| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"" |
| Date: |
08 Oct 2004 09:33:12 PM |
| Object: |
Losing Liberty |
http://www.detnews.com/2003/editorial/0311/16/a16-325952.htm
Sunday, November 16, 2003
Losing Liberty: First Amendment, An Editorial Page series
Press, Speech Freedoms Fall Victim to Terrorism War
A sustained attack on the First Amendment is eroding Americans' right
to know and right to speak freely
"Democracies die behind closed doors," wrote federal Judge Damon J.
Keith, in a now-famous decision opening the deportation hearing of a
suspected terrorist collaborator from Ann Arbor.
In writing his opinion a year ago, the Appeals Court judge noted that
the First Amendment to the Constitution, "through a free press,
protects the people's right to know that their government acts fairly,
lawfully and accurately. ..."
But keeping the doors open so Americans have an unimpeded view of the
workings of their government is a constant challenge.
At all levels, government officials are seeking to limit access to
public records and proceedings, and to remove their activities from
public scrutiny. They are also throwing a blanket over dissent,
quieting the voices of criticism and silencing the vigorous debate
that is essential to a true democracy.
Other forces are at work as well. In an effort to shield every
American from hurt feelings, speech codes on campuses and in the
workplace are greatly limiting what individuals can say to each other,
what symbols they can display and what opinions they can voice.
"The First Amendment exists precisely to protect the most offensive
and controversial speech from government suppression," says American
Civil Liberties Union Executive Director Anthony Romero. "The best way
to counter obnoxious speech is with more speech. Persuasion, not
coercion, is the solution."
Free Speech
If persuasion, as Romero says, is a better course than coercion, it
cannot take place in silence or in an environment where every word
must be weighed before it is spoken.
The threats to free speech include:
* Limits on protest. A few voices speaking against the many have
always been the impetus for change in this country. It's what ended
slavery, overturned segregation and Jim Crow laws in the South, and
stopped the Vietnam War. But the right to protest is being limited
throughout the country.
In New York City, a police department policy forbids peaceful
leafletting and picketing in front of public schools. In Miami,
protesters at the upcoming trade talks will be banned from using
certain signs and other props, and from wearing gas masks.
And the Secret Service restricts protesters at presidential visits to
Michigan and other places to specified zones far from the main event.
Shutting out unpopular viewpoints cheats citizens of their right to
weigh opinions from all sides of an issue before deciding the truth.
Writes Judge Keith: "The Framers of the First Amendment 'did not trust
any government to separate the true from the false for us.' "
* Patriot Act. A variety of organizations from librarians to
publishers to civil liberties groups are suing the government on First
Amendment grounds, charging that the unlimited ability it grants the
government to monitor the reading material and political activities of
its citizens has had a chilling effect on the expression of contrary
opinions.
"Section 215 of the Patriot Act provides the government with an
unchecked and unprecedented power to obtain materials protected by the
First Amendment whenever the government states that the materials are
sought 'to protect against international terrorism,'" lawyers for the
Muslim Community Association of Ann Arbor wrote in a brief supporting
an American Civil Liberties Union free speech challenge of the Patriot
Act. The suit was filed in Detroit Federal Court in July.
* Speech codes. Colleges first began imposing speech codes on their
students and faculty in the late 1980s. The goal was to stamp out hate
speech that "creates an intimidating, hostile or demeaning environment
for educational pursuits" -- to quote the code of the University of
Michigan, among the first to draft one.
The codes aren't just for show. They are used widely and frequently to
stifle views that are outside the academic mainstream. A California
Polytechnic State University student recently was punished for posting
fliers promoting a speech by a black conservative whom some black
students found offensive.
The codes work to create a more hostile environment, not one that is
less so, because they inhibit the open exchange of ideas and prevent
students from working out their differences through honest debate.
Free Press
A growing and unchecked government secrecy has limited public access
to information that used to be routinely available.
The Patriot Act and other measures are used to shield routine
information in the name of national security.
And the public -- with the image of New York City's World Trade Center
seared in its mind -- has tolerated the intrusion on its most basic
right -- the right to know.
The Patriot Act and other government measures have shut down access to
information to both the public and the press.
"The irony is that the Founding Fathers instituted a free press as a
check on their own power," says Ken Paulson, executive director of the
First Amendment Center in Nashville, Tenn. "Thomas Jefferson believed
there needed to be a third party to make sure that government adhered
to its ideals."
Secrecy thrown up in the name of national security is also a perfect
screen to hide government mistakes and even routine information.
The Bush administration has reversed the idea that government
information is public unless shown otherwise. The label -- "Sensitive
but Unclassified" -- allows public officials to conceal a broad range
of information on public utilities and scientific research, and any
subject that can be construed as potentially useful to a terrorist.
The problem is that such information is the same stuff that voters use
to make informed judgments on their elected officials.
"The way a democracy works, the public gets information, usually from
the media," says Lucy Dalglish, executive director The Reporters
Committee for Freedom of the Press.
"And they use it to make decisions at the ballot box. If they can't
get the information, they can't make informed choices about who
they're going to elect or how we're going to live together as a
society."
Like some of its incarnations or not, the American press is set up in
the Constitution as a way to guarantee the flow of information to the
public.
An open society is a noisy place. And it is fueled by the unfettered
access to information, so citizens can separate for themselves the
true from the false.
Freedom rests on a solid foundation of free speech and a free press.
--
Contempt of Congress meter reading-offscale.
Vote for Bush. Why vote for the lesser of two evils?
No matter the candidates the superstition industry wins.
'Jesus' is a sock-puppet Christians utilize to add 'authority' to
whatever action they intend on taking. -Stoney
.
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