Free speech as guaranteed by our First Amendment can be tricky. It is too tempting for people to leap to protect speech with which they agree, while complaining that speech with which they disagree warrants punishment by law. The case of Michael Wood, of Clark County, Ohio, is a perfect example.

Back in 2016, Wood went to the Clark County Fair wearing a shirt that bore an obscenity directed at police. He was confronted by deputies and the fairgrounds’ executive director who asked him to leave. (He had already taken off the shirt.)

He DID leave. But while doing so, he repeatedly swore at the deputies. They arrested him.

Plenty of you may be thinking the deputies’ action was justified by the content of Wood’s speech. That is understandable.

But fortunately, a three-judge panel at the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati disagrees. The court understood Wood had a constitutionally protected right to speak against the officers (as he was obeying their direction to leave the fairgrounds).

ACLU of Ohio attorney David Carey said the decision “confirms that the First Amendment protects people’s right to criticize their government, including law enforcement, regardless of whether they go about it politely.”

We see plenty of politicians and celebrities these days complaining about having their freedom of speech taken away, despite having endured only the reaction to their speech, rather than legal prosecution for that speech. Law enforcement did, indeed, attempt to charge Wood with a crime for his words.

Good for the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals for understanding the need to protect his rights.