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More than half a million people, including hundreds from Lancaster County, took part Saturday in the Womens March on Washington. Millions more participated in so-called sister marches across the United States including here in Lancaster city and in some 80 countries around the world. The marches were spurred by concerns over how President Donald Trumps agenda might impact women.

We will leave to others the arguments over whether the Womens March on Washington and the sister marches were necessary, inclusive or productive.

Will this be a one-time thing or, with the march organizers promise of action over 100 days, the beginning of a movement a kind of tea party for progressives in the age of Trump?

Whether you marched here or in the nations capital, whether you were appalled or thrilled by the marches, we invite your thoughts on these questions via letters to the editor.

For now, a couple of things seem to us to be clear.

The marches were a vivid reminder of how fortunate we are to live in a country in which the very first amendment to the Constitution enshrined freedom of speech and the freedom to peaceably assemble.

You may have disagreed with the content of that speech and the reasons for those assemblies, but thats another great thing about America: Were allowed to hold different opinions and to express them.

Its not always easy to live with one another when were noisily expressing different points of view. But the Founding Fathers deemed freedom of expression to be essential. Without freedom of thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom; and no such thing as public liberty, without freedom of speech, Benjamin Franklin wrote.

Another thing seems clear today: Aside from Madonna and her expletive-laced remarks (did anyone expect anything else from the desperately seeking headlines singer?), the marches were well-organized and incredibly well-attended.

Just as Trumps election held a message for Democratic leaders, Saturdays marches held a message for Republican leaders, Trump included. Democrats, Republicans, theyd all do well to listen.

The larger-than-anticipated marches might have led to mayhem, but there were no arrests made in connection with the D.C. march. Or in Los Angeles, where more than half a million people marched. Or in New York City, where some 400,000 marched. Or in Lancaster city, where hundreds of people packed the northeast quadrant of Penn Square.

Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich penned the line, Well-behaved women seldom make history, but Saturdays marches were nothing if not well-behaved.

Maybe it was because women were in charge (that also worked out pretty well for the Trump presidential campaign). Maybe it was because the police kept the riot gear stowed. Maybe it was because there were a great many mothers and grandmothers in attendance, and who steps out of line when theyre around? Were just glad the marches were peaceful.

At both the inauguration Friday and the Womens March on Washington on Saturday, people stacked trash as near as possible to the full trash cans, making the job of the cleanup crew easier, National Park Service spokespeople told news organizations.

So, even in this divided country of ours, it appears that both Trump supporters and feminist marchers have neatness in common.

Its not much, but its something.

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Agree or disagree with the women marchers' cause, but the First Amendment is a great thing - LancasterOnline

We are here, and we will be heard, said Warren Murphy, one of several speakers Saturday at the Wyoming Women and Allies March Park County.

He called for protecting the dignity of women, ethnic minorities and those with disabilities.

Lets become the solid nation we all want, he said.

The gathering was organized in part to support the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that guarantees freedom of speech and assembly, said Christine Garceau of Powell. The amendment ensures a marketplace of ideas, facilitates majority rule and consensus, and provides a means to participate and deliberate.

Its imperative that people protect their rights, said Amy McKinney, a professor of history at Northwest College in Powell. In the past, women couldnt control their paychecks or vote and faced discrimination in the work place.

Now women can run in the Boston Marathon and serve on juries and apply for credit in their own names, she said. Now they cant be fired for being pregnant

A womens right to vote is enshrined in the Wyoming Constitution, along with another significant value public education as a basic right, two firsts among the states, said Steve Thulin, also a history professor at NWC. Education preserves the republic and advances democracy, he added.

Our children are the future, he said.

Many children of the past came from families who immigrated here from foreign lands, creating a diversity that formed this country, said Mary Ellen Ibarra-Robinson of Powell. They were seeking better lives, as todays immigrants do.

Lets acknowledge that all individuals in our country are due the opportunity to live in peace with the hope of achieving their dreams, she said.

The developmentally disabled should also be able to reach their dreams, said Marion Morrison of Powell. They learn differently, cope with life differently, and deserve a chance to continue learning after 21.

They need our support and voice so they can blossom and enrich our lives with their gifts, she said.

