What does the First Amendment stand for on campus?

The words of the First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances” have not changed in over 200 years. What’s changed is how we interpret them today.

The media reports almost daily on clashes of First Amendment rights, beliefs and values: same-sex marriages; abortion rights; demonstrations for and against war in Iraq and Afghanistan; the Ten Commandments in public buildings; issues concerning religion; the Pledge of Allegiance in classrooms, and the burning or defacing of the American flag.

Dr. Gabriel Bach, a government professor at North Lake College, polled his students in February 2005 concerning their views about flag burning, freedom of the press, freedom to express anti-government opinions, freedom to sing offensive songs, and their views about the First Amendment rights.

It is a selective survey and does not accurately reflect North Lake’s total student population. The sample includes 226 students, evenly divided with 113 males and 113 females. Ethnic background: 42 percent Anglos, 23 percent non-white, 14 percent African-American, and 21 percent Hispanic. Age: 39 percent under 20; 52 percent between 20 and 29; 7 percent between 30 and 49, and 2 percent over 50.

Partisanship: 35 percent consider themselves Republican; 29 percent Democrat; 17 percent independent, and 19 percent did not choose between the three political groups.

Responses to the survey questionnaire are as follows:

Do you participate in one, two, or three activities on and/or off campus?
Forty-three percent participate in one activity, 19 percent in two, and 9 percent in three. Nineteen percent do not volunteer at all.

People should be allowed to burn or deface the American flag as a political statement.
Nineteen percent agree; 14 percent ‘don’t know.’ “This makes 33 percent of the students polled who ‘don’t know’ or understand the First Amendment,” said Bach. “If we were to ignore the ‘don’t know’ answers, the survey would show 27 percent who believe that people should not be allowed to burn or deface the American flag as a political statement.”

Newspapers should be allowed to publish freely without governmental approval of stories.
Sixty-nine percent support the statement. Twenty-five percent believe that the government has to approve before publication. “If we add the ‘don’t know’ answers to the ‘censors,’ the survey would reveal 31percent who do not quite understand the First Amendment,” said Bach.

People who express anti-government opinions are anti-American.
Eight percent agree. Ten percent do not have an opinion. “Eighteen percent of the students surveyed displayed a limited knowledge of the First,” said Bach.

Musicians should be allowed to sing songs with lyrics others may find offensive.
Twenty-one percent would not allow musicians to sing offensive lyrics, and 9 percent of the students ‘don’t know,’ for a total of 30 percent unaware of the First Amendment, says Bach.

The First Amendment goes too far in the rights it guarantees.
Eleven percent of the government students agreed with this statement; 23 percent ‘don’t know.’

Bach said that a sizable minority, between 10 and 33 percent of those polled, do not know the First Amendment rights it protects, misunderstand them, or are indifferent to them. “Schools seem not to do enough to teach the First Amendment and its impact on our daily lives,” he said.

“Stances about our First Amendment are fundamental and critical because each generation of Americans contributes in defining what liberty and freedom mean in our society,” said Bach.

In the next newspaper issue of the News-Register, Bach’s students’ attitudes on the First Amendment will be profiled to provide a better understanding of the way the First is interpreted by many at North Lake College.