“The right to swing my fist ends where the other man’s nose begins” is an axiom not always, but often attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes. Whichever learned individual penned it, the quotation exemplifies the omnipresent and judicially confounding tension between “freedom of” and “freedom from” speech and expression.
In reviewing In re Welfare of A.J.B., the Minnesota Supreme Court invalidated Minnesota’s stalking-by-mail statute and narrowed the mail-harassment statute. Under the first statute, stalking-by-mail occurs when a person “repeatedly mails or delivers or causes the delivery by any means, including electronically, of letters, telegrams, messages, packages” and “the actor knows or has reason to know [this conduct] would cause the victim under the circumstances to feel frightened, threatened, oppressed, persecuted, or intimidated.” Pursuant to the second statute, mail harassment occurs when an actor “with the intent to abuse, disturb, or cause distress, repeatedly mails or delivers or causes the delivery by any means, including electronically, of letters, telegrams, or packages.”
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