In spite of what some misinformed internet users are suggesting.
The Supreme Court determination says that Texas "can" reject a specialty plate with a Confederate flag image. It did not say it "Had" to. Also, it was only about issuing a license plate. No Confederate Flag band.
- Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, one of the more conservative
members of the country's high court, sided with four liberal justices
Thursday in ruling that Texas could reject a specialty license plate
featuring an image of the Confederate flag. [Huffington Post]
- The Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision on Thursday that specialty plates convey the state's endorsement of a particular message.
- "Indeed,
a person who displays a message on a Texas license plate likely intends
to convey to the public that the State has endorsed that message. If
not, the individual could simply display the message in question in
larger letters on a bumper sticker right next to the plate," wrote
Justice Stephen Breyer in the majority opinion, which was shared by Justices Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.
The dissenting opinions, though, has worthy merit:
- The dissent, authored by Justice Samuel Alito
and joined by Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Antonin Scalia and
Justice Anthony Kennedy, argued that custom Texas license plates do not
imply an endorsement by the state of whatever message the plate carries.
The dissent included images of other custom license plates issued by
Texas that Alito argued the state doesn't endorse. One plate shows a can
of Dr. Pepper, another carries an advertisement for Re/Max, a third is
for the University of Notre Dame and a fourth reads "Rather Be Golfing."
Alito and his fellow dissenters said it would be unreasonable for
people to think that the messages on the plates were endorsed by the
state of Texas."If a car with a plate that says 'Rather Be
Golfing' passed by at 8:30 am on a Monday morning, would you think:
'This is the official policy of the State -- better to golf than to
work?'" the dissent reads. "If you did your viewing at the start of the
college football season and you saw Texas plates with the names of the
University of Texas’s out-of-state competitors in upcoming games --
Notre Dame, Oklahoma State, the University of Oklahoma, Kansas State,
Iowa State -- would you assume that the State of Texas was officially
(and perhaps treasonously) rooting for the Longhorns’ opponents? And
when a car zipped by with a plate that reads 'NASCAR – 24 Jeff Gordon,'
would you think that Gordon (born in California, raised in Indiana,
resides in North Carolina) is the official favorite of the State
government?"
