The research topic addressed in this project was the constitutional protections of the “fighting words” exception to the First Amendment and reevaluating constitutional protections for this category of speech. This research aimed to contextualize the fighting words classification of speech within recent Supreme Court decisions, legal scholarship, and the greater research into the harms of hate speech on individuals. This research was conducted by reading relevant court cases, both federal and state supreme court decisions, as well as legal research, and social science research. In conducting this research, I found that the fighting words doctrine remains a present restriction on speech in state courts and serves a valuable purpose in protecting individuals from the real harms that can be caused by speech. This being said, the fighting words category of speech needs to be carefully drawn to only proscribe a narrowly tailored category of speech, including by ensuring that speech restrictions do not discriminate on the basis of viewpoint, which is something the Supreme Court and other courts have struggled with since the doctrine’s inception.
