Freedom of Speech and Contempt of Court
![handle is hein.journals/illlr36 and id is 624 raw text is: FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND CONTEMPT OF COURT
Max Radin*
At the October term of 1941 two strangely assorted fellow-travellers
arrived together at the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States.
They were Mr. Harry Bridges of the C. I. 0., and the Los Angeles Times.
What made the temporary and casual association of these two petitioners
particularly strange was that they both complained of a denial of freedom
of speech, and it may be said of the Los Angeles Times that for a number
of years it has been furiously intent on granting Air. Bridges as little
freedom of speech or of anything else as possible. Nonetheless the Times
has been compelled to submit to the fact that the right to freedom of
speech for itself was adjudged in a case that-if we may trust the advance
reports-is likely to be called the case of Bridges v. California.,
The two cases, however, while finally determined together, did, as
the opinion states, grow out of different circumstances and concerned
different parties. I do not know whether Mr. Bridges or the Times would
be more vigorously insistent on the latter difference. But, the Court goes
on to say, both relate to the scope of our national constitutional policy
safeguarding free speech and a free press''2
Both petitioners had been fined for contempt of court by the Superior
Court of Los Angeles. The offense charged against Bridges was that he
had caused to be published or acquiesced in publishing a telegram to the
Secretary of Labor declaring that a decision of the Superior Court, where
a motion for a new trial was pending, was outrageous, that to attempt
to enforce it would tie up the port of Los Angeles and involve the entire
Pacific Coast and that the union did not intend to allow state courts to
override the majority vote of members in choosing their officers and to
override the National Labor Relations Board.3
The offense of the Times was the publication of two editorials deal-
ing with several persons already convicted by trial courts but not yet
sentenced. Both editorials violently denounced the prisoners. One stated
that the Judge would make a serious mistake if he granted probation
to two men convicted and declared that nothing would serve the public
* Professor of Law, University of California School of Jurisprudence.
1 62 S. Ct. 190 (1941).
2 Id. at 191.
3 Quoted fully in Note 20 of the majority opinion. The telegram was published in the
San Francisco and Los Angeles newspapers on Jan. 24th and 25th, 1938.
C 599]](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/illlr36&div=49&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
What Is HeinOnline?
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most
Freedom of Speech and Contempt of Court
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most