PIML 96061302 / Forwarded to Patriot Information Mailing List: [Liberty on the net -- until the next time.] PIML ================================================================== Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 12:28:47 -0400 From: "Peter J. Celano" Organization: SILENCE IS DEATH! http://ic.net/~celano Subject: L&J: We won! Reply-To: liberty-and-justice@pobox.com FEDERAL COURT HANDS DOWN IT'S DECISION The Federal court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania has handed down it's decision today with a strong support for free speech on the internet. The court recognized the net for the vibrant, free-wheeling world-wide conversation that it is and upheld netizens rights to communicate and spread their words with the highest protection from government interference. Judge Dalzell wrote: Cutting through the acronyms and argot that littered the hearing testimony, the Internet may fairly be regarded as a never-ending worldwide conversation. The Government may not, through the CDA, interrupt that conversation. As the most participatory form of mass speech yet developed, the Internet deserves the highest protection from governmental intrusion. True it is that many find some of the speech on the Internet to be offensive, and amid the din of cyberspace many hear discordant voices that they regard as indecent. The absence of governmental regulation of Internet content has unquestionably produced a kind of chaos, but as one of plaintiffs' experts put it with such resonance at the hearing: What achieved success was the very chaos that the Internet is. The strength of the Internet is that chaos. Just as the strength of the Internet is chaos, so the strength of our liberty depends upon the chaos and cacophony of the unfettered speech the First Amendment protects. For these reasons, I without hesitation hold that the CDA is unconstitutional on its face. To read more wonderful words, you can access the full text of the opinion from our web site. Enjoy! -Michele Member of Families Against Internet Censorship: www.rmii.com/~fagin/faic, email faic@rmii.com =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Unsub info - send to majordomo@pobox.com with "unsubscribe liberty-and-justice" in the body (not the subj) of the msg. Listowner: Mike Goldman ================================================================== Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 15:17:17 -0400 From: freematt@coil.com (Matthew Gaylor) Subject: Excerpts from ACLU v. Reno decision Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 10:53:30 -0700 From: Rich Burroughs Subject: Excerpts from ACLU v. Reno decision Wooohoo! :) Rich ============ A preliminary injunction in the ACLU v RENO case was announced this morning! The judges ruled 3-0. The next step is probably an appeal to the Supreme Court. More info and the full text of the decision are available at: http://www.cdt.org/ciec It looks like these judges have reached a very good understanding of how the Net works, and the issues involved. The decision is very interesting, and here are some things that caught my eye during my first read: >From the panel's Finding's of Fact (80-81): "Once one has entered cyberspace, one may engage in the dialogue that occurs there. In the argot of the medium, the receiver can and does become the content provider, and vice-versa. The Internet is therefore a unique and wholly new medium of worldwide human communication." Judge Dalzell: "Just as the strength of the Internet is chaos, so the strength of our liberty depends upon the chaos and cacophony of the unfettered speech the First Amendment protects." "It is no exaggeration to conclude that the Internet has achieved, and continues to achieve, the most participatory marketplace of mass speech that this country -- and indeed the world -- has yet seen.... Indeed, the Government's asserted 'failure' of the Internet rests on the implicit premise that too much speech occurs in that medium, and that speech there is too available to the participants. This is exactly the benefit of Internet communication, however. The Government, therefore, implicitly asks this court to limit both the amount of speech on the Internet and the availability of that speech. This argument is profoundly repugnant to First Amendment principles." "Some of the dialogue on the Internet surely tests the limits of conventional discourse. Speech on the Internet can be unfiltered, unpolished, and unconventional, even emotionally charged, sexually explicit, and vulgar -- in a word, 'indecent' in many communities. But we should expect such speech to occur in a medium in which citizens from all walks of life have a voice. We should also protect the autonomy that such a medium confers to ordinary people as well as media magnates." "Moreover, the CDA will almost certainly fail to accomplish the Government's interest in shielding children from pornography on the Internet. Nearly half of Internet communications originate outside the United States, and some percentage of that figure represents pornography. Pornography from, say, Amsterdam will be no less appealing to a child on the Internet than pornography from New York City, and residents of Amsterdam have little incentive to comply with the CDA." "The diversity of the content will necessarily diminish as a result [of the CDA]. The economic costs associated with compliance with the Act will drive from the Internet speakers whose content falls within the zone of possible prosecution. Many Web sites, newsgroups, and chat rooms will shut down, since users cannot discern the age of other participants. In this respect, the Internet would ultimately come to mirror broadcasting and print, with messages tailored to a mainstream society from speakers who could be sure that their message was likely decent in every community in the country." Judge Slovitner: "Subjecting