The new Hate Speech law in Massachussetts

Hate crime and hate speech are related, but not identical topics.  A hate crime is a crime that is motivated by bigotry.  

Hate speech is defined by Black’s Law Dictionary (10th ed., 2014) as: “Speech that carries no meaning other than the expression of hatred for some group, such as a particular race, esp. in circumstances in which the communication is likely to provoke violence.”   However, hate speech by itself is not a crime in the United States.

The First Amendment of the Constitution guarantees the right to freedom of speech and the press.  There is no “hate speech” exception to the First Amendment in the U.S. Constitution.

[*The equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment clarifies that this applies to all the states.]

Nevertheless, the right to free speech is not absolute. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that certain types of speech are not protected by the Constitution. In the 1942 case of Chapinsky vs. New Hampshire (1942), the U.S. Supreme Court summarized the case law: “There are certain well-defined and limited classes of speech, the prevention and punishment of which have never been thought to raise any Constitutional problem. These include the lewd and obscene, the profane, the libelous and the insulting or fighting words– those which by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.”  “Fighting words” are furthermore construed to mean words directed at a specific individual, in a face to face confrontation, likely to lead to immediate violence.   Since 1942, however, no hate speech cases that have been brought before the U.S. Supreme Court have been found to include “fighting words”

Ben found a bill House Bill 3719 (Mass) which would make using the word "Bitch" as a way to be fined.