Equality (Vera Speaking)
				Source		MAIN PATH: John
			John			Malik

I think we should be more flexible in the way we interpret the Fourteenth Amendment. Remember that the First Amendment doctrine that you are relying on is entirely a 20^th century development. It was the flexibility of the Supreme Court that gave us the new doctrine of free speech. The court could show the same flexibility with regard to the Fourteenth Amendment.

But perhaps you are right that the Fourteenth Amendment was never intended to guarantee much in the way of substantive equality. Perhaps that is how the amendment is most likely to be interpreted at present. If we make these assumptions, my position is that we should modify the fourteenth amendment to guarantee a range of substantive equality rights and to allow us to ban hate speech.

You may think this is unrealistic, but you might be mistaken. The best model here is Canada. In 1982 Canada adopted a new Charter of Rights and Freedoms that contained what Kathleen Mahoney has called a "comprehensive set of equality rights." The Canadian Supreme Court went on to decide some very important cases the required it to balance the freedom of expression against guarantees to equality. This is exactly what we should be doing here in the United States. If it requires a constitutional amendment, then so be it.

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