Reply #22: Conyers blogs [View All]

[MelissaB]

about Civil Rights Under the Bush Administration -- The Unmet Promise, the Raw Story interview, and much more. Here is what he said about freedom of speech.

3/9/2005 4:30 pm

Freedom of Speech in the Blogosphere

The basis of our government being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate for a moment to prefer the latter.

Thomas Jefferson was privileged to observe the beginnings of American print media; in our lifetimes, we have witnessed the birth of electronic journalism. In modern parlance, then, it is our obligation to ask whether we should have government regulation without the alternative media, or the alternative media without government regulation. I believe a healthy balance can be achieved but, given the choice, I like to think that I would side with President Jefferson and choose public opinion over outright censorship.

The fight to extend the full implications of the First Amendment to the electronic media is not going to be easy. This week, two legal proceedings threaten to stunt the growth of blogs as a legitimate source of public information.

The first involves the Federal Election Commission and campaign finance reform. In 2002, the FEC issued a blanket exemption of the Internet from the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act; in 2004, a U.S. district court overturned that exemption. The judge cited Americans’ increasing reliance on the World Wide Web for political information. This week, I was advised that the FEC is about to begin a rulemaking process to determine how McCain-Feingold will apply to the Internet.

The second issue compounds the first. The New York Times reports that, sometime this week, a Santa Clara County judge will rule on whether bloggers and online publishers can be considered journalists. Apple Computer Inc. has filed suit against three websites, demanding that the sites reveal the sources used to report inside information about unreleased Apple products. Attorneys defending the sites have argued that the First Amendment ought to apply to e-journalists–like any traditional reporter, a blogger should not ever have to compromise his sources.

First Amendment law must be ushered into the twenty-first century. The alternative media must be afforded the same protections we extend to the mainstream press I have written the FEC to express these sentiments, and I am encouraged by the dozen House colleagues who are adding their signatures to the letter. Unless a website receives funding from a candidate or political party, a blogger ought to be free to post unrestricted cultural and political discourse without being subject to invasive government regulations. And as long as Americans continue to turn to the alternative media for information, the law ought to protect the voices of the bloggers and online journalists who supply the commentary.

Link: http://www.johnconyers.com/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC={B166974A-C132-4EC3-9682-FE6E08C1A584}