Opinion ID: 1710025
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: casts contempt upon

Text: ¶ 26. In Street v. New York, 394 U.S. 576 (1969), the defendant, Street, was convicted of a New York law which made it a misdemeanor to publicly mutilate, deface, defile, or defy, trample upon, or cast contempt upon either by words or act [any United States flag]. Id. at 577-78. After hearing a news report that civil rights leader James Meredith had been shot by a sniper in Mississippi, the defendant walked outside to a city intersection, stood on the corner and burned the flag. While doing so, he disparaged the flag by shouting we don't need no damn flag, and if they let that happen to Meredith we don't need an American flag. Id. at 578-79. ¶ 27. Reserving the question of whether Street's conviction for burning the flag was constitutionally permissible, the Court held that the New York law had been unconstitutionally applied to Street because it permitted him to be punished merely for speaking defiant or contemptuous words about the flag. See id. at 580-81. In so holding, the Court stated: We have no doubt that the constitutionally guaranteed freedom to be intellectually. . .diverse or even contrary, and the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order, encompass the freedom to express publicly one's opinions about our flag, including those opinions which are defiant or contemptuous. Id. at 593 (citations omitted). ¶ 28. Wisconsin Stat. § 946.05(1) expressly prohibits the very conduct which was held to be protected by the First Amendment in Street. Its casts contempt upon language encompasses any speech that is defiant or contemptuous of, or which expresses distaste for the flag. In fact, this portion of the statute casts its jaundiced eye with such reprobation as to reveal that the only interest being served is the proscription of expressive communication. [10]