All people deserve access to medical services, said Valerie Lengfelder of Powell. She noted that 20 million citizens gained coverage through the Affordable Care Act, which may not be perfect, but is a start, in her opinion. If its repealed, there should be a simultaneous replacement program.

One reason Im marching is for universal health coverage for all, she said.

The urgency of dealing with climate change was addressed by Lynn Horton of Powell. She cited carbon dioxide at record high levels and 2016 as the hottest year on record. Locally, the effects are seen in receding glaciers and devastated forests. Globally, the impacts will hit the minorities and the poor hardest.

Climate change is our nations greatest security threat, Horton said.

Buzzy Hassrick

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Preserving First Amendment rights motivates marchers - Cody Enterprise

If UW President Ana Mari Cauce were to disinvite Milo Yiannopoulos, the provocative editor at the conservative news site Breitbart, she would subject the university to legal liability for abridging First Amendment rights.

IN 1997, Eleanor Holmes Norton stated: You seldom get to defend the First Amendment by defending people you like You dont know whether the First Amendment is alive and well until it is tested by people with despicable ideas.

Both the character of the speaker and the content of her message speak to the controversy surrounding the scheduled arrival of Milo Yiannopoulos to the University of Washington on Friday. Yiannopoulos is the provocative British journalist and Breitbart editor who incenses many with his abrasive attacks (sometimes personal and cruel) on liberals and the PC-culture.

Norton, a woman of color and a Democrat, represents the District of Columbia in Congress. She is a person with a long and honorable history of commitment to the struggle for racial and gender justice. When lives were on the line in 1964, she ventured off to Mississippi for the Freedom Summer to register African-American voters. The young activist also worked with the likes of Medgar Evers, the civil rights activist who was murdered. And in the 1970s and thereafter, Holmes was a key figure in the campaign for womens rights.

Ronald K.L. Collins is the Harold S. Shefelman Scholar at the University of Washington School of Law where he specializes in constitutional and First Amendment law.

It is against that backdrop that her words take on special meaning. It is against that backdrop that her willingness to defend the free-speech principle in supporting the rights of segregationists to speak (and she did just that!) demands our attention and respect.

Let us be clear: Hate speech is abhorrent; it is an affront to the dignity of every person and to all persons. But that said, let us not speak falsely: It is also protected under the First Amendment. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall affirmed that idea in 1969 when he signed onto the courts unanimous opinion in Brandenburg v. Ohio (upholding the rights of KKK members to engage in racist expression). Justice William Brennan, a stalwart defender of equal justice, agreed with that idea when in 1977 he signed onto the courts opinion in National Socialist Party of America v. Village of Skokie. And in 1992, liberals and conservatives alike voted unanimously to affirm the right to engage in race-hate speech in R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul (the ACLU defended the First Amendment right).

Of course, hate speech plus certain forms of conduct can and should be punished. For example, hate speech that is tantamount to a true threat, as defined by the Supreme Court, is not protected. Washington law tracks this prohibition against threats by way of our malicious harassment statute and likewise criminalizes injury to person or property if done with animus based on race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or with reference to other specified groups. Fighting words and incitement intended to and likely to produce imminent illegal conduct, again all properly defined, can also be regulated.

For UW President Ana Mari Cauce to dismiss the law and disinvite Yiannopoulos would subject the university to legal liability for abridging First Amendment rights.

Equally important, such rash action would contravene the long-held principle of our democracy that all ideas are entitled to have their say in order that they might be tested and even rejected. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis put it well in a 1927 opinion: Believing in the power of reason as applied through public discussion, [our founders] eschewed silence coerced by law If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence.

Today, some progressives celebrate the silencing of Yiannopoulos at the UC Davis campus his event last Friday was canceled after rowdy protesters created an unsafe environment for students. So, too, some now call on President Cauce to disinvite him. By that measure, conservative students, who are firmly opposed to abortion, should be able to act in kind i.e., to call on Cauce to disinvite Planned Parenthoods Cecile Richards should she be asked to speak by some progressive students group.

As the late Nat Hentoff once declared, free speech for me but not for thee is anathema to our system of constitutional government. It turns our freedom on its head.

Let us learn from Nortons example: Confront injustice, speak out against bigotry, protest peacefully, and use the First Amendment to make the case for an America that takes its cue from our collective humanity rather than from the divisive invectives of a flamboyant British provocateur.

