"The owner, Brookfield Properties, expressly prohibits tents, tarps and sleeping in the park—rules ignored by the protesters. It also has a history of denying use of the park for political activities, which is within its rights. Last year the city and Brookfield Properties denied a request by a group to use the park to protest against the planned new mosque near the World Trade Center. A content-neutral approach, the cornerstone of First Amendment jurisprudence, should also have kept Occupy Wall Street out."
Gordon Crovitz: The Police Remove the Occupy Wall Street Tents - WSJ.com11-21-11
The First Amendment does not protect behavior that threatens health and safety.
Last week, the New York City Police Department's First Precinct issued the latest crime statistics. Typical offenses in the financial district and Tribeca usually are limited to minor matters such as hawking fake Rolexes and operating unlicensed food carts. This time there was a big increase in violent crimes. "Almost all of these crimes were in and around Zuccotti Park," commanding officer Edward Winski reported, adding wryly: "Many of these were assaults against police officers."
From Oakland, Calif., to Portland, Ore., to New York, the Occupy Wall Street movement has worn out the patience of even the most liberal cities. The protesters were shocked when politicians stopped excusing their unlawful behavior by referring to their First Amendment rights and instead forcibly removed their tent cities as threats to health and safety.
The protesters never-ending endgame is a reminder that under the First Amendment, speech may be subject to time, place and manner restrictions that do not include the concept of "occupation."
The global movement began in New York's Zuccotti Park, which Mayor Mike Bloomberg finally cleared out last week after nearly two months of a tent city even the police feared to enter. By the end, it featured rapes, drug use and public health dangers. It took 150 Sanitation Department workers hours to clear the mess, finding everything from used hypodermic needles to buckets of human waste. "These were some of the worst smells I've ever experienced," a veteran garbageman told the New York Post.
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