From Nazis to Late Night: Why Free Speech Matters

Frank Collin: Truth is always in the interests of the community, whether the times are favorable to it or not.

Host: In the late 1970s, this guy was all over national TV…

Collin: The utmost truth, Adolf Hitler’s truth, that the white race is the master race and has the right to dominate and should dominate. That truth is eternal and should be broadcast and spoken about regardless of the climate of the times.

Host: His name was Frank Collin, and he was a Nazi. He founded The National Socialist Party of America. In 1977 he and his small band of fellow neo-Nazis applied for a permit to march in the suburban town of Skokie, just north of Chicago.

Newsreel/AP: They want to hold demonstrations there and pass out some of their abundant anti-Jew, anti-Black literature.

Host: Skokie had a population of about 70,000, and about 40,000–more than half! –of those residents were Jewish. A lot of Holocaust survivors lived there . So it’s understandable they weren’t a big fan of real-life Nazis demonstrating in front of their town hall…

Newsreel/AP: Skokie officials have blocked Nazi demonstrations with court injunctions. When the Nazis appealed to the State Supreme Court, the judges refused to hear the case.

Some Jewish groups, like the right-wing Jewish Defense League, were even gearing up to fight…

1977 Special Report: My stand on violence has not changed. The Nazis will not march in Skokie without being physically beaten.

The question: Did Nazis have the right to march through a mostly Jewish town––in storm trooper uniforms!, with swastikas!? Did the risk of violence outweigh the right to free speech? This was the defining First Amendment controversy of its day. It was national news for over a year as it made its way through the courts, and through the court of public opinion. 

Now, all this happened before I was born. I’ve only just learned about it while preparing for this podcast. I now know what happened, and if you’re old enough to remember it, you obviously do, too. But if this is the first time you’re hearing about it, well, it is weird…

Newsreel AP: The group has gotten a favorable ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court, which says that it’s a violation of the first amendment to refuse a hearing for any group. Party leader Frank Collin says he’s so pleased with the high court’s reversal of the injunction he’s inviting Nazis from all over the United States to hold a demonstration at Skokie on the fourth of July.

Collin: There will be a united effort to have organizations from California, New York, St. Louis and Texas and so forth, and this will be a real united cause, we feel. 

There were two huge ironies in this controversy. The first: the Skokie march… never took place! Even though the Supreme Court ruled they had the right to demonstrate in Skokie, the Nazis instead held a small rally in Chicago’s Marquette Park, not far from their headquarters. Which is what they had wanted to do all along.

[Sound from Marquet Park demo.]

Counter-demonstrators at this protest vastly outnumbered the Nazis, and the violence that did take place was between the counter-demonstrators and the police. No one got killed, but there were arrests and minor injuries. And in the end the Chicago police basically protected about 25 Nazis.

[More sound from Marquet Park demo.]

The ACLU represented the Nazis in court. But the other ironic thing is that the local ACLU attorney in charge of this case was Jewish. So was the ACLU’s executive director. So here we had Jews defending the right of free speech of Nazis. 

This almost 50 year-old controversy still has a lot to tell us about free speech and the First Amendment—the topic of the day on campuses, in the streets, in the media. We’re going to hear more about all of this from that executive director of the ACLU at the time of the Skokie controversy. He’s not only Jewish but also a Holocaust survivor. He also happens to be a co-founder of Human Rights Watch.

This is Rights & Wrongs, a podcast from Human Rights Watch. I'm Ngofeen Mputubwele. I am a writer, a lawyer, and a radio producer. Human Rights Watch asked me to look at human rights hotspots around the world through the eyes and ears of people on the front lines of history.

This week, the intimate connection between Freedom of Speech and Human Rights.

Ngofeen: Aryeh Neier has lived through a lot of history. He was born in 1937 in Berlin in 1939. He was just two years old when his family fled. The Nazis who went on to murder, much of his extended family. You might say that his professional career has been an effort to prevent that brutal history from endlessly repeating itself.

He started working for the ACLU in 1963 and became its executive director in 1970. In 1978, he co-founded Helsinki Watch, which was renamed Human Rights Watch. 10 years later, he also served as the inaugural president of George Soros Open Society Institute from 1993 to 2012. He's been on the front lines of human rights struggles for pretty much his entire life.

In 1979, he published Defending My Enemy. American Nazis in Skokie, Illinois and the risks of freedom. That book has been recently reissued with a new chapter, addressing the threats to free speech that we're seeing in 2025. Aryeh Nier. Welcome to the podcast Rights and Wrongs. Thank you very much. I'm gonna go back in time to the late 1970s.

Uh, you were the executive director of the ACL U. Um, do you remember at all what your favorite music was at the time, say 1977?

