Your April 29 editorial “Fear of ideas” is on the money. You rightly emphasize the importance of the First Amendment. No other constitutionally guaranteed freedom in this country is under stronger attack right now.

Oddly, it seems that there are as many staunch defenders of it as there are persons trying to weaken or nullify it; and there are many who wish to manipulate it, seeking to make it apply to all sorts of activities and behaviors that are not even remotely “speech” at all. All this is because of its tremendous power.

What I think you should have emphasized more strongly is that the First Amendment really is the keystone, the linchpin to our American freedoms; once it is knocked down, all the others will fall in quick succession, like dominoes. This is the greatest danger facing America’s freedoms.

How ironic, then, that freedom of speech’s most ardent foes come not from the outside, but like a cancer, from within — liberals and the left. They are the Trojan horses who will enable those scenarios you describe in France and Canada to happen here. What we do not protect, we will lose, and in doing so will no longer deserve to keep.

MICHAEL L. MARTEL

Bristol