In cases such as
Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, ,
New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, ,
R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul (1992) and others, the Supreme Court has addressed various areas of controversial speech. The Court has frequently sided with the speakers, but occasionally the Court has sided with the government and acknowledged its (limited) power to pass laws protecting citizens from specific types of harmful speech.
Virginia's cross burning ban In 1952, the
Virginia Legislature passed a law banning the wearing of masks in public and
cross burning after members of the
Ku Klux Klan Bill Hendricks of Florida and Thomas Hamilton of South Carolina announced plans to hold rallies in the state. Governor
John Battle signed the bill into law in that April. In December 1966, Governor
Mills Godwin announced a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of cross burners and in response the Ku Klux Klan burned a cross in front of the
Executive Mansion. A slew of cross burnings across the state followed. In 1967, Wilson Ralph Price and Nanny Jane Price were arrested and convicted for burning a cross on a public sidewalk in
Richmond, but the
Virginia Supreme Court overturned their conviction the next year finding the ban did not apply to public property because the statutes language limited it to the cross burnings "on the property of another." In 1968, the Virginia Legislature amended the state law to apply to public property and included a section that specified "the unlawful burning of a cross shall be
prima facie evidence of the intention to intimidate a person or group of persons."
Arrests and convictions Three defendants were found guilty of violating Virginia's anti-
cross burning statute. The cases were combined upon appeal and reached the
U.S. Supreme Court during the Fall 2002 session.
Barry Black On August 22, 1998, Barry Black held a
Ku Klux Klan rally on private property and with the consent of the owner in
Cana, Virginia, located in rural
Carroll County. A neighbor and the county sheriff witnessed the event and heard attendees make many negative comments concerning black people. During the rally Black lit a cross, was arrested, and charged with violating the state's ban on cross burnings. In June 1999, Black, who was represented by an African American
American Civil Liberties Union attorney named David Baugh, was found guilty by an all-white jury after 25 minutes of deliberations and sentenced to a $2,500 fine. Black appealed and in December 2000 the
Virginia Court of Appeals affirmed his conviction. In 2001, the
Supreme Court of Virginia found that the cross burning statute was unconstitutional and overturned Black's conviction. == Decision ==