FIRST, LET'S BE CLEAR about this much: Cross-burning is among this country's most repugnant cultural anachronisms, a primordial method of expression embraced only by knuckle-draggers and others of feeble mind.

And cross-burning has an undeniable historical link with this nation's violently racist past. It evokes memories of lynchings and other horrible racial injustices.

But because cross-burning is always the articulation of a set of ideas and not always tantamount to a threat of violence, it shouldn't be defined as illegal behavior on its face.

The First Amendment to our Constitution guarantees every American the right to express his or her most hateful ideas, and only bars that expression where it threatens or intimidates.

That's why the Supreme Court has previously struck down blanket laws against cross-burning, and why it ought to similarly reject arguments being made on behalf of Virginia and Pennsylvania laws that were used to punish racists who put flame to wood as a display of their hatred.

The laws in those states overreach to the point of punishing ideas, rather than regulating behavior. And that's an important distinction to make. No one's saying bigots ought to be able to burn crosses on other people's lawns or use their hateful symbol as an advance warning of violence.

But there already are laws against those things. It's arson, or destruction of property, or trespassing, or assault.

The problem with outright bans on cross-burning, no matter how cleverly they are crafted, is that in addition to illegal behavior, they target protected, though abhorrent, ideas. For example, if people want to burn a cross out in the woods somewhere as a display of their dislike of blacks or other racial minorities, it ought to be permissible. It's not directed at anyone in particular. It's not a prelude to violence. It's an idea they are asserting.

The difference being drawn here is not materially different from the one articulated in terms of other kinds of offensive speech. Rap stars, for instance, can threaten police all they want on their albums, because that's protected expression. But if they were to direct similar sentiments toward a specific officer, their expression becomes a threat, and transcends legality.

Similarly, the law prohibits ethnic, religious or gender-based intimidation in the workplace. But if you want to sit around your house and curse women or blacks or Jews or anyone else, that's your right. It's protected speech when you do it alone; it's actionable behavior when you direct it toward someone else.

During oral arguments at the Supreme Court this week, several justices signified their concern that cross-burning has become so integrally linked to racial violence that it has lost its protected expressive value. Some of the justices said 100 years of history - lynchings and other racial violence - sets cross-burning apart from other forms of protected speech. Those are important, well-intended sentiments - but they seem more firmly grounded in emotion than in the law or precedent.

Cross-burning stinks, and its continued popularity is a pockmark on the country's record of racial progress. But if we don't protect this most offensive type of expression, no brand of speech is ultimately safe.