Information in this article, originally published Jan. 19, 2017 was corrected Jan. 20, 2017. A previous version of this story incorrectly misidentified Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards as Cecile Roberts.

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Hate speech is vile and protected - The Seattle Times

Back before the Internet made it so easy to find a celebritys age, a 29-year-old actress landed the role of a 17-year-old girl and helped propel Beverly Hills 90210 into a hit TV show in the 1990s.

That was the story actress Gabrielle Carteris told state lawmakers last year as she lobbied for a bill to strip actors ages from commercial websites used in casting. Now the president of the Screen Actors Guild, Carteris said she would never have been able to land the career-making role today because of websites like IMDb.com that publish actors ages.

In response, lawmakers sweeping aside First Amendment concerns that the government doesnt have the right to keep anyone from publishing information such as a birth date approved AB1687, and Gov. Jerry Brown signed it into law.

That law is now being challenged in federal court with a lawsuit that says it amounts to unconstitutional censorship. Its one of a handful of policies to come out of the Democratic-controlled Legislature that limit unfettered speech some of them prompted by pressure from liberal allies such as the actors labor union and Planned Parenthood. And when the state has to defend them, taxpayers wind up footing the bill.

The government tries to restrict speech in order to serve whatever it sees as important goals, said Eugene Volokh, a law professor at UCLA, one of several First Amendment scholars who signed an amicus brief supporting IMDb.com in its suit against the state over AB1687. Usually free speech prevails, even against worthy government goals.

In this case, the worthy goal was the Legislatures desire to shield actors from being discriminated against as they age. AB1687 author Assemblyman Ian Calderon, D-Whittier (Los Angeles County), said his bill does that without violating the Constitution.

The Legislature isnt looking to censor anyone or anything just because we think we can, he said. Its about protecting an industry that is large in this state, that is homegrown to this state, and the folks that work within it.

A different case Volokh litigated last year, on behalf of a gun rights group called the Firearms Policy Coalition, challenged the Assemblys long-standing rule that prohibits rebroadcasting public video footage of its proceedings for any political or commercial purpose. The firearms group wanted to use government video clips in political ads and argued that the prohibition infringed on its right to free speech.

The Legislature defended the rule, saying it was meant to keep lawmakers from grandstanding. A federal court judge ripped that argument apart in a sharply worded injunction that said the Assemblys rule violated the First Amendment.

One persons grandstanding is anothers passionate debate. In other words, grandstanding is simply speech by another name, said U.S. District Judge Morrison England. The states interest in preventing such speech is far from compelling.

The Legislature then passed a new law repealing the prohibition on rebroadcasting public video footage.

First Amendment concerns were also raised last year as the Legislature debated a bill inspired by the revelation of secretly recorded videos of a Planned Parenthood executive. State law already forbids secret recordings; the bill made it an additional crime to distribute a confidential communication with a health care provider.

Lobbyists for the news media feared the bill would inhibit a free press. Publishers and other First Amendment advocates successfully lobbied for amendments that prevent news organizations from being prosecuted for distributing undercover videos they did not record.

Still, legislative staffers flagged the potential for a lawsuit in their analysis of the bill, writing that there could be potentially significant future costs for litigation to the extent the provisions of this measure face constitutional challenges under the First Amendment. Nonetheless, the bill was approved and signed into law in September.

Its impossible to know exactly how much First Amendment legal challenges cost the state, because they are handled by the attorney generals office as part of its overall case load. Free speech advocates in Sacramento expect debates to continue as the media landscape shifts with the evolution of technology.

The Internet is a Wild West of free speech issues, said Nikki Moore, a lawyer for the California Newspaper Publishers Association. I dont expect this to be a dying trend.

Case in point: Democratic lawmakers have already proposed two new bills inspired by the fake news phenomenon that emerged during presidential campaign. The bills, AB155 and SB135, call on education officials to craft lessons teaching students to discern which online news stories are trustworthy.

Free speech advocates will be watching to see if Democrats response to the latest liberal cause celebre escalates into a constitutional violation.

Laurel Rosenhall is a reporter for CALmattters.org, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.