Aryeh Neier: Um, I mostly listened to, uh, to classical music.

Ngofeen: Okay. Are we a Beethoven, a Bach, a Verdi, uh, Stravinsky?

Aryeh Neier: Well, you are mentioning a number of my favorite, uh, composers of the more recent composers.

I put, uh, Stravinsky as probably the greatest composer of the 20th century.

Ngofeen: Okay.

Aryeh Neier: A lot of Stravinsky has what would be called in German. Storm and drunk Uhhuh, uh, storm and stress, and I think we're in a period of storm and stress.

Ngofeen: Yeah. Yeah. It is 2025 to a lot of us. The world feels crazy. Um, it feels like every big thing is happening right now.

I've only lived 38 years, so my, my perspective might be narrow. I'm wondering, as someone who's lived longer, how does what's happening right now strike you?

Aryeh Neier: This seems to me the most, uh, dangerous period of my adult life. The forces of authoritarianism have been prevailing on a global basis. We have Xi Jinping in China.

We have Putin and Russia. We have. Leaders, uh, such as Erdogan and Turkey and Modi in India, and Sii in Egypt and many other, uh, authoritarian leaders who exercise significant power. But we also see an advance of authoritarianism here in the United States. And so I feel that the values that matter to me are in greater danger than ever.

Before, and it seems to me all the more necessary to be able to speak out, to organize with others who may sympathize with my concerns for freedom and sympathize with the concerns of those who suffer repression. And in that way, uh, to protect, uh, all, uh, rights and not only the right to freedom of speech.

Ngofeen: So you're the executive director of the ACL U. A CLU decided to represent Frank Collin and the National Socialist Party of America in the Nazi party's efforts to march and hold a demonstration in Skoki. What, why? 

Aryeh Neier: Because, uh, the role of the ACL U, first and foremost is to defend freedom of speech. The A CLU was, uh, created in 1920.

That had been a period when freedom of speech was under great stress, uh, during. Uh, World War I, thousands of Americans were prosecuted and punished for opposing American entry into the war, uh, and for opposing the draft in the immediate aftermath of the war. There were the Palmer raids in which radicals were rounded up and imprisoned without due process, and many of them were deported summarily from the United States.

Uh, we in the A CLU thought of freedom of speech as the way to protect all rights. That is, it was, uh, difficult to protect rights unless we could speak out about violations of rights. And the First Amendment and the commitment to freedom of speech made it possible to denounce any violations of rights.

And, uh, that was the, uh, the foremost concern of the ACL U.

Ngofeen: Hmm. You or Jewish, uh, from a family who had fled the Nazis. So, um, what did you personally think of Frank Collin and his crew?

Aryeh Neier: I had only contempt for Frank Cullen. I had dealt with a number of the neo-Nazi leaders of that time. Uh, they were a repugnant, uh, group of people.

Uh, but the A CLU uh, had the standpoint that no viewpoint repression should take place. Any viewpoint could be expressed peacefully.

Ngofeen: Hmm. So you write in your book, I supported free speech for Nazis when they wanted to march in Skokie in order to defeat Nazis. Yes, defending my enemy is the only way to protect a free society against the enemies of freedom.

I wonder if you could explain what you mean by that.

Aryeh Neier: I think that if any group is persecuted, if Jews are persecuted in Nazi Germany, if blacks are persecuted in the United States or South Africa, if Roma are persecuted in Eastern Europe, if we go are persecuted in China, it's always important that they should make known.

The, uh, abuses they suffer to those who may be sympathetic in other parts of the country or other parts of the world. And that is essential, uh, in defending freedom. And I thought that. One has to, um, defend even those who are themselves most, uh, antagonistic to freedom of speech. If one was to ensure that freedom of speech is protected for everyone else.

Ngofeen: And is the idea that in your conception, is it that like freedom of speech. The basis that other freedoms are built upon or that are necessary now they're for the freedoms.

Aryeh Neier: Freedom of speech is the way to protect all other freedoms. Mm-hmm. If you are concerned with the way in which immigrants are being treated, you have to let others know about the unfairness or the abuses that take place, and then that way you can rally support for those who are being victimized. That's the essence of free speech. If I am persecuted, I don't want to be silent about it. I want to speak out and I want to have the right to speak out. I want to align myself with others who are in the same position and to secure the support of others who may be sympathetic to my cause.

Hmm.

Ngofeen: I wanna get your take on free speech issues now in Trump's President Trump's inauguration speech. He said that after years and years of illegal and unconstitutional federal efforts to restrict free expression, I will also sign an executive order to immediately stop all government censorship and bring back free speech.

In America we are. 10 months into his second term. Now, I wonder what you make of that statement.

