The Apology, Socrates, and Freedom of Speech

"Without Freedom of Thought, there can be no such thing as Wisdom; and no such thing as public Liberty without Freedom of Speech"
-Benjamin Franklin, The New England Courant, Jul. 9, 1722



Freedom of speech has been a central notion to the concpet of democracy, and remains a hotly contested point even now. Perhaps the most famous case involving freedom of speech is Plato's Apology, an account of the trial of Socrates. In the Apology, Socrates is brought before a large jury (501 citizens) to defend himself against the charges of Meletus, Anytus, and Lycon that he is not worshipping state sanctioned gods and is corrupting the youth. Socrates explains that he has made many important people uncomfortable with his intense questioning in the search of wisdom, and that he suspects this is much of the real reason for the accusations brought against him.

Though this work is called "Apology" it is not an apology in the sense that we usually use the word. Socrates does not express regret or remorse about the things he is accused of. Instead, "apology" here means a defense or a formal justification. Throughout the work, Socrates goes to great lengths to express that he is not afraid to die, and in fact would rather do that than have his free speech restricted.

"if you say to me, Socrates, this time we will not mind Anytus, and will let you off, but upon one condition, that you are to inquire and speculate in this way no more, and that if you are caught doing this again you shall die;- if this was the condition on which you let me go, I should reply: Men of Athens...I shall never cease from the practice of teaching philosophy, exhorting anyone whom I meet after my manner, and convincing him..."

"Someone will say: Yes Socrates, but cannot you hold your tongue, and then you may go into a foreign city, and no one will interfere with you?...if I tell you that this would be a disobedience to a divine command, and therefore that I cannot hold my tongue, you will not believe that I am serious; and if I say again that the greatest good of man is daily to converse about virtue, and all that concerning which you hear me examining myself and others, and that the life which is unexamined is not worth living - that you are still less likely to believe"

Plato's Socratic dialogues, particularly Apology, Crito, and Phaedo are full of passages like these that have helped establish Socrates as a martyr for philosophy and for the idea of freedom of speech. It would be easy to condemn the Athenians for what seems to us a tragic example of democracy gone wrong. However, I believe we would do better to examine the thoughts of Saxonhouse in her Free Speech and Democracy in Ancient Athens when she contrasts the ideas of Thomas Jefferson ("It does me no harm for my neighbor to say that there are no gods or twenty gods; it neither picks my pocket or breaks my leg.") with an Athenian society in which freedom of speech and religion were entirely separate concepts. The reason for this refers us back to a running theme throughout this blog, that the modern US separation between the pubilc and private life make our democracy drastically different from that of the Athenians, for whom being a citizen, and tending to public affairs, was essentially a full time job. For us, and many of the Founders, religion was a private matter, not one pertaining to public affairs, which is why the very beginning of the First Amendment reads "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of a religion, or prophibiting the free exercise therof". However, this does not work in the Greek system where private matters are essentially public matters. While the Greeks understood the need for freedom of speech as it pertained to politics and government, they did not consider religious beliefs to fall within that scope.

This difference in meaning of freedom of speech can be seen in a detailed reading of the Apology by the fact that Socrates, for a man being accused of atheism, references the gods consistently throughout the work, as if to show the jury that he does in fact believe in them. He relates his mission to find the meaning behind the oracle at Delphi and he defends himself directly against the charge that he does not believe in the proper gods in his (extremely one sided) dialogue with Meletus. So, I think we can conclude that Saxonhouse has an interesting and worthwhile point in her statement that "for Athenians freedom of speech could not be uttered in the same breath as the totally alien notion of freedom of religion"

Interestingly, in the modern world, many of the regions most in need of freedom of speech are also regions where religion plays a major cultural and governmental role. In the middle east, where religious views are already highly charged, protests about religion or freedom can easily shift from one to the other. As citizens in countries such as Libya, Egypt, and Bahrain seek more freedom, it will be interesting to see whether they develop governmental systems that support freedom of religion in addition to freedom of speech and freedom from tyranny or whether they will mandate a state religion like the Athenian government did. This will depend on the roles of citizens in those countries and their relationship to the state. It also of course depends on the cultural background of the people in the political system. The US, being founded by people who fled other countries, often because of religious persecution, is in a unique situation which has led to a unique system of government.

