Breyer Thinks It Through

Credit where it's due department: earlier this week I wrote about remarks that Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer made that indicated he might be willing to to look at banning the burning of the Koran. It now appears that Breyer has thought better of his earlier remarks. Eugene Volokh has the transcript of Breyer's recent interview with Larry King on CNN:

CNN’s Larry King: There’s no doubt that Pastor Jones, little church in Florida, had the right, he has the right to burn the Quran, doesn’t he?

Breyer: Yeah, I said it depends on what analogy you use, but the most one analogous case is that there was — you have the right to burn an American flag as a symbol....

King: ... Does [the flagburning decision] make us a great country?

Breyer: It helps. It helps.... [W]hat we’re saying is we protect expression that we hate. And protecting expression that we hate is not the only good thing in the world, but it is one good thing in the world. And when you have a country of 300 million different people who think different things, it is helpful. It is helpful to tell everyone, you can think what you want.

King: Hard for other people to comprehend why Nazis can march —

Breyer: There they are. You know, it’s so often I hear people say — and particularly this is a college students, sir. Well, that’s just so terrible what he’s saying. I say, oh, you think that free speech is only for people who don’t say things that are terrible....

Empasis mine. Much better. A welcome clarification from the Justice. As for Illinois Nazis, we already know the way to deal with them (link NSFW, of course).