Aryeh Neier: Well, when he made that statement in his inaugural address, I wondered what he was talking about. Two thoughts came to mind. One thought was that he was referring to the people who had stormed the capitol on January 6th.

And might be saying that they were engaged in freedom of speech and the next day he pardoned, uh, 1600 people. So that made me think of the, uh, the January 6th events as possibly what he was talking about. The other thought. That came to me, which was reinforced by the fact that his inauguration was attended by many of the titans of the internet, uh, industry, was that he was suggesting.

That the government was responsible for the, uh, content moderation policies of a number of the social media companies, and, uh, he was intent on ending those content moderation programs. I still don't know for sure. What he was referring to, but the actual practices of the Trump administration have had a severe impact on freedom of speech, but it's quite different from earlier periods in American history.

Mm-hmm. The characteristic of many of the Trump administration's attacks on freedom of speech is that the targets have been establishment institutions. They have been elite universities. They have been, uh, wealthy major law firms. Uh, they have been the broadcast media such as, uh, CBS and A BC, and also he has filed a number of suits against major newspapers, at least with.

To the broadcast media, the universities, and the law firms. A dismaying aspect of that, from my standpoint is that those institutions have very large, uh, amounts of money at stake in their relations with the, uh, the federal government and a significant number of them have succumbed to the pressure of the Trump administration.

I would've expected. Did more resistance to these attacks on, uh, freedom of expression. And I think the fact that they have capitulated to the administration is the most dangerous, uh, aspect of what is taking place.

Ngofeen: How so?

Aryeh Neier: the broadcast media, for example, paid damages to Trump when he filed lawsuits against them, which could not have prevailed.

Uh, in court he filed a lawsuit against a, B, C. For George Stephanopoulos broadcast in which he said that Trump had been found liable for rape, Trump was actually found liable, not for rape, but for sexual abuse by, uh, a court in the Eugene Carroll case. Mm-hmm. The press, uh, or anybody as protected in defamation litigation by the Supreme Court's ruling in times versus Sullivan in 1964, in which when one supposedly defames a public figure, it is necessary to prove actual malice, which means knowledge. That the allegation is false or reckless, disregard, whether it's true or false. Uh, he could not have prevailed in the, uh, the lawsuit against, uh, a, B, C if it had gone to court, but a, b, c felt it necessary to pay him $16 million, which in effect was a bribe, so as to make sure that the administration.

Dealt with the financial needs of, uh, a, b, C in a manner that was, uh, helpful to the network. The lawsuit against CBS for the broadcast of 60 minutes and the Kamala Harris interview was even more preposterous than the litigation involving the, uh, Stefanus matter essentially. Trump accused CBS of false advertising for its editing of the Kamala Harris interview and CBS paid the same amount that a b, C had paid in order to, uh, to settle the suit and the chief executive of the 60 minutes program.

Resigned over this. The, uh, president of CBS News resigned over this. These were significant intrusions on freedom of the press, but the press in terms of two important, uh, broadcast media capitulated. To Trump, the law firms have been, uh, even worse. Trump attacked various law firms out of personal antagonism to those firms.

They had done something or other, which antagonized him. The case that proceeded first was, uh, the one involving the Paul Weiss, uh, law firm, and his complaint against the Paul Weiss Law Firm is that one of the lawyers for the firm. Had taken a leave of absence in 2021 and had worked with the Manhattan District Attorney's office in an investigation of corruption in Trump's business, and the executive order that Trump side not only would have.

Prevented the federal government from doing any business with that firm, and not only would've denied any of the lawyers from that firm security clearances, but it said they would not be allowed to enter federal buildings. So on the basis of a personal grievance. Trump acted as though the federal buildings were his personal property, and he could exclude personnel from those firms, uh, from those buildings.

And yet law firms like Paul Weiss, where the average partner made about $6 million a year, went along with Trump and agreed to perform. $40 million worth of pro bono work for Trump supported causes. Among them, the law firms that capitulated to Trump agreed to provide about a billion dollars in pro bono services for causes supported by Trump.

And again, all of these based on personal grievances rather than, uh, anything that involved public policy.

Ngofeen: Mm-hmm. Um, you mentioned universities. Yes. Um. The Trump administration has attacked universities for almost the allegation of allowing, uh, antisemitism on canvas. Um, we're in New York, Columbia University essentially capitulated to the, the demands.

What do you make of the Columbia situation and how do you analyze it?

Aryeh Neier: I think the Columbia situation was another example of capitulation. Columbia University had demonstrations in support of the Palestinian cause. Columbia could appropriately regulate those demonstrations on the basis of time, place, and manner.

