Does the First Amendment give Americans a free pass to call even their president all kinds of names?
In 1804, the Prussian scientist and philosopher Alexander von Humboldt visited Thomas Jefferson in the White House. While waiting in Jefferson’s office, the visitor picked up a newspaper and was shocked to see that it was full of “the most wanton abuse and licentious calumnies” about the President. When Jefferson arrived, the Prussian held up the paper and asked why he didn’t have the publisher arrested, or even hanged, for spreading such lies.Jefferson’s response: “Rather would I protect the spirit of freedom which dictates even that degree of abuse. Put that paper into your pocket, my friend, carry it with you to Europe, and when you hear any one doubt the reality of American freedom, show them that paper, and tell them where you found it.”Jefferson added: “The country where public men are amenable to public opinion; where not only their official measures, but their private morals, are open to the scrutiny and animadversion of every citizen, is more secure from despotism and corruption, than it could be rendered by the wisest code of laws, or best formed constitution.”Jefferson’s attitude about press freedom is well established. When he was Minister to France in 1787, the future President wrote to Edward Carrington, a Virginia delegate to the Continental Congress: “Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.”Now, 230 years later, the attitude in the White House on press freedom is different. When Trump learned of the impending publication of “Fire and Fury,” a book that cast a critical light on his presidency, he had his lawyers seek a “cease and desist” order from a judge. Thanks to the First Amendment, he failed.