hate crimes
On June 11, 1993, the United State's Supreme Court upheld Wisconsin's penalty enhancement law, which imposes harsher sentences on criminals who intentionally select the person against whom the crime is committed, because of the race, religion, color, disability, sexual orientation, national origin or ancestry of that person. Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the unanimous Court. On the evening of October 7, 1989, Mitchell and a group of young black men attacked and severely beat a lone white boy. The group had just finished watching the film "Mississippi Burning", in which a young black boy was, while praying, beaten by a white man. After the film, the group moved outside and Mitchell asked if they felt "hyped up to move on some white people". When the white boy approached Mitchell said, "You all want to screw somebody up? There goes a white boy, Go get him." The boy was left unconscious, and remained in a coma for four days. Mitchell was convicted of aggravated battery, which carries a two-year maximum sentence. The Wisconsin jury, however, found that because Mitchell selected his victim based on race, the penalty enhancement law allowed Mitchell to be sentenced to up to seven years. The jury sentenced Mitchell t
become known as the "fighting words doctrine". Chaplinsky was a Jehovaıs Witness in a predominantly Catholic town. He distributed leaflets to a hostile crowd, and was refused protection by the townıs marshall. Chaplinsky then referred to the marshall as a "god damn racketeer and a damn fascist", for which he was convicted of breaching the peace. Justice Murphyıs opinion argued that certain speech, including that which is lewd, obscene, profane, or insulting, is not covered by the First Amendment. According to Murphy, "There are certain well-defined and narrowly limited classes of speech, the prevention and punishment of which has never been thought to raise any Constitutional problem. These include the lewd and obscene, the profane, the libelous, and the insulting or fightingı words- those which by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace." Under Chaplinky, bigoted remarks would probably qualify as fighting words. However, the courts have generally been reluctant to uphold the fighting-words doctrine, and the Supreme Court has never done so (Gellman 369,370). Even if todayıs Court were to consider Chaplinsky valid, Mitchellıs comments, though racial in nature, would be difficult to classify as bigoted. In fact, Constitutional considerations aside, the biggest problem with penalty enhancement laws such as Wisconsinıs, is classifying and prosecuting an incident as hate-motivated (Cacas, 33). At what point can we be certain the victim was selected based on race, religion, or sexual orientation? Another more pressing problem is police unwillingness to investigate a crime as hate-motivated (Cacas, 33). Certainly, the difficulty in determining whether a crime is hate-motivated is one of the reasons police are hesitant to pursue crimes as hate-motivated, and illustrates yet another reason why such statutes should not exist. Consider the following FBI guidelines to help determine whether a crime is hate-motivated (Cacas, 33): 380). Therefore, penalty enhancement laws such as Wisconsinıs give the government too much power to excessively punish what it deems unacceptable. This is a compelling argument, but I would argue this practice is itself of questionable constitutionality, in that it allows the sentencing judge to exercise excessive discretionary judgment based on his view as to what constitutes acceptable and unacceptable motives. However, even if this practice is held to be constitutional, surpassing the existing maximum penalty with an additional statute that specifically lists bigotry as an unacceptable motive, certainly qualifies as being the same as imposing an additional penalty for unpopular beliefs. To illustrate the dangers inherent in laws such as Wisconsinıs penalty enhancement statute, we need only examine Texas v. Johnson, a 1989 Supreme Court case. The Court ruled the stateıs flag desecration statute unconstitutional. However, using Rehnquists logic in Mitchell, the state of Texas could have easily achieved their goal by prohibiting public burning, a legitimate exercise of their police power, and enhancing the penalty for those convicted of violating the statute if they did so in opposition to the government (Gellman, -Justice Jackson in W.V. Board of Education. v. Barnette Clearly, when the legislature enacts penalty enhancement laws with the intent of suppressing unpopular ideas, the state violates both the First and the Fourteenth Amendments. The state interferes with an individualıs right to free speech by suppressing ideas not supported by the government, and fails to provide equal protection to all its citizens when it punishes an act more severely when committed by an individual whose opinions are not shared by the state. Mitchell v. Wisconsin is a clear example of majority will infringe upon minority rights, and proves that the Bill of Rights works well, except in the instances when it is most needed. Another
Some common words found in the essay are:
Supreme Court, St Paul, Justice Rehnquist, Fourteenth Amendment, Wisconsin Mitchell, Mississippi Burning, Court Gellman, Justice OıConnor, Consider FBI, Hell Unfortunately, penalty enhancement, supreme court, st paul, penalty enhancement law, wisconsin mitchell, enhancement law, rav st paul, fourteenth amendment, rav st, fighting words, free speech, white boy, penalty enhancement laws, hate-motivated cacas 33, enhancement laws wisconsinıs,
Approximate Word count = 3213
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page double spaced)
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