And while I do feel that some speech does cross the line, I agree with Supreme Court Justice Holmes that the line resembles “crying fire in a crowded theatre”–meaning that there is a close link between the words and violence such as inciting a lynch mob. Trying to define, much less censor, ‘hate speech’ is an almost impossible task. Virtually every time Senator Edward Kennedy makes a major speech it is, by my lights, a ‘hate speech’ against some group, generally harmless religious folk, hard-working white men, or blacks who don’t toe the liberal party line.

I also agree with the old adage, “Keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer.” Placing few limits on speech, as the U.S. does, is far wiser in the long run. It makes it easier for the rest of us to “keep our enemies closer” by following who is saying what–much easier than if that sort of speech were driven underground. It also forces us to counter what they’re saying with the truth rather than with a censorship that only lends it the attraction of the illicit.

Do we really want to persecute the twits who believe Holocaust denial trash like the Europeans do? I watched one of their foul videos on Seattle’s wide-open cable channel. Persecution only reinforces their belief in a vast Jewish conspiracy. And if we silence them, shouldn’t we do something about the NY Times, which won a Pulitzer for the work of a reporter who denied Stalin’s killing of some five million Ukranians in the early 1930s? And how about all the hatred spewed out by 9/11 conspiracists? I talked to one on the bus just a few days ago. Scary, irrational stuff of the sort that inspires hate with much of it being streamed over the Internet. Even more telling, why aren’t these European governments going after anyone promoting the ‘class hatred’ of Marxism and communism? Those ideas killed far more people than Nazism.

No, in this I’d say the United States has it right and Europe has it wrong. TV broadcasting should be licensed only because it takes up a major chunk of the publicly owned radio spectrum and that requires that a broadcaster act in the public interest. The Internet has no such limits and shouldn’t require a license, permits or any such thing.

Don’t forget that it’s long been the European pattern to “maintain order” by licensing printing presses and keeping broadcasting a state monopoly. Three days after Hitler took power, Goering was able to silence Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was giving a radio speech critical of the “Fuhrer Principle.” That sort of thing could conceivably happen here, but it would take a lot longer than three days to put the regulatory machinery into place. In today’s evolving EU, similar restrictions could be applied within hours. Internet video licenses would tell them precisely who to target.

–Michael W. Perry, editor of The School of Journalism by Joseph Pulitzer.