TOLEDO – The city has a slim chance of legally stopping neo-Nazis from demonstrating again in a neighborhood where rioters looted businesses and launched bricks at police, law experts say.
Mayor Jack Ford said this week he expects that the white supremacist group will try again to stage a rally in the city. He has asked his legal team to look into whether they can do anything to limit where the neo-Nazis demonstrate.
The worst violence broke out after the march was called off Saturday and rioters turned their anger toward police because they felt officers were protecting the neo-Nazis and did nothing to stop their plan to walk through their neighborhood.
Among the options being explored is whether the city can require another demonstration to take place at a neutral site, such as the downtown courthouse, and away from the neighborhood known as Polish Village.
“If we’re forced to let them back in the city, it has to be on our terms,” police Chief Mike Navarre said.
Jerome Barron, a law professor at George Washington University, said he doubts that city officials would prevail if they try to move the supremacist group to another area.
“The fact that violence may ensue is not a reason to stop them,” he said. “If you thought they were coming with baseball bats, you could stop it. But the people who were breaking the law were not the Nazis.”
Local governments can restrict protests to protect public safety, but free speech rights protect protesters who aren’t planning anything illegal, Barron said.
“A hostile audience is not a basis for preventing first amendment activity,” he said. “The reason they’re going to this neighborhood is because they know it’s provocative.”
It’s not known whether the National Socialist Movement is planning another rally. Bill White, a spokesman for the group, said they will not announce their plans in advance again.
The National Socialist Movement said they wanted to walk through the area because they claimed whites in the neighborhood were being threatened and harassed by gangs.
City officials canceled the march after the group gathered in a park because they said the neo-Nazis tried to change the time and route.
The unrest lasted about four hours. Police arrested 114 on charges including assault, vandalism and failure to obey police.
David Goldberger, a constitutional law professor at Ohio State University, said cities have the right to place some limits on demonstrations.
For instance, they can stop a group from demonstrating in the middle of the night with loud speakers in a neighborhood.
“What they can’t do is say you’re not allowed to come here because these counter-demonstrators are going to cause trouble,” said Goldberger, who represented neo-Nazis during the 1970s in their fight to march in Skokie, Ill.
The U.S. Supreme Court in 1977 refused to block the Nazis from marching in the heavily Jewish Chicago suburb.
“There’s no question the city has a dilemma,” Goldberger said. “Society has to learn with live with competing ideas and view points.”
The law, he said, isn’t clear on how much protection police must provide. Ford said several rioters told him during the melee “why don’t you just leave, we’ll take care of them.”
“I think they would have,” the mayor said.
The city should do a better job of setting up security if the neo-Nazis plan another demonstration instead of trying to block them, said Jeffrey Gamso, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union in Ohio.
“You can’t pick and choose the messages,” he said. “We live in a world where there’s lots and lots of hatred. The remedy is more good speech.
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