Citizenship Bibliography

Primary Sources:
-Aristotle (Translated by Benjamin Jowett); Politics

Aristotle's Politics is divided into eight books addressing a variety of topics, briefly described as follows. Book I defines a political communitiy and compares it to the community of a household. Book II addresses ideal states, particularly those discussed by Plato, and then considers the well run states of Sparta, Crete, and Carthage. Book III considers citizens and the civic body, how to classify constitutions, and various forms of monarchy. Book IV focuses on variations of the main types of constitutions. Book V discusses revolutions, their causes, and how to avoid them. Book VI examines the organization of democracies and oligarchies. In Book VII, Aristotle relates his ideas of what is best for individuals and states, including many details regarding the best state such as the size of the population, territorial concerns, the best types of citizens, and the education system. Book VIII continues Aristotle's discussion of education of citizens.

The most relevent Book for my topic was Book III, as it considers citizens and the civic body. Therefore, that is the section that is cited in my discussion of Aristotle's Politics.

-Plato (Translated by Benjamin Jowett); Apology

Apology is Plato's version of Socrates's speech as he defends himself against the charges Meletus, Anytus, and Lycon have brought against him. His accusers claim that he has been corrupting youths and that he does not believe in the gods that the rest of the city believes in. Socrates does not apologize in the modern sense of the word, but rather explains that the claims are mistaken. He also questions Meletus and shows his arguments to be contradictory. Even when the jury finds him guilty, Socrates refuses to beg for forgiveness, and instead proposes his punishment be a small fine. The jury, likely angered by this proposition, sentences him to death and Socrates continues to assert his preference for death over dishonor until the end of the work.

-Plato (Translated by Desmond Lee); The Republic

Plato's Republic explores the concept of justice in societies and individuals. In order to examine these ideas, Plato proposes a city ruled by philosopher-kings. This is in contrast to the democratic ideas that fit the Athenian government of the time, but this disparity is significant because it confirms that the ancient Greeks questioned the entire concept of democracy, unlike most modern western societies. This examination of the various forms of government (albeit an idealized one) has laid the groundwork for numerous studies over the course of history and has made The Republic one of the most influential works of both political theory and philosophy.

-Thucydides (Translated by Richard Crawley); The History of the Peloponnesian War

The History of the Peloponnesian War is a major historical work in which Thucydides chronicles the 27 year war between Athens and Sparta. Despite the fact that Thucydides is an Athenian, this work is often held to be a fairly objective. This image of a scientific history is aided by the work's structure, which contains many first hand accounts, lists events in chronological order, and does not reference the gods the way many other works (like those of Herodotus) do.

Since The History of the Peloponnesian War is a lengthy work and not entirely related to the subject of this blog, my focus was on Pericles' Funeral Oration in Book 2. This funeral speech is significant in that it is a traditional public funeral for soldiers killed in battle, but the speech itself is not of the traditional form. Rather than simply honoring the dead and the ancestors, Pericles uses it as a platform to honor Athens and to push Athenians to strive for higher achievement. This includes interesting persepctives about the state, its citizens, and their rights and responsibilities

-United States Declaration of Independence
http://www.archives.gov/

The Second Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence as a statement of why the American colonies were justified in separating themselves from England. The document lists 27 specific abuses that King George III was guilty of inflicting on the colonists along with general abuses of the colonists by the government authorities of England as well as its citizens

This document is important background reading for this blog because it lays out what releatively modern Americans considered inalienable rights and unacceptable trespasses. This was an important starting point to see where these ideas of individual and government rights overlapped or diverged from those of the ancients

-United States Constitution
http://www.archives.gov/

The US Constitution is the fundamental legal document of the United States by which all other laws are measured. It consists of a Preamble, 7 Articles, and 27 Amendments. The Preamble explaines why the Constitution was created, but it has no legal force. The first 3 articles establish the structure for the 3 branches of government (legislative, executive, and judiciary). Article 4 addresses the states and the relationships between their governments. Article 5 explains the process of amending the Constitution, while Article 6 establishes it as the supremem law of the land, and Article 7 outlines the process required to ratify/accept it.

I will not list all of the amendments here, but will mention that for the purposes of this blog the First Amendment is particularly important. The First Amendment includes the rights to free speech, free assembly, free press, free religion, and petition of the government. This is particularly important to our comparison of citizen rights and responsibilities across times and cultures because most Americans would agree that these are the most crucial and basic rights an individual should have.

