Now More than Ever, Free-Speech Dogma Is Worth Defending

‘Two things form the bedrock of any open society,” Salman Rushdie once noted, “freedom of expression and rule of law. If you don’t have those things, you don’t have a free country.”

Well, in a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, “How Free Speech Dogma Failed Us in Charlottesville,” Michael Signer, the former mayor of Charlottesville, makes the argument that restricting speech is necessary for the rule of law.

The first problem with Signer’s case is the premise itself. Sorry, but we have no uniquely pressing need to “keep pace” with...