Background Knowledge.

The First Amendment to the U. S. Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech." But the Supreme Court has never literally interpreted this guarantee as an absolute prohibition against all restrictions on individual speech and expression. Instead, the Supreme Court has identified seven kinds of expression that the government may regulate to varying degrees without running afoul of the Free Speech Clause: (1) core political speech; (2) speech that incites illegal or  subversive activity; (3) fighting words; (4)obscenity (5) symbolic speech; (6) commercial speech; and (7) student speech.