December 6, 2006

Protest

The First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University has a very interesting in-house exhibition of photographs, paintings and other items related to the history of political protest through American history, from pre-Revolutionary War incidents such as the Boston Massacre to modern-day political demonstrations. The exhibition, called Protest: The Power of Petition and Assembly in American Society, is described as "an overview of the rights to petition and assemble as they have been practiced by generations of Americans from the Revolutionary War through the civil rights movement to the 2001 presidential inauguration."

I searched the organization's website but found no information about it - no news release or online "brochure" to link you to. Just trust me on this one - if politics and free speech are important to you and you're into the history of such things, head on over. It is worth the trip.

The First Amendment Center published a pretty good piece on the First Amendment rights of bloggers a year ago, though I don't agree with the authors' apparent belief that bloggers aren't "journalists" and therefore might not be eligible for the same legal protections. The First Amendment wasn't a special right created for journalists - it was written to protect the right of all Americans to speak, publish, worship and assemble freely and to petition their government for redress of grievances.

Bloggers are journalists when they do journalism, whether they get paid for it or not.

Update: WKRN investigative reporter Trent Seibert in the comments below recommends the book Infamous Scribblers: The Founding Fathers and the Rowdy Beginnings of American Journalism, by Eric Burns, saying, "the parallels to those pioneers and today's bloggers are uncanny."

You can purchase the book at Amazon.