Secondary Sources:

-Ehrenberg, Victor; The Greek State; Oxford, Blackwell, 1960

The Greek State considers mainly the origin, structure, and functions of the Hellenic and Hellenistic states. Following Ehrenberg's definitions of these two states, the ancient Athenian democracy falls into the Hellenic state, so I did not consider the Hellenistic portions of the book. The detailed section on citizenship proved especially useful as background studies for this blog.

-Gunnell, John; Imagining the American Polity: Political Science and the Discourse of Democracy; University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press

In Gunnell's own words, Imagining the American Polity is "primarily a study of the evolution of the vision of democracy in American political science". It is important to know how democracy has been defined/redefined over time because Americans consider the United States to be the ideal model of democracy without always knowing what that entails. Gunnell traces what exactly democracy means through the relationships between the concept of democracy and those of the state, liberalism, and pluralism.

-Loizou, Andros and Lesser, Harry (Editors); Polis and Politics: Essays in Greek Moral and Political Philosophy; Avebury, England; Gower Publishing Company Limited, 1990

This book contained several articles by separate authors on different ancient political topics.

-Richard, Carl; The Founders and the Classics: Greece, Rome, and the American Enlightenment; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994

The Founders and the Classics gives an in depth explanation of the widely known fact that the Founding Fathers were very knowledgable about and interested in classical works. Richard explains how the Founders originally became interested in the classics through their education, the way that they appropriated various symbols and models based on their knowledge of ancient history, and their interaction with classical philosophy.

-Richard, Carl; Greeks and Romans Bearing Gifts: How the Ancients Inspired the Founding Fathers; Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2008

Greeks and Romans Bearing Gifts lays out a number of ways in which the Founding Fathers were influenced by Sparta, Athens, the fall of Greece to the Macedonians, Early Rome, the Roman Republic, and the Roman Emperors. Richard formats each chapter as a brief overview of the events of the era folowed by the lesson the Founders would have taken away from the classical records of those events. Since my focus is on the ancient Athenian democracy that we view as a sort of golden age, I paid particular attention to th chapter on "Athens and the Perils of Democracy"

-Saxonhouse, Arlene; Free Speech and Democracy in Ancient Athens; Cambridge University Press; New York City, 2006

In this book Saxonhouse explores the practice and limitations of free speech in ancient Athens through a wide variety of primary sources. She also compares and contrasts the modern concept of free speech and the tools required to achieve it with those of the ancient Athenians. This book was used to study free speech, which is one of the most important rights of citizens in a democracy.

-Woodruff, Paul; First Democracy: The Challenge of an Ancient Idea ; Oxford University Press; New York City, 2005

In First Democracy Woodruff discusses what real democracy is compared to common imitations of democracy like voting, majority rule, and the presence of elected representatives. He then explains what he considers to be the seven essential characteristics of democracy, freedom from tyranny, harmony, rule of law, natural equality, citizen wisdom, reasoning without knowledge, and education. Finally, Woodruff assesses whether Americans are ready for a true democracy. This book proved very useful in comparing and contrasting our modern political culture and the ancient Athenian political culture against an idealized concept of democracy rather than against each other, which provided a unique perspective on both states.

Original Intent: the Battle for America (1)

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The video above is taken from the documentary film "Original Intent: The Battle for America". This documentary addresses the debate over the meaning of the US Constitution and the original intent of the Founders. Politicians and judges often debate whether the Constitution should be interpreted according to what the Founders' words meant, literally, when the document was written or whether we should make our own decisions with reference to what principles we think the Founders were trying to protect when they wrote the Constitution.

In this clip we see former President George Bush explain several times that he will appoint judges that "strictly interpret the Constitution" and don't allow their personal opinion to shape their interpretation. (He is naturally overlooking the fact that being an originalist is also a personal opinion that is being used to interpret the Constitution.) We then see Justice Antonin Scalia explain that "There is indeed no reason to have a Constitution except to establish a fundamental framework that cannot be departed from"

Whether the originalists have it right or wrong, their attitude of reverence and strict adherence to a document written roughly 200 years ago is drastically different from the democracy of ancient Athens.The Athenian democracy had a smaller jurisdiction both geographically and in population, than our own. This allowed for, and in fact demanded, much more active citizens. In order to facilitate this sort of government, the citizens had to be free to make decisions, and so their rules were less restrictive in this sense than our Constitution is. The Athenians would certainly not have held reverently to a 200 year old document if the various citizen bodies found it out of date and absurd. The issue of what exactly a word meant 200 years ago, would not be an issue, because they would not have been bound by such documents. Even the judiciary branch of Athenian democracy relies far more on the common man than our own, as decisions were often made by panels or large juries (because large juries are harder to bribe) rather than by individual judges or a relatively small number of judges like our Supreme Court.

