# When exactly did these free speech zones first appear? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 17, 2004, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002 "2004-01-17T21:56:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![barton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@barton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/barton)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2004, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/1 "2004-01-17T21:56:08Z")
This is a two-part question. First, when did the Secret Service start creating ‘free speech zones’ during Presidential appearances? I have the general impression it was not long after the 2000 Republican convention, but I would appeciate clarification. I would be interested to learn if this predates Bush, and just the terminology is new. Secondly, it appears the term itself orginated with colleges attempting to control student protests - there are plenty of online references to such in the mid-'90’s, but I would be curious as to the first actual usage. I’m suspecting a campus during the '60’s, but I have been unable to find much info. ---
**Author:** ![seriousart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@seriousart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seriousart)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2004, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/2 "2004-07-20T15:33:36Z")
Was doing a search on this myself, wondering the same question as the OP. Seems like noone knew when barton asked the first time. Maybe someone knows now? ---
**Author:** ![UncleBill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/d26b3c/32.png) [@UncleBill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBill)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2004, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/3 "2004-07-20T16:22:22Z")
President Reagan came to Duke University in the mid-80’s while I was there, and the protesters were placed behind a barrier, but well within sight and sound of the entourage. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2004, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/4 "2004-07-20T16:58:01Z")
Well, i did a Lexis/Nexis search among major newspapers for the term “free speech zone,” covering all available dates. I got a total of 165 hits. Some of the hits had nothing to do with the subject at hand. For example, some of the earliest references to “free speech zones” involved a 1989 debate over freedom of speech on the campus of Tufts University. The issue involved speech that the university declared to be sexist. The university and the student representative body passed what was essentially an anti-hate speech rule, and some groups protested that this was a first amendment violation. The first reference i found to “free speech zone” in the context described by the OP was in a bunch of stories coving the Republican National Convention in San Diego in 1996. Here are a few snippets i’ve cut from the articles. I can’t provide links, because Lexis/Nexis is a paid subscription service. > [@](#): > > **THE PROTEST PIT; Got a Grievance for the GOP? Can You Yell Really Loud?** > > \ > > Moore’s attention turns toward the convention center. “These people make $100,000 a year and smoke big, fat cigars and my 11-year-old son has to watch that big liquor truck drive up and deliver drinks for these big, fat Republicans,” he protests. > > No conventioneers, regardless of their wealth or weight, can hear a word Moore is saying. Though the ACLU and various protest groups defeated a GOP proposal to place the demonstration site 1,200 feet away from the convention, this protest ground is still 400 feet from any delegates – across the tracks, beyond the fences, separated by an ocean of indifference. > > “What’s all that?” a passing delegate asks a San Diego police officer. And once she hears the explanation, she says, “They should get a job.” > > \ > > GRAPHIC: Photo, nancy andrews, Kangaroo rat court: Patrick Connors of San Diego shouts through the chain-link fence enclosing the Official Republican National Convention Demonstration Site. Gay rights demonstrators throng the “free speech zone,” 400 feet and a world away from San Diego’s convention center. > > (_Washington Post_, 14 August 1996, p. C01) and > [@](#): > > \*\* Plenty of Elbow Room In ‘Free Speech’ Zone\*\* > > Activities during the opening day of the tightly controlled “free speech” protest zone opposite the convention center here evoked the mind-teasing parable of the sound of a tree falling in a solitary forest. > > Five people turned out to support the first of 65 groups that were issued demonstration permits – a grass-roots organization called San Diegans for Honest Government that sought to draw attention to large corporations underwriting the $ 15 million GOP gathering. > > By midday, the crowds had swelled to 12 for the National Association of Social Workers, protesting the “criminalization of poor mothers” in the welfare reform bill that is awaiting President Clinton’s signature. Amnesty International’s call to protest the death penalty drew 30 people, including reporters. > > “If you want