Flag Desecration Case Study

Gregory Lee Johnson burned an American flag to protest against Reagan administration policies. He was tried and convicted under a texas law outlawing flag desecration. He was fined for $2,000 and a full year in jail. It was later reversed and sent to the supreme court for the new sentencing of the case. The question for this case should of been is this action a denial of Johnson's first amendment right or is it a criminal offense? When it was sent to the supreme court they decided he was indeed protected by his first amendment right. Which in my personal opinion they were 100 percent correct in this decision. He did this to make a political statement and in doing so he decided to burn a flag. The supreme court also reached that conclusion that it was burnt for political reasons and that the fact that an audience takes offense to something does not justify prohibitions of speech. They also said no state can make a law that goes against your first amendment right based on a certain …show more content…
I can understand the fact that this was probably a huge controversy during this time. Honestly though they should of looked at it as a symbolic freedom of speech. It should never have even gone as far as it did but I guess without this case these rules may have never been made. I think if we look at this case and then compare it to what we see in today's society I think many americans are against burning of the flag today still but I do believe it occurs much more often now than back then. I do believe it was important in that the rule was made that you can’t make a law to make sure a certain object or action desecration illegal. I think if we did there would be a much larger amount of arrests and protests because of not only those laws but because of the arrests that occurred over the law. I like to think of it as if you tell someone not to do something more than likely they are going to try it at least once when given the

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Flag Desecration Case Study

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