Doj Continues To Waste Millions On Copa And Cipa Censorship Issues - Government Activity

Online Newsletter, May, 2001

From the sublime to the ridiculous.

When John Ashcroft became the new Attorney General under the Bush Administration, it was expected that a new U.S. Department of Justice era would begin on censorship issues. ... But apparently not so.

Instead, on April 16 the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a brief opposing a DOJ petition for certiorari submitted by the DOJ on February 26, which seeks Supreme Court review of the June 2000 decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third District Circuit in Philadelphia. In that opinion, a unanimous three-judge panel expressed its belief that the 1998 censorship law is fatally flawed.

The ACLU and EFF, is asking the U.S. Supreme Court not to disturb any lower court ruling that found the Child Online Protection Act (COPA) to be unconstitutional.

Ironically, the case formerly known as "Reno vs. ACLU" is now known as "Ashcroft vs. ACLU".

The COPA legislation was introduced in Congress after an earlier effort to regulate children's access to "indecent" material - the Communications Decency Act (CDA), which was held unconstitutional by a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court in 1997. To date, every federal judge to consider the legality of CDA or COPA has found that the Internet content regulation laws violate the First Amendment.

To further muddy the censorship waters, Congress passed and President Clinton signed the latest in the Internet censorship laws called CIPA (Child Internet Protection Act) as part of an omnibus budget bill prior to the close of the Clinton Administration. CIPA (also known as "CHIPA") has made U.S. libraries "hopping mad" because it will use a "carrot and stick" approach to libraries who do not conform by denying federal e-rate subsidies. (see 'Online Libraries and Microcomputers' February 2001 p.1 and April 2001 p.4)

The leading Internet censorship advocate in the U.S. Congress is Senator John McCain (R-AZ). The senator has repeatedly advocated and pressed for legislation which undermine or attempt to evade First Amendment rights.

Even though the "legal eagles" at the ACLU and other interest groups have said that the U.S. Supreme Court has assured First Amendment rights for the Internet on censorship issues - the plain fact is that the Supreme Court has -not- made that issue clear as an outright statement. -- Rather, what the Supreme Court needs to do is to issue that message clearly to the U.S. Congress and its members - once and for all.

In the meantime, the continuing DOJ and Congressional censorship issues are wasting not only millions of dollars in taxpayer money, but an equally enormous expenditure of private funds as well.

Will the madness continue? ... We hope not. [RSH]