California lawmakers gave final approval Monday (Aug. 22) to legislation that would restrict when prosecutors can cite rap lyrics as evidence, Billboard reports. The first-of-its-kind legislation is considered a big victory in the ongoing fight by activists to end the practice of rap lyrics being used in court as evidence of criminal wrongdoing.
The state Assembly re-voted Monday in favor of a bill it had already passed months earlier, and now it's headed to Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is expected to sign it into law. The new law would essentially ban lyrics from the courtroom unless prosecutors show how they're directly relevant to the facts of the case and won't "inject racial bias into the proceedings."
California will be the first state to limit when rap can enter a courtroom, though a similar bill was introduced in New York earlier this year, but ultimately stalled.
On the federal level, the Restoring Artistic Protection Act (RAP Act), which seeks to protect artists from the use of their lyrics being used against them as evidence in criminal and civil proceedings, was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives, last month. That came on the heels of the ongoing high-profile case of Atlanta rappers Young Thug and Gunna, who were both arrested on RICO charges back in May. Their lyrics were a key component of the charges filed against them.
“Freddy Mercury did not confess to having ‘just killed a man’ by putting ‘a gun against his head’ and ‘’pulling the trigger. Bob Marley did not confess to having shot a sheriff. And Johnny Cash did not confess to shooting ‘a man in Reno, just to watch him die'," a release announcing the proposed legislation said, referencing the 2021 case Bey-Cousin v. Powell.
The use of rap lyrics in court has been an ongoing issue that started long before Young Thug's case, spanning back to the early 90s — Mac “The Camouflage Assassin” Phipps, Boosie Badazz, Mac Dre, Mayhem Mal — are all among the rappers who've had their lyrics used in court.
“Prosecutors, judges, and juries have decided that rap lyrics are autobiographical, they're like diaries,” Erik Nielson, co-author ofRap Lyrics on Trial told Rock The Bells earlier this year. “No other fictional artform is treated that way. And there are plenty of other genres that are replete with violence, whether it's gangster movies, novels, hardcore punk, or horror. It’s not hard for us to understand that these are fictionalized. What you see with rap music is that it is isolated because it's a combination of people believing that rap is real, or young Black men, who are the primary producers of it, are incapable of creative thought. Unfortunately, it maps to stereotypes that many people still have about young Black and Hispanic men.”
