Hecklers and counter-speakers (again)

Mark Tushnet, writing on Vox and Balkinization, argues that the counter-speakers/hecklers/audience members who attempt to shout down other speakers engage in constitutionally protected activities and the First Amendment is violated by many of a state university's efforts to stop hecklers. Mark argues that the speaker and the hecklers are "symmetrically situated with respect to speech" and that the intuitive "first come, first served" rule fails to capture the complexity of situations or to recognize that it is not always clear who is "first" in any situation. (If the speaker is inside the auditorium and the hecklers are outside, the hecklers are first in that outdoor space).

Mark captures well a lot of what I have been thinking and arguing about this, that deriding hecklers/protesters/counter-speakers as exercising the dreaded heckler's veto misses the mark. Labeling this  as "noisy interference" also is too simplistic, as it fails to capture the expressive nature of what many hecklers do. And all of this comes on the heels of a poll showing that a majority of college students believe it is ok to shout-down speakers.

Mark is searching for a rule or balance that does not inevitably take content into account. One answer might be that it depends on the precise forum,. On this, perhaps we distinguish between a limited-space auditorium that must be reserved and open areas on campus; audience members have greater counter-speech rights in the latter than the former. Or we distinguish between the speaker stage and the audience, so a heckler can shout from the audience, but not run on stage and grab the microphone.

But Mark's arguments show that the content problem arguably never goes away (something I had not crystallized previously). Consider audience members in an auditorium, with the speaker on stage. Mark argues that, even if the speaker has priority over the audience, all members of the audience are symmetrically situated. We can imagine a situation in which the crowd of speaker-supporters is loud and raucous, to the point that their cheering and shouts of "USA! USA!" or "you said it" cause the speaker to pause or make it impossible for him to hear. I doubt anyone would want these supporters removed. So what is the difference between audience members whose jeering and shouts of "fascist" (Mark uses  Joe Wilson's "You lie") cause the speaker to pause or make it impossible for him to be heard? Content and viewpoint.

We might get around the problem by distinguishing the nature of the forum and the expression in that forum0--an academic lecture as opposed to a political or partisan rally. But that highlights the complexity of the problem and the absence of easy answers--the precise point Mark is trying to make.