The Modern Link: Excerpts on Democratic Government from Pericles' Funeral Oration

[Primary Source Excursus]

Thucydides was an Athenian historian who lived from 460-395 BC. His great contribution to Classical Studies was "The History of the Peloponnesian War", a large record of the war between Sparta and Athens that took place in his lifetime. The war lasted approximately 30 years, and Thucydides considered it to be of enormous historical importance. Accordingly, he gives detailed accounts from eyewitnesses or recounts events or speeches he witnessed himself. Unlike Herodotus, Thucydides does not regularly reference the will of the gods, and so many scholars consider his work to be a relatively objective account of the war.

The excerpts in the post below come from Book 2 of this work, a section known as Pericles' Funeral Oration. In this passage, Pericles, a famous Athenian politician, is giving a speech at a customary public funeral for Athenian soldiers killed during the war (as seen in the painting below). Pericles starts his speech in the customary way, by refering to the glory of the ancestors. However, he soon deviates from this and focuses instead on praising Athens and exhorting the living to continue to live up to the reputations of tose who have been killed in battle.



These public funerals and Pericles' interest in the city rather than individual glories show us a culture that is shifting away from individual glory towards a more democratic, egalitarian death ritual. It is interesting that the 5th C Athenian form of democracy, which is more interested in equal rights among different classes, applies this group death ritual, while in current United States culture death is viewed as a very private and isolated affair.

There are several passages from Pericles' Funeral Oration (Thucydides, "The History of the Peloponnesian War") that espouse what I would consider typical middle class American beliefs. In fact, I would say that it is only the rhetoric, rather than the content that allows us to detect the difference between Pericles' statements and some of our own. However, the fact that these are what we would consider national ideals does not mean that we always act on them. This can be seen from some of the controversial topics below. Based on the controversies within our own society, it seems safe to assume that the ancient Greeks also had similar conflicts within their society.

Example 1: Immigrants

" We throw open our city to the world, and never by alien acts exclude foreigners from any opportunity of learning or observing, although the eyes of an enemy may occaisionally profit by our liberality; trusting less in system and policy than to the native spirit of our citizens"
-Pericles

It is important to note here, that though Pericles claims that Athens is a worldly city, and is highlighting the opportunities available to foreigners, he is simultaneously distinguishing them from citizens. He is not claiming that foreigners can come to Athens and be equal to citizens, but simply that there are opportunities here for them in addition to citizens.

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me.
I lift my lamp beside the golden door."
-Inscription from the Statue of Liberty

This inscription from the Statue of Liberty depicts a US that professes to be a melting pot, a country where nearly everyone came from somewhere else and all are welcome. However, in reality the US, like so many other places has struggled to accept foreigners and grant them full citizen rights. Two fairly modern controversies involving immigration/foreignes can be seen in the videos below.

Rush Limbaugh on illegal immigration: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHPm_TEQ0PA

PBS on Manzanar internment camp: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgmY2P-xT_Y

I see a strong parallel between Pericles' assertion that the Athenians have a worldy city where people can come from all over and be given all kinds of opportunities, and the US's similar assertion that it is a country where anyone who is downtrodden or persecuted can go. Regardless of both cultures' insistence on openess and opportunity, it appears that we still struggle with the same concerns and issues the Greeks did over 2000 years ago.

Example 2: Privacy

"The freedom which we enjoy in our government extends also to our ordinary life. There, far from exercising jealous surveillance over each other, we do not feel called upon to be angry with our neighbor for doing what he likes.."
-Pericles

Many Americans consider privacy a crucial right, and would like to think that Pericles' statement above applies to the current government of the United States. However, as can be seen in the pictures below, there are still groups of citizens and even government agencies that "excercise jealous surveillance" and are "angry with our neighbor for doing what he likes". So, here again we can see a parallel between the current United States and the ancient Greek culture.


