First Amendment makes for a messy political arena, but we shouldn't want it any other way

Many reporters were in Florida on Nov. 15 to cover former president Donald Trump’s announcement that he is still running for president.

One of them, a reporter for a conservative website, declared that other media were violating the First Amendment by failing to carry Trump’s announcement live on TV and online.

Such a ridiculously inaccurate understanding of the First Amendment ought to embarrass the reporter.

But these days, misconstruing the Constitution is just another way to score political points.

Sometimes at great cost.

Elon Musk comes to mind. The wealthy Musk spent $44 billion — including other people’s money — to show us how little he knows about the First Amendment.

When he bought Twitter, a social media platform favored by many partisans, Musk claimed he was doing it to promote free speech.

Within a few days, Musk was busy banning users and firing employees who criticized him (as well as thousands of employees he figured were superfluous).

Like many Americans, Musk’s interpretation of the First Amendment is self-serving. He thinks speech that fits his views — and makes him money — is allowed. But speech critical of him — or which costs him money — must be shut down.

What the First Amendment actually does is protect Americans from government intrusion.

It states: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

That’s a lot of protection in relatively few words.

But it’s not absolute. Our First Amendment rights do come with restrictions. There are laws, for example, barring child pornography, and other laws regulate such things as where you can place political signs.

But the First Amendment pretty much allows Elon Musk to run a social media site any whack-a-doodle way he chooses. The government is limited in what it can or can’t make him do.

As someone who worked in newspapers, I can tell you this is no small thing.

During my coast-to-coast career, people would complain, at least once a month, that the newspaper was violating their First Amendment rights.

It’s what the man in Indiana said when we refused to run his letter claiming President George W. Bush directed the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the United States.

It’s what the perpetual protester in New York said when we declined to send a reporter to cover his weekly event protesting his cause of the day.

It’s what the advertiser in Kansas said when the newspaper declined to accept an advertisement for a job opening that was available only to men.

And for every person we angered because we wouldn’t publish something, we angered three more by printing information — arrests, bankruptcies and such — that they wanted to keep from the public.

Over the years, people threatened to get me fired, beat me up, have me jailed, sue me, call my boss — all more than a few times.

The First Amendment, however, allowed the newspaper to make those decisions.

The Constitution protected the rights of the newspaper, and of those complaining about it, from government interference.

There are times the government is asked to referee, usually when one person’s rights conflict with another’s. That’s why we see lawsuits, for example, when a baker, citing his religious rights, refuses to bake a cake for a gay couple or when a boss fires employees for stating opinions with which he disagrees.

We should applaud government agencies that stay out of Americans’ cultural, religious and political battles as much as possible.

The First Amendment is our guarantee that government will not try to foist certain religions, or ideas or political candidates on us. The freedoms it protects certainly makes for a messy political arena, but that’s far better than the alternative.

Julie Doll, a native of Garden City, is a former newspaper journalist now living in Tucson, Arizona.

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Elon Musk doesn't understand the First Amendment or U.S. Constitution