Defending Governor Andrew Cuomo’s recent order that state agencies divest from corporations refusing to do business with the Jewish state, Eugene Kontorovich refutes those who claim the order impinges on the freedom of speech:
The First Amendment protects speech, not conduct. . . . [T]he act of boycotting Israel does not in and of itself express any political viewpoint. Companies may boycott Israel to prevent further harassment from the BDS movement, to curry favor with Arab states, or out of mere anti-Semitism. Unless the company or institution explains its actions, those actions have no message. That is why refusals to do business are not speech. . . .
More to the point, the current wave of state anti-boycott measures do not criminalize or prohibit any conduct, let alone speech. The First Amendment allows states to place conditions on those companies that want to do business with them. The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that conditioning government money on compliance with anti-discrimination policies does not violate the First Amendment.
Read more on New York Daily News: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/eugene-kontorovich-boycotting-israel-isn-free-speech-article-1.2669349