to see people, you better go to the beach,” said San Diego Police Officer Marshall White. “There’ll be 300,000 or so of them there.” > > Protest leaders were disappointed, but not surprised, considering what they claimed was a concerted effort by Republican convention officials to keep organized dissent “out of sight and out of mind.” > > The designated protest zone, within sight of the convention hall but partially obscured by a row of lavatory trailers, is surrounded by a 12-foot-high chain-link fence. > > Within the perimeter is another fence surrounding the speaker’s platform, leaving an effect that one protester likened to a prison exercise yard. “I just hope they leave the gates open when we’re ready to leave,” said Esther Salazar, a member of the National Association of Social Workers. > > (_Washington Post_, 12 August 1996, p. A18) According to the _Houston Chronicle_, however, such free speech zones extend considerably further back than 1996. > [@](#): > > The Republican National Convention is coming to San Diego–and with it, protesters. But unlike the 1992 convention in Houston, protesters and demonstrators will set up a stone’s throw from the front gates. > > Protesters are delighted; the GOP is not. > > ""It will be better this time because we’ll be right in front of the convention center,’’ said lesbian activist Suzanne Pharr. ""It was pretty bad in Houston. It was isolated and hidden. We were out in the middle of a cow field. ‘’ > > The GOP’s first choice was to use the currently designated protest site–located at 4th Avenue and K Street–as a drop-off spot for handicapped and elderly delegates and guests. Protesters, argued the GOP, should instead be kept about four blocks away, on 8th Avenue. > > But demonstrators, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, fought the 8th Avenue designation in federal court–and won. > > \ > > In 1972, the site of both the Democratic and Republican conventions was Miami Beach, Fla. In order to avoid violence, officials there met regularly with the leaders of some 25,000 protesters who descended upon the city. > > Established there was a pattern that continues today: the creation of college campus-like free-speech zones. Eventually, those zones became official protest sites, in which demonstrators reserve time blocks to deliver a message. > > The courts have found such arrangements constitutional because they balance free speech rights with security needs. > > Generally, the only legal challenges to those arrangements have been over location. > > (_Houston Chronicle_, 8 August 1996, p. 14) So, there you have it. The _Chronicle_ article suggests that the creation of the “free speech zones” was largely in response to violence at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago. But if they were to take any lessons from Chicago, it should have been that the best way to avoid unnecessary violence is to keep the cops away. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2004, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/5 "2004-07-20T17:09:58Z")
I should add, i guess, that the issue of special zones around national conventions is somewhat different than the zones that the OP is asking about, which recently seem to be set up for just about any Presidential appearance. For the most part, the zones around the national conventions apply to _any_ people who are not part of the convention, and yet who want to make their voices heard. This applies, at least in principle, to both opponents and supporters of the party in question. The free speech zones at Bush’s appearances, however, have been set up purely for the purpose of keeping opponents away from the President. Supporters of Bush, carrying similar signs and wearing similar t-shirts, have not been herded into these zones. I don’t know whether this happened under any other Presidents or not, but Lexis/Nexis reveals no similar instances in the pre-Bush era. ---
**Author:** ![NurseCarmen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5daacb/32.png) [@NurseCarmen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NurseCarmen)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2004, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/6 "2004-07-20T17:11:37Z")
I think it came at the heels of the RICO ruling in the abortion protest SCOTUS decision. It seems that folks are taking that ruling and applying to non-RICO type situations. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2004, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/7 "2004-07-20T20:25:14Z")
Another data point: Restricted areas for protesters got a big boost during the WTO rioting here in Seattle in November and December of 1999. It was a serious pain in the ass to have a job downtown and be limited only to certain routes walking around because the police had cordoned off otherwise public streets in order to control the demonstrators. There was a legal challenge to the concept of “protest in this public space = OK, protest in that public space = Not OK,” but it ended rather ambiguously as I recall. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2004, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/8 "2004-07-20T20:45:05Z")