That is, uh, it could insist that the demonstrations. Not interfere with classes or not interfere with graduation or not occupy the administration building, but it should not be able to silence any group because of the viewpoints that are expressed, or at least if, uh, Columbia adhered to, um. Public standards of, uh, freedom of speech, and in general, universities in the United States, whether they are private or public universities, have adhered to public standards with respect to the viewpoints that may be expressed and the demands of the administration with Columbia included having receivers appointed for certain departments at the university.

For departments of the School of International Public Affairs, the departments dealing with the Middle East and with Africa, uh, and with, uh, Asia, and those would be the parts of the School of International Public Affairs, which would tend to have. A significant number of Muslim students or students from Muslim countries and faculty members who, uh, hail from those countries.

Columbia also was subject to other aspects of viewpoint discrimination, and the government clearly exceeded its authority. In imposing those kinds of restrictions on Columbia and Columbia agreed to, uh, a settlement of about $200 million with the Trump administration. That's a significant burden, uh, on the, uh, the university.

Mm-hmm. And, uh, I think it's an improper attack on freedom of speech. In addition, of course. The Trump administration has sought to penalize, uh, a number of the students at Columbia University. It attacked, for example, the student, Mahmoud Khallil, who was detained and would have been deported from the United States except for the legal battle that was waged in his behalf.  

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Ngofeen: One thing I wanna ask, so we're, we're talking about Columbia and also I'm just thinking about the, the contemporary moments. It's like antisemitism, Charlie Kirk and also Jimmy Kimmel are all, in the world I inhabit, the things that people are talking about related to speech. And I'm wondering how your ideas intersect with those things because, uh, I think some people certainly feel that the speech is too dangerous and so, and then would use Charlie Kirk to say, ah, this is the example of it being too dangerous. As someone who, like this is your territory in terms of legally and experience, how do you process all of that?

Aryeh Neier: I think the best remedy, uh, for hate speech is counter speech. That is, if there are expressions of antisemitism or, uh, antagonism to, uh, to any other group, uh, it is very important that opposing, uh, points of view should be expressed. And I think the effort to make sure that those, uh, are expressed,uh, has a significant effect. Uh, if you take the, uh, the Skokie matter, ultimately, after we prevailed in court and the Nazis were allowed to demonstrate in Skokie, they didn't turn up. And the reason I think they did not turn up is there would've been 20 or 30 of them at the most, and there would have been about 50 or 60,000 people who came to denounce them, and they would've looked ridiculous or they would've looked pathetic In those circumstances. The Nazis above all wanted publicity. They thought that they would be able to, um, recruit more members by getting attention, and they got an immense amount of attention during the Skokie controversy, but it didn't help them. They didn't recruit, uh, any more members. And not long after they prevailed in court, the little Nazi group in Chicago dissolved and was never heard from again. And I think the willingness of many people to turn out, to denounce them, to turn out peacefully to denounce them was very important. So if there are anti-Semites on the, um, Columbia campus, I am, uh, very much in favor of denunciation of the anti-Semites, but counter-speech is very different from a prohibition on speech.

Ngofeen: Yeah.

Aryeh Neier: The, uh, the Jimmy Kimmel, uh, episode is, uh, I think, uh, important. Uh, because I think that ABC in that circumstance capitulated because the chair of the Federal Communications Commission threatened, uh, ABC and they had financial interests, which were at stake in that matter, but then the Federal Communications Commission chair was denounced among others by a couple of Republican senators, Rand Paul denounced the uh, chair of the Federal Communications Commission. And to my surprise, to my pleasant surprise, one of those who denounced the chair of the Federal Communications Commission was Senator Ted Cruz. And he likened the chair of the Federal Communications Commission to a mafioso in attacking ABC. I think that probably stiffened the backbone of ABC.

And after a few days, uh, they brought Jimmy Kimmel back and that I think was a victory for the, uh, the First Amendment. So it's always important to speak out and it's important that not only the usual cast of characters speak out, but people you don't expect to speak out like Cruz, uh, actually defend the First Amendment, and that has a very valuable impact.

Ngofeen: Aryeh Neier. Thank you so much. Aryeh NI's recently reissued book is called Defending My Enemy, American Nazis in Skokie, Illinois, and the risks of Freedom.

Host: You’ve been listening to Rights & Wrongs from Human Rights Watch. The archival clips in this episode came from the Associated Press, ABC News Chicago, ABC News, CBS, The Washington Post and the US Department of State.

This episode was produced by me and Curtis Fox. Sophie Soloway is the associate producer. Ifé Fatunase and Stacy Sullivan are the executive producers. Thanks also to Anthony Gale. 

I’m Ngofeen Mputubwele. We’ll be back in two weeks with a new episode. Thanks for listening!