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GUEST: Christopher Finan, President of the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression and the chair of the National Coalition Against Censorship, author of “From the Palmer Raids to the Patriot Act: A History of the Fight for Free Speech in America”

Writing the first comprehensive history of the evolution of free speech in the United States, Christopher Finan, begins his new book with the Palmer Raids of 1919-1921. He takes this history of the fight for free speech, all the way to today’s PATRIOT Act. Along the way, Finan reports on the founding of the American Civil Liberties Union, government attacks on communists as well as extremist groups like the Ku Klux Klan, the second Red Scare, the civil rights era, the anti-Vietnam War movement, Watergate, the Pentagon Papers, and the Reagan-era anti-obscenity crusades. While the US Supreme Court has historically played a lead role in defining the scope of free speech, Finan shows how ordinary citizens including miners, railroad workers, union reps, political activists, book sellers, and librarians, have been at the forefront of the struggle to maintain our civil liberties.

For more information, visit the author’s website at ChrisFinan.com.