Federal Judge Hands Free-Speech Victory to Retired Engineer
fliptop writes:
Court holds that state officials violated the First Amendment when they ordered retired engineer Wayne Nutt to stop talking about math in public:
Chief Judge Richard Myers issued an opinion holding that the North Carolina Board of Examiners for Engineers and Surveyors violated the First Amendment when it ordered retired engineer Wayne Nutt to stop expressing opinions about engineering without a state license. Nutt, represented by the Institute for Justice (IJ), filed the lawsuit after the Board sent him a series of threatening letters ordering him to stop publicly offering opinions about engineering without a license, on pain of potential criminal punishment. Today's ruling confirms that those letters-and the law they were based on-violate the First Amendment.
"State licensing boards nationwide increasingly act as if they are boards of censors, deciding who may or may not speak about the topics they regulate," explained IJ Attorney Joe Gay. "Today's ruling is a powerful reminder that in this country we rely on people to decide who they want to listen to. We don't rely on government boards to decide who gets to speak."
[...] "The First Amendment protects everyone's right to speak their minds, whether they're talking about politics or talking about math," explained IJ Deputy Director of Litigation Robert McNamara. "Regulators often seem to forget that basic fact, but we always stand ready to remind them."
Also at MSN.
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