Feiner v. New York

SCOTUSCase
Litigants=Feiner v. New York
ArgueDate=October 17
ArgueYear=1950
DecideDate=January 15
DecideYear=1951
FullName=Irving Feiner v. New York
USVol=340
USPage=315
Citation=71 S. Ct. 303; 95 L. Ed. 295; 1951 U.S. LEXIS 2249
Prior=300 N. Y. 391, 91 N. E. 2d 316; certiorari to the Court of Appeals of New York
Subsequent=
Holding=The conviction is sustained against a claim that it violated petitioner's right of free speech under the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
SCOTUS=1949-1953
Majority=Vinson
JoinMajority=Reed, Jackson, Burton, Clark
Concurrence=Frankfurter
Dissent=Black
Dissent2=Douglas
JoinDissent2=Minton
LawsApplied=U.S. Const. amends I, XIV

"Feiner v. New York", 340 US 315 (1951)ref|citation was a United States Supreme Court case involving Irving Feiner's arrest for a violation of section 722 of the New York Penal Code, "inciting a breach of the peace," as he addressed a crowd on a street.

Background

On March 8, 1949, Irving Feiner, a WWII veteran attending Syracuse University because of the GI Bill, and his fellow Progressive Party members were trying to call attention to a meeting they were holding at a nearby hotel. The meeting was a protest/discussion about the "Scottsboro Trial of the North." In order to call attention to the meeting, Feiner and the Progressives used a loudspeaker system set up on the roof of a car at South McBride and Harrison Street in a predominantly minority neighborhood. Eventually a crowd stopped and listened to what they were saying. The police were called and upon arrival found about 75-80 people covering the sidewalk and spilling out into the street.

During his address, Feiner was quoted as saying:
*"Mayor Costello (of Syracuse) is a champagne-sipping bum; he does not speak for the Negro people."
*"The 15th Ward is run by corrupt politicians, and there are horse rooms (gambling houses) operating there."
*"President Truman is a bum."
*"Mayor O'Dwyer is a bum."
*"The American Legion is a Nazi Gestapo."
*And most importantly for the case, "The Negroes don't have equal rights; they should rise up in arms and fight for their rights."

The police were at the scene while Feiner spoke, when a white man approached an officer and said, "If you don't get that son of a bitch down, then I will." On three occasions, the police asked Feiner to get down and stop speaking. Finally, after he had been speaking for about thirty minutes, they arrested him for "inciting a breach of the peace."

The question posed to the Court was, "When is it constitutional for the police to silence a public speaker?"

The Decision

The 6-3 decision upheld Feiner's arrest.

Focusing on the "rise up in arms and fight for their rights" part of Feiner's speech, the Court found that Feiner's First Amendment rights were not violated, because his arrest came when the police thought that a riot might occur. The Court found that the police did not attempt to suppress Feiner's message based on its content, but rather on the reaction of the crowd. The Court reaffirmed the fact that a speaker cannot be arrested for the content of his speech. The Court also reaffirmed the fact that the police must not be used as an instrument to silence unpopular views, but must be used to silence a speaker who is trying to incite a riot.

The Dissent

Justice Black wrote a foresighted dissent, in part pointing out that the police, instead of arresting Feiner, should have probably protected him from hostile members of the crowd.

Justice Douglas, jointed by Justice Minton, additionally did not believe the situation constituted a disturbance of the peace, and questioned the fairness of the trial Feiner received.

Aftermath

As a result of his conviction, Syracuse University expelled Mr. Feiner. He finally completed his degree from Syracuse when they readmitted him, and was invited back to the school to speak at the opening of the Tully Center for Free Speech in October 2006. To this day, he continues to fight for tuition reimbursement, as his original schooling had been covered under the GI Bill. Following the court ruling, Feiner tried to work on a local newspaper but was fired after the FBI sent agents to the small town office and informed the editor of Feiner's "criminal" past. The FBI continued to haunt Feiner's life; he enjoys telling his family and friends of an incident in which agents would not get off his property, so his wife, Trudy, sprayed them with a garden hose.

Irving Feiner lives in Nyack, New York where he has been a small business owner. He continues to fight and write about freedom of speech and progressive issues, including squaring off, on First Amendment grounds, against Stephen Baldwin, who fought to keep an adult bookstore from opening in the village. He has two adult daughters, Susan and Emily, and five grandchildren: Lisa, Dana and Laurie Roberts and Rebecca and Jeremy Feiner Blair. Born in 1924, Mr. Feiner is 83 years old and is currently involved in school/property tax reform and fighting a planned village parking garage.

Lectures at Rutgers University

At the invitation of renowned Professor Milton Heumann, Feiner has given several surprise guest lectures to students of Professor Heumann's Civil Liberties class at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ. These lectures took place on February 14, 2006 and February 12, 2008. Feiner explained his side of the case, contending that some of the facts found in the Supreme Court's decision were mistaken or that some facts were omitted. For example, the only witnesses that the prosecution called were the two arresting officers. The infamous "S.O.B." man was never called as a witness. Feiner also explained that shortly after V-E day he was in Paris where he saw a V-E parade in which marchers marched with locked arms. Feiner claims that in his speech the night he was arrested he said "the Negroes of this town should march with locked arms down to the mayor's office and demand their rights." As a result of this case, the University of Iowa Law school retracted its offer of admission.

It should be noted that the Supreme Court only deals with matters of law and not with matters of fact. Matters of fact are established in lower trial courts, and the Supreme Court generally makes its decisions based entirely on lower courts' findings. If there are distortions in the case file, the file is still passed up to the Supreme Court, which must sort out what is reliable and what isn't.

Current life

Irving Feiner currently lives comfortably in Nyack, New York. He has 2 children, Susan and Emily, and 5 grand children. Their names are Lisa, Dana, Laurie, Jeremy, and Rebecca (who is well known locally for her politically talented mind) Feiner owns a native American jewelry store with his wife Trudy. He continues to speak his mind in politics, and has no problem sharing every single one with anyone he meets, and is constantly attending meetings on local politics. He has also ran for local positions like mayor several times (without intending to win, just to get a chance to make a statement)

ee also

* List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 340

External links

* [http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=340&invol=315 Text of the decision from Findlaw]
* [http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/faclibrary/case.aspx?case=Feiner_v_NY First Amendment Center]