Members of Westboro Baptist Church


Senate Subcommittee on Investigations - McCarthy Hearings

Example 3: Equal Rights

"If we look to the laws, they afford equal justice to all in their private differences; if no social standing, advancement in public life falls to reputation for capacity, class considerations not being allowed to interfere with merit; nor again does poverty bar the way, if a man is able to serve the state, he is not hindered by the obscurity of his condition"
-Pericles

"The Department of Education— enforces federal statutes prohibiting discrimination in programs and activities receiving federal funds and ensures equal access to education for every individual.
The Department enforces five civil rights statutes to ensure equal educational opportunity for all students, regardless of race, color, national origin, sex, disability or age. These laws extend to all ... entities that receive U.S. Department of Education funds." (http://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/focus/what_pg2.html#howdoes)

While the United States has consistently moved towards equal justice for all citizens, there are undeniably some areas where discrimination still exists. Sometimes this discrimination is personal and intentinal, but more often it is unintentionally integrated into a system, such as the public school system, where it cannot be easily eradicated. While the Athenians worked hard to ensure that class/economic differences did not influence their political system, they were not concerned about eliminating discrimination against women, slaves, or foreigners. So, when Pericles says that the laws afford equal justice to all, he means al citizens, not all people. It is important to note this difference between the Athenian culture and our own, because it has a strong effect on the governmental structure and its success.

Pericles' statements rendered here by Thucydides speak to fundamental ideas of democracy still deemed important today. This is augmented by the complexity of the details surrounding these statements and the controversy that is generated by said details. While most of us would agree that the points layed out here by Pericles are excellent qualities to have in a democracy, we often disagree when weighing between qualities and settling details and policies.

Citizenship: The Public vs Private Life

In a democratic government the role of a citizen must be clearly defined. What makes one a citizen? What rights and responsibilities does that include? Can citizenship or the associated rights be stripped if the person does not meet the requirements set forth by the society? These questions were perhaps even more important to the Greeks than they are to us today since their government was run directly from the citizens rather than through representatives.

Aristotle addresses The citizen, civic virtue, and the civic body in Politics, Book III, Ch 1-5. In Chapter 1, he explains that in a democracy a citizen is not a complete citizen just because they live in a certain place, or are born in a certain place, or even because they have access to the courts. Rather that "his special characteristic is that he shares in the administration of justice, and in offices" or more broadly, that "He who has the power to take part in the deliberative or judicial administration of any state is said by us to be a citizen of that state".

So here we can see a definition of a citizen that is more stringent than our own and is tied much more closely to the state than our own. Our relationship with the state involves almost entirely receiving rights, with the only societal expectation of responsibility being that we obey the laws. The Greek relationship between the citizen and the state involved more responsibilities for the citizens, like active political involvment and the willingness to participate in military campaigns.

Finally, in Chapter 5, Aristotle addresses whether those who hold no share in office can be true citizens. He concludes that they are not as "he is a citizen in the highest sense who shares in the honours of the state" and "he who is excluded from the honours of the state is no better than an alien". Aristotle states that "It must be admitted that we cannot consider all those to be citizens who are necessary to the existence of the state; for example, children are not citizens equally with grown-up men, who are citizens absolutely" This shows a consistent and firm belief that the rights and responsibilities of citizens were firmly linked to their participation in public life, and that it was not sufficient to be born a citizen if you did not fulfill these public duties.

The Foremost Right of Citizenship? : Amendment I

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise therof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceabley to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances" - US Constitution, Amendment I, 1791

For full transcripts see:
Constitution: http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution.html
Bill of Rights: http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/bill_of_rights.html

The First Amendment expresses what many Americans consider to be the foremost rights of citizenship. Much like we still debate about what the scope of these freedoms should encompass, the ancients were often inconsistent or unsure of what speech or actions should be protected. However, the perspective of the ancient Athenians was based on a vastly different political and social structure.

The first chapter of "Free Speech and Democracy in Ancient Athens" (Saxonhouse, 2006) addresses these differences, pointing out that the American concept of free speech is built around the idea of a citizenry whose rights need to be protected from infringment by the government. The Athenian system however, with government positions being chosen by lot, meant that the citizens WERE the government and so they were more concerned with protecting free speech to ensure equality among citizens. These ideas are expressed by Saxonhouse as follows:

"The Athenians certainly understood and feared tyranny....but they, as citizens ruling over themselves, were not the tyrants they feared. The separation of the people and its government, so much a part of our language today....has no place in the political culture of the ancient Athenians"

"The modern individual possesses freedom of speech so that the government as his or her agent acts in the interest of the governed, so that those in authority do not misuse their power......The Athenian freedom of speech is the affirmation of the equality of participation and self-rule."