Regrettably, this is not uncommon in our history. Most recently, imposing a food and drug embargo on a country - Iraq - with the intention of making conditions so difficult for the population that they will rebel against their government, is terrorism (with food and medicine as the weapons, not bombs). Bombing civilian centers and the society's public infrastructure in Kosovo and Serbia, again with the intent of coercing political outcomes, was terrorism. And now, attacking Afghanistan (one of the world's poorest countries) and hugely aggravating starvation dangers for its population with the possible loss of tens of thousands, or more lives, is terrorism.”

 

“If Muslims do not take up their duty, it will be shameful. This battle is a decisive battle between atheism and faith. The American interests are everywhere all over the world. Every Muslim has to play his real and true role to uphold his religion and his nation in fighting, and jihad is a duty. This is the crusade that Bush has promised us, coming against the Islamic nations. We are living under this bombardment from the crusade, which is also targeting all Islamic peoples. The Islamic nations must take up their response and in the end I thank God for allowing us to start this jihad and ask God to give us victory in the face of our enemy and return them defeated."

 

As a U.S. citizen, Lake was permitted to return to the United States. However, the U.S. Attorney is seeking a grand jury indictment against Lake on charges that Lake committed seditious conspiracy contrary to the laws of the United States. Meantime, Lake is on a speaking tour arranged by the publisher of his recently published book, “Montana Jihad.”

 

 Last week, the president of Mills College in Oakland, Calif., a private college, revoked the college's invitation to Lake to speak, citing “credible threats of violence” if he were allowed to speak on campus. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger told a dinner banquet that there was "a difference  between freedom of speech and inviting a bigoted terrorist supporter."

 

 Now, it looks like Ryan Lake is headed back to Missoula, having been invited to speak by the UM Philosophy Department and the Jeannette Rankin Peace Center. Already, some people have voiced their concern and anger. President Dennison has called an unusual public meeting on Feb. 7 to let people speak their minds.

 

 

 Here’s where you come in. We are going to recreate this meeting. Half of you (Groups A-D) want no part of Lake and do not want him to speak on campus. The other half (Groups E-H) favor letting him speak.  Whatever half you are assigned to, you may adopt any persona you wish—university student, regent, faculty member, UM administrator or town citizen—and fashion your argument accordingly. You may even dress the part if you wish. You are free to do more reading if you wish. Although the line of cases we will be studying in the week after the debate has some bearing on this case, this is really more of a policy debate than a legal debate. What are the limits of community tolerance for speakers with extremely unpopular, even hateful, viewpoints?

 

 

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