Carlin family tabs area group for donation

From staff reports
Published: June 28, 2008

Curmudgeonly comedian George Carlin, who died of heart failure Sunday at age 71, would no doubt approve of the two organizations his family chose to receive donations in his name.

One represents something he fought for for much of his life; the other fights what killed him.

The American Heart Association is one. Charlottesville’s Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression is the other.

The center touts what was near and dear to the revered contrarian comic — free speech. And the center will join the fray against the Federal Communications Commission in an upcoming U.S. Supreme Court case forever tied to Carlin’s routine, Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television.

Still, Josh Wheeler, the center’s associate director, was surprised Wednesday when he got a phone call from Carlin’s daughter, Kelly Carlin McCall. Her father performed in Charlottesville in 1997 and 2006, but Wheeler knows of no ties between Carlin and the center.

Carlin’s daughter told Wheeler that “because he was such a believer of the First Amendment” the family wanted an organization that fights for that right to receive donations in his name.

In her search, she Googled First Amendment organizations and found the Charlottesville center, Wheeler said. It didn’t hurt that she is a big Thomas Jefferson fan. It also helped that the center’s Web site had posted George Carlin stories and links, including one to his Seven Words routine. “That was sort of fate, to her,” Wheeler said.

But what ultimately sold her on the center was its mission statement, that it promotes “free expression in all its forms,” Wheeler said she told him.

“It was a very nice phone call. I learned a lot of nice things about her father,” he said. “It was nice hearing it from a daughter about her father.”

Being chosen by Carlin’s family is “very flattering” and “a real honor” for the center, he said. Wheeler said Carlin’s Seven Words routine is still important.

The skit was played on a New York City radio station in 1973. After a father complained, the FCC sanctioned the station, which the Supreme Court later upheld, ruling that the routine was indecent but not obscene.

“That case and routine is over 30 years old and yet that routine and case is still relevant today,” Wheeler said.

The Supreme Court will hear the case tied to Carlin in the next term, he said, noting that while the center is not directly involved, it will file a friend-of-the-court brief.

He said the case focuses on the FCC’s “more restrictive” policy regarding the use of “fleeting expletives,” regardless of context.

“And that is a radical departure” from how the FCC handled such words in the past, Wheeler said.

The comedian will be “front and center next year” during the free-speech battle, he said. “George Carlin will be alive and well.”