Some members of the committee said such a ban, proposed two months after a prominent conservative activist was caught meeting with a famous white supremacist, might be a “slippery slope” or too vague.
Some members of the committee said such a ban, proposed two months after a prominent conservative activist was caught meeting with a famous white supremacist, might be a “slippery slope” or too vague.
Thats a clear violation of the first amendment, freedom of association. Am I misreading the article?
The Republican Party of Texas is a non-government organization that can demand its members (politicians) follow a code of conduct.
Yep, I completely misread it the first time. I thought it was a law they were trying to pass, not something for party members.
Pretty sure government organizations can impose a code of conduct, though they’re usually framed as laws or regulations. Hatch Act would be one example.
Edit: though I guess it might depend on how you define “code of conduct.”
Free speech and freedom of association are not unlimited rights. There are still a couple things that you can’t do like yell fire in a crowded movie theater or incite violence etc. Anything that poses an immediate and forseeable lethal danger to others is going to be non-protected speech and association. And arguably NAZI ideology falls into that camp given one of its stated goals is ethnic cleansing. The only real defense NAZIs have is to quibble over what the word “immediate” means.
This would have been a rule in the Texas Republican Party, not a law for the state.