Discussion: Federal Court Rules Texas Must Issue Confederate Flag License Plates

bluestatedon · July 15, 2014, 5:17pm

Large caps, and preferably in an elegant serif such as Sabon or Bodoni.

truthdogg · July 15, 2014, 5:18pm

Sooo, anything at all can be put on a commemorative license plate? Seriously, no limit?

austin_dave · July 15, 2014, 5:18pm

You need to pay a fee and have something like 25000 people sign up to request it.

meri · July 15, 2014, 5:19pm

ASSpiring Pornstars of America.

With something classy, like a glass speculum?

snarkus_aurelius · July 15, 2014, 5:20pm

Murka is a-gittin’ it Textarded, YEE-HAW!

ralph_vonholst · July 15, 2014, 5:21pm

Yeah, I guess in Texas self-expression is a pretty narrow one-way street with only sharp right turns.

leftflank · July 15, 2014, 5:24pm

It’s still about the blacks, they can’t accept anyone but a redneck. Let’s not over complicate things.

jep07 · July 15, 2014, 5:29pm

So, how long until swastikas grace our licence plates?

thunderclapnewman · July 15, 2014, 5:36pm

Large caps—ad snow white, of course.

captaincommonsense · July 15, 2014, 5:36pm

These idiots won’t be hard to spot, they’ll be the same morons that the day before they got their Stirs & Birs plates, had Truk Nutz and were Rollin’ Coal.

fourlegsgood · July 15, 2014, 5:37pm

Thanks Federal Court, for helping Texas slide even farther backward.

maxie · July 15, 2014, 5:37pm

The Confederate flag needs to be an issue for Democrats. This is the flag of traitors and Democrats need to say that out loud…of course they won’t, and even if they did they’d apologize in nanoseconds and start saying that they too are concerned that Obama has taken the powers of a dictator.

imkmu3 · July 15, 2014, 5:37pm

Does that mean someone could demand plates with a swastika on them?

imkmu3 · July 15, 2014, 5:38pm

Damn, you beat me to it.

darcy · July 15, 2014, 5:39pm

“John McConnell, an attorney for the Sons of Confederate Veterans said the ruling confirms that “the government cannot step into an issue and silence one side while endorsing the viewpoint of the other side,” according to the Dallas Morning News.”

I don’t get it. What’s the “viewpoint of the other side”? What other side are they talking about? Is it the I love golden retrievers vs. I hate golden retrievers? This kinda stuff just exhausts me for some reason. Maybe … let them have their stupid license plates.

chelsea530 · July 15, 2014, 5:42pm

Gee, I would have thought the sons of confederate veterans would be dead or too old to drive. Hmmm.

Morons.

ralph_vonholst · July 15, 2014, 5:45pm

I would say,theoretically yes, since the U.S., unlike Europe has no Federal “hate speech” laws that I am aware of, but it would have to pass the “imminent danger of unlawful action” test. I doubt the Swastika would get by this.

From Wikipidia

In 1969, the Supreme Court protected a Ku Klux Klan member’s racist and hate-filled speech and created the ‘imminent danger’ test to permit hate speech. The court ruled in Brandenburg v. Ohio that; “The constitutional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a state to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force, or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.”

This test has been modified very little from its inception in 1969 and the formulation is still good law in the United States. Only speech that poses an imminent danger of unlawful action, where the speaker has the intention to incite such action and there is the likelihood that this will be the consequence of his or her speech, may be restricted and punished by that law.

So my above Darwin/Dawkins plate could possibly be refused on this basis for exactly the reasons that NC Steve gave - in TX, almost certain vandalism.

rudesan · July 15, 2014, 5:46pm

Yeah, seems like they are Confederate Patriots.

pluckyinky · July 15, 2014, 5:47pm

It’s becoming more and more amusing as to what is being classified as free speech. Money is speech, campaign ads are speech, and now license plates are speech. It won’t be long before these regressive old assholes decide rape is free speech as well because, ya know, he just wanted to express his attraction to her.

slbinva · July 15, 2014, 5:48pm

Hmmmm, I guess the guy who had his ATHEIST vanity license tag revoked by the state of Virginia because they had gotten complaints that some people were offended by it should have taken his case to federal court. I think about that guy every time I see a Virginia vanity plate that says something like “LV JSUS” or “P&W HIM.” Funny how the tolerance is only supposed to run one way.