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Legislature runs afoul of First Amendment advocates - San Francisco Chronicle

Complete silence engulfs the back room of a West Loop bookstore as the crowd listens with rapt attention to T Clutch Fleischmann read House With Door, a monologue about an encounter with a little boy on the street. The boy finds a commonality between the two after questioning the writers gender identity, by shouting: Hey! I live in a house with a door!

Hey, me too! Fleischmann replied.

And we both laughed and then it was over, I was down the block, read Fleischmann, whose writing focuses on transgender issues.

Poet T Clutch Fleischmann shares a piece they wrote post about gender identity and striving for commonality among differences at Open Books in the West Loop Jan. 15.

The words roll over the audience in swift, rhythmic waves that capture the rooms energy.

Fleischmann is one of more than 75 authors who participated in the local chapter of the worldwide Writers Resist movements Jan. 15 re-inauguration of compassion, equality, free speech and fundamental democratic ideals in the wake of a Donald Trump presidency and a new political era.

The Writers Resist movement which started in New York City after the election and spread to 50 cities around the globe in just three monthshighlights the fears and disbelief of writers, journalists, nonprofit organizations and activists since Trumps election in November. The movement is attempting to take hopelessness and anger and transform them into a call to action against the threats Trump represents to freedom of speech, the First Amendment and human rights of marginalized groups, leaders say.

Trump publicly harassed a disabled New York Times reporter during his campaign, seen in video footage and subsequently reported by multiple news organizations such as the Washington Post; however, in a Nov. 26 Post article, Trump said he did not intend to mock the reporter but rather the reporters confusion. This sort of routine denial from Trump has been described as gaslighting, from the 1944 movie about a man who tried to drive his wife crazy by denying the obvious and creating his own reality.

Trump has been outspoken about his contempt for the press, refusing to call on CNN reporter Jim Acosta during his first official press conference Jan. 11 and denouncing the news organization as fake news.

Later, Trumps spokesperson Sean Spicer threatened to have the reporter ejected from the conference if he tried to ask more questions, according to a CNN story from the same day.

Reince Priebus, the incoming White House chief of staff, also suggested changes to daily press briefings that would alter the traditional relationship between the press and The White House, according to his Dec. 14 interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt.

In a country that historically values and supports free speech, many writers and artists are defending democracy through marches and protests, public artwork and writing events. Some believe a call to action is neededaction that has a lasting impact on the Trump presidency, according to Brian Kornell, one of the organizers of Chicagos Writers Resist.

Brian Kornell, one of the organizers of the local chapter event for Writers Resist, shared his opening remarks at Open Books in the West Loop Jan. 15.

Kornell remembers how tough it was to get through Nov. 9, the day after the election. Like many around the country and the world, Kornell said he felt downtrodden and hopeless, but seeing protesters out on the streets of Chicago reminded him that he was not alone, and using artistic expression to resist the new president was crucial.

Historically, writers have been the ones to reflect what is happening in society, Kornell said. The bigotry that feels like is taking hold or has given a place to exist [forced me] to speak up as a writer, as a citizen. [Writers Resist] is the way for me to feel like I am taking some action to help.

Kornell, who writes nonfiction and is assistant editor of online literary publication The Rumpus, said the movement is not necessarily meant to focus on Trump and his disrespectful rhetoric but to empower creatives to band together and remain positive in unpredictable times.

Writers Resist Chicago has managed to do exactly that, bringing together successful writers with diverse backgrounds and experiences into a unified voice for freedom of the pen. Writers Resist, which held seven events across Chicago Jan. 15 with a central reading event at West Loops Open Books, 651 W. Lake St., had support from Planned Parenthood of Illinois, Center on Halsted and the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois.

Rachel Murphy, an organizer for the ACLU of Illinois, said the nonprofit has 30,000 members statewide. Of those, one third have joined since the election, which is indicative of the fear Trump has aroused, Murphy noted.

Murphy said the ACLU is concerned about government encroachment in five areas: womens reproductive rights, LGBT rights, policing, national security and surveillance, and immigration and refugees. The ACLU plans to work locally and make sure marginalized communities, which she said are under attack from Trump, have their voices heard.

Womens reproductive rights and abortion might face the greatest threat after years of battles in court and the legislature, Murphy added.

