Limited Protected Speech

#1 The U.S. Supreme Court divides speech into three categories, fully protected, limited protected, and unprotected speech. The following paragraphs will address limited protected and unprotected speech. Limited protected speech, cannot be banned by the government, but is subjected to time, place and manner restrictions. There are several forms of limited speech, but two major forms are offensive and commercial speech. Offensive speech, not to be confused with obscene speech, is speech that offends a large population of society, it cannot be banned by the government, but is placed under time, place, and manner restrictions to protect the population that is offended by the speech (Cheeseman, 2013, p. 96). Examples of these types of restrictions
Examples of unprotected speech include, but are not limited to, defamatory language and fighting words. Fighting words are words that when spoken face to face are likely to cause the intended listener to react in a hostile or violent manner. Personal insults and epithets are examples of fighting words (“Categories,” n.d.). Defamatory language, both written and verbal is unprotected speech that is false and damages a company or person’s reputation. For example, if a person writes a blog claiming that Subway uses child labor to harvest their produce when in fact, Subway does not, Subway can sue the writer for
121). Many states have adopted the strict liability doctrine to determine product liability cases. Under strict liability, defendants can be determined liable despite following all necessary preparations from manufacturing to sale; this concept is known as liability without fault (Cheeseman, 2013, p. 121). Therefore, all parties in the supply chain of distribution are liable for any injury caused by the product. For example, a customer purchases a new stove from a local hardware store that has an unknown heating element defect. Later, the heating element catches fire, causing significant damage to the customer’s house. If the customer lives in a jurisdiction that recognizes strict liability that customers can sue any party of the chain of distribution, including the hardware store, manufacturer, and distributor. A defendant, who is not at fault, can later sue the negligent party of the chain of distribution to recover monetary rewards paid to the