Fox News contributor Jonathan Turley previews his book on the threats to free speech on 'Special Report.'

As the nation heads into the July 4th holiday, we have rarely been more divided as a people. Ironically, we are still debating the core values that define us, particularly the right to free speech. Indeed, "debate" hardly captures the rising anger and animosity from campuses to Congress. That is also nothing new.

While I have called this "an age of rage," it is not our first. The United States was born in rage.

Roughly 250 years ago, a group calling itself the Sons of Liberty boarded three ships and dumped almost 100,000 pounds of English tea into the Boston harbor. The "Boston Tea Party" is still celebrated as an act of defiance that helped spark the American Revolution.

A University of Southern California protester confronts a university public safety officer at the campus Alumni Park during an anti-Israel occupation on April 24, 2024, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel)

It was also an act of rage, a key moment that is the focus of my book out this week, "The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage."

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As a nation, we have gone through almost cyclic periods of unhinged rage, including periods of what I call "state rage." The first victim has always been free speech, including in our current age of rage. Indeed, this is arguably the most dangerous anti-free speech period in our history.

"The Indispensable Right" is a reference........

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