I don’t know when the Secret Service began setting up free speech zones. However, here are the earliest references to that concept I could find. [Free Speech Movementl Chronology](http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/FSM/chron.htm), entry dated Sept. 22, 1964: > [@](#): > > The ASUC Senate also began circulation of a petition to gather student grass-roots support, and discussed the possibility of the ASUC purchasing the disputed land and establishing it as a free speech area. (I guessed this was related to the “Free Speech Movement”, and this turned up.) Even though I started college in 1968, I don’t remember anything about a “free speech area”. But that’s probably because my school was not a hotbed of protest. [http://www.valleycollege.edu/Marketing/history\_part4.php](http://www.valleycollege.edu/Marketing/history_part4.php) > [@](#): > > Student concern was also expressed by demonstrations in opposition to the Vietnam War. During the period of greatest activism, a “free speech area” with a permanent podium was established at the southeast corner of the Quad, in front of the Campus Center. Following are the earliest references I could find from Proquest Newspapers. The references are matter-of-fact, so I infer the idea was well-established at the time. > [@](#): > > Homosexuals’ parade hailed; Klan jeered; > Tom Brune. Chicago Sun - Times. Chicago, Ill.: Jun 30, 1986. pg. 7 > > The Klan gathered at the “free speech” area of Lincoln Park, just north of softball fields near North Avenue. > [@](#): > > Anti-Gay Petition Drive; San Francisco Chronicle (pre-1997 Fulltext). San Francisco, Calif.: Dec 5, 1987. pg. A.13 > > Students at Fresno State University are circulating a petition protesting student government underwriting of the campus homosexual club, the Gay and Lesbian Student Alliance. > > … > > Early Monday, someone set fire to the club’s booth in the campus free-speech area and homosexuals and those opposed to them had a heated verbal exchange in the free-speech area on Wednesday during a club rally to protest the torching of the booth. \“Heated” verbal exchange after a fire? The author had an interesting sense of humor.\ > [@](#): > > ‘Free speech area’ for protesters; > > Publication title: Chicago Sun - Times. Chicago, Ill.: Jul 18, 1988. pg. 4 > > ATLANTA: A two-acre parking lot at the site of the Democratic National Convention will be filled this week with people who, for a variety of reasons, do not welcome the Democrats or at least want to deliver a message to the party… > > The first bookings at what has been dubbed the “free speech area” provide a clue as to why police might want to keep protesters where they can watch them. The lead-off speaker Sunday afternoon was white supremacist Richard Barrett, a leader of last year’s anti-civil rights rallies in suburban Forsyth County. A march and rally by Barrett supporters was called off by authorities, however. > > Speakers advocating gay and lesbian rights followed Barrett… A similar article: 1988 Democratic National Convention Police Bar 2 Klan-Style Rallies; [Home Edition] DAVID TREADWELL, HENRY WEINSTEIN. Los Angeles Times (pre-1997 Fulltext). Los Angeles, Calif.: Jul 18, 1988. pg 5. ---
**Author:** ![ratatoskK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ratatoskk/32/2987_2.png) [@ratatoskK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ratatoskK)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2004, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/9 "2004-07-20T21:49:20Z")
That’s fascinating. From the examples mentioned, it sounds like “free speech area” generally designated a semi-permanent public area where people could go and speak; designating it with this name would attract interested people to participate. It did not imply that other areas were off-limits to public speaking. But the current usage of “free speech zone” is more of an attempt to deflect attention from the fact that everywhere outside of the “zone” is really a “prohibited speech zone.” Does that sound like an accurate summary? ---
**Author:** ![dre2xl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/34f0e0/32.png) [@dre2xl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dre2xl)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2004, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-exactly-did-these-free-speech-zones-first-appear/225002/10 "2004-07-21T01:09:17Z")
I was at the 1996 Republican convention (well, not IN the convention, but we were in the area at the time and we decided to go to the area… there were lots of vendors and booths and the like). The entire area was fenced with a chain link fence (but awfully big links, and the fence did not look recently constructed). There was only one protestor, behind a chain link fence but well within the sight of the RNC and throwing distance of the other attendees. He was so visible and so close to the rest of the attendees that I never got the impression that he was “forced” there. This is a WAG but I’ll bet that protestors have been shuffled into different locations for a while, but what is different about these “free speech zones” is that the protestors are now shuffled _out of sight_ .