speakers to criminal penalties for speech that is constitutionally protected in itself raises the spectre of irreparable harm. Even if a court were unwilling to draw that conclusion from the language of the statute itself, plaintiffs have introduced ample evidence that the challenged provisions, if not enjoined, will have a chilling effect on their free expression." "Even if a broad search will, on occasion, retrieve unwanted materials, the user virtually always receives some warning of its content, significantly reducing the element of surprise or 'assault' involved in broadcasting. Therefore, it is highly unlikely that a very young child will be randomly 'surfing' the Web and come across 'indecent' or 'patently offensive' material." "The Supreme Court has held that 'minors are entitled to a significant measure of First Amendment protection, and only in relatively narrow and well-defined circumstances may government bar public dissemination of protected materials to them.' Erznoznik v. City of Jacksonville, 422 U.S. 205, 212-213 (1975)(citations omitted)." "But the bottom line is that the First Amendment should not be interpreted to require us to entrust the protection it affords to the judgment of prosecutors. Prosecutors come and go. Even federal judges are limited to life tenure. The First Amendment remains to give protection to future generations as well. I have no hesitancy in concluding that it is likely that plaintiffs will prevail on the merits of their argument that the challenged provisions of the CDA are facially invalid under both the First and Fifth Amendments." Judge Buckwalter: "I continue to believe that the word 'indecent' is unconstitutionally vague, and I find that the terms 'in context' and 'patently offensive' also are so vague as to violate the First and Fifth Amendments." "The fundamental constitutional principle that concerns me is one of simple fairness, and that is absent in the CDA. The Government initially argues that "indecent" in this statute is the same as "patently offensive." I do not agree that a facial reading of this statute supports that conclusion. The CDA does not define the term "indecent," and the FCC has not promulgated regulations defining indecency in the medium of cyberspace." "Contrary to the Government's suggestion, Pacifica does not answer the question of whether the terms pass constitutional muster in the present case. In Pacifica, the Court did not consider a vagueness challenge to the term "indecent," but considered only whether the Government had the authority to regulate the particular broadcast at issue -- George Carlin's Monologue entitled "Filthy Words." In finding in the affirmative, the Court emphasized that its narrow holding applied only to broadcasting, which is 'uniquely accessible to children, even those too young to read.' 438 U.S. at 749. Thus, while the Court sanctioned the FCC's time restrictions on a radio program that repeatedly used vulgar language, the Supreme Court did not hold that use of the term 'indecent' in a statute applied to other media, particularly a criminal statute, would be on safe constitutional ground." ======== Rich ______________________________________________________________________ Rich Burroughs richieb@teleport.com http://www.teleport.com/~richieb See my Blue Ribbon Page at http://www.teleport.com/~richieb/blueribbon New EF zine "cause for alarm" - http://www.teleport.com/~richieb/cause **************************************************************************** Subscribe to Freematt's Alerts: Pro-Individual Rights Issues Send a blank message to: freematt@coil.com with the words subscribe FA on the subject line. List is private and moderated (7-30 messages per week) Matthew Gaylor,1933 E. Dublin-Granville Rd.,#176, Columbus, OH 43229 **************************************************************************** ================================================================== Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 13:53:15 -0400 From: Terry McIntyre Subject: L&J: Oathbreakers! Reply-To: liberty-and-justice@pobox.com Senator Bob Dole, like all other congresspeople, and the President, swore an oath to uphold the Constitution. Tens of thousands of people on the internet sent e-mail, letters, telegraphs, and every other form of speech to Congress and the President, clearly and elequently informing them that the so-called "Communications Decency Act" was not only bad law, but violated the Constitution. Yet most of Congress, preferring the sensational tales told by Marty Rimm to the sober voices of their constituents, ignored their oaths, and voted to violate our rights, even though these rights are acknowledged in the employment contract of the President and of Congress - the Constitution. Today, three justices in Philadelphia called them on it. Judge Dalzell wrote: "As the most participatory form of mass speech yet developed, the Internet deserves the highest protection from governmental intrusion." "I without hesitation hold that the CDA is unconstitutional on its face." As for me, I name Senator Bob Dole and President Bill Clinton, and all others who supported the CDA, as oathbreakers. They failed in their sworn duty to uphold our rights. Clinton and Dole and their companions may not understand the meaning of the word "no", as in "Congress shall make NO law ... abridging the freedom of speech", but I do. And they'll understand what we mean when they are told "NO" at the voting booths. If our Liberty is worth anything, it is certainly worth voting for! Terrence McIntyre, Chair Allegheny County Chapter, Libertarian Party of Pennsylvania RD 3 Box 237 Waynesburg, PA 15370 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Unsub info - send to majordomo@pobox.com with "unsubscribe liberty-and-justice" in the body (not the subj) of the msg. 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