“The now-infamous Gates story has gone through the familiar media spin-cycle: incident, reaction, response, so on and so forth. Drowned out of this echo chamber has been an all-too-important (and legally controlling) aspect: the imbroglio between Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., and Cambridge Police Sgt. James Crowley has more to do with the limits (or breadth) of the First Amendment than with race and social class. ”
“The issue is not how nasty the discourse between the two might have been, but whether what Professor Gates said–assuming, for argument’s sake, the officer’s version of events as fact–could by any stretch of both law and imagination constitute a ground for arrest for “disorderly conduct” (the charge leveled) or any other crime.”
Harvey Silverglate explains Freedom of Speech @ http://www.forbes.com/2009/07/28/gates-crowley-arrest-first-amendment-free-speech-harvard-opinions-contributors-harvey-a-silverglate.html?partner=email