In the last five years, we have seen an onslaught of anti-access in legislation in an attempt to undermine the fundamental right to choose, established in Roe v. Wade, Murphy said.

Organizations around the country are joining in, such as PEN America, which unites writers and defends their self-expression. Dubbed the flagship sponsor of the Writers Resist movement, PEN is an outspoken proponent of First Amendment freedoms. Even inadvertent violations, unlike the deliberate ones of the Trump administration, sound alarms for writers and artists, said Sarah Edkins, deputy director for Communications at PEN America in New York. PEN America is part of the PEN Charter, which spans more than 100 countries worldwide.

When we see those early warning signs of infringement on the First Amendment, that really gives writers pause and makes them feel a great deal of concern, Edkins said. As more and more rights are potentially taken away and infringed uponas they are more at risk and surveilledoftentimes that can stifle [creativity].

Some also see this as a fertile time for creative voices and the generation of big and crazy ideas that result in some of the best literature and art, Edkins said. This also applies to journalists, whom Trump has demonized and has ominously opined about the possible expansion of libel laws, she added.

Edkins said the most basic and important action is to speak up about these concerns and not lose hope.

Keep this constant dialogue, constant pressure, constant reminder of how important these rights are within our community, but also expand that conversation to happen within a larger community, she said.

Throughout her career, journalist and writer Michele Weldon has used her work to start discussions about controversial topics within the worlds largest community: the internet. An outspoken feminist who frequently writes about the medias portrayal of gender and women and has written five nonfiction books, Weldon said her feminist commentaries have attracted threats of violence and rape. But that will not silence her, especially when the incoming president has shown a fundamental disrespect toward women, she said.

Weldon may have even predicted Trumps ascendancy in her work. In her 2008 book, Everyman News: The Changing American Front Page, she discusses the dangers of unvetted sources and citizen journalism as the 21st century witnesses a changing media landscape. In her chapter Chicken Little Journalism, which she read from on Jan. 15 at a Chicago Writers Resist event in Evanston, Illinois, Weldon analyzed the effect that reality TV, such as Trumps The Apprentice, has had on the cultural appetite and how it contributed to confusing opinion with fact. Nine years later, Trump became the next president, confirming that her worries were founded, Weldon said.

Audiences do not understand the difference between an investigative reporters text based on data and interviews and hard evidence versus a tweet that just says something is true backed up by nothing, she told The Chronicle. It is easy to just type. We are confusing typing with reporting.

Weldon, who has more than 38 years of journalism experience and was a professor at her alma materNorthwestern Universitys Medill School of Journalismuntil 2013, said journalists need to stand their ground in this era of political uncertainty and maintain high standards for publishing fact-checked material. Weldon said journalists need to vigorously refute unverified claims by the administration and is committed to the fight, and other writers and citizens should be as well, she said.

I am ensuring myself up for a deeper and more fierce onslaught of hate [and] preparing to safeguard myself because I plan on being outspoken and backing everything up with evidence, Weldon said.

From the perspective of someone not born in this country, New Zealand native and writer Toni Nealie said the political issues in the U.S. are unlike anything she has experienced.

People on all sides on the political spectrum are horrified, she said of the view of Americas politics from her homeland. This is not a right-wing-left-wing [issue]. Anyone who believes in democracy, even in limited and sometimes shedding democracy, [is] alarmed in what they see.

Nealiea prolific writer in Chicagos literary scene and editor for Newcity and The Rumpusteaches in the Television Department at Columbia. She also published a collection of personal essays called The Miles Between Me in May 2016 that each explore her cultural heritage, family and dispersal.

Fleischmann, who is also a visiting professor in Columbias Creative Writing Department, pointed out that challenges did not just start happening but occurred during Obamas administration as well, such as the former presidents deportation recordhigher than any other president in history.

Fleischmann said looking at how artistic expression is affected from both sides of the political landscape will spark effective resistance and show a myriad of ways art can shift ideals.

Ideally and hopefully, writers and artists are always paying some attention to the way our work is resonating in the world, Fleischmann said. Hopefully, thinking it communicates for a world that is more free or more liberated or more equitable.

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Writers in Trump's America: Creatives mobilize to protect First Amendment